EMPLOYEES

We believe that equality, inclusion and diversity are essential elements that must be incorporated into the culture and business strategy of any business. Globaltrans strives to be an equal opportunity employer and our philosophy is to treat everyone fairly and respectfully. Regardless of age, disability, ethnicity, country, gender, race, color, religion, or sexual orientation, we value and embrace our employees' individuality and respect them for their performance, talents, and contributions.

We seek to prevent any act of discrimination and provide our people with equal employment. This zero tolerance for discrimination is set out in the Group’s Diversity and Inclusion Policy, the breaches of which are grounds for disciplinary action.

Globaltrans’ commitment to diversity extends to all of our business activities including hiring, employee retention, promotions, pay and benefits, career development and training, working arrangements and appointments to the Board.

The Group has always sought to provide equal pay opportunities for both women and men. To increase the transparency of our diversity data this year we are publishing our first-ever gender pay gap1 figures. The gender pay gap relates to differences in average pay between men and women within an organisation; it does not compare the wages paid to men and women for doing identical or similar jobs (known as equal pay). In 2021 the average pay gap between men and women in our non-managerial workforce was –3% which indicates that female employees’ average hourly pay is higher than male employees. This reflects the fact that there are proportionally more men in our workforce in less-skilled roles.

We are committed to building a more diverse workforce and a more inclusive workplace where everyone feels accepted, respected and empowered. Historically, the freight rail transportation sector has been male dominated. By concentrating on attracting more women into the workforce, we are progressively and successfully addressing the gender imbalance within our Group.

As at year end 2021, women comprised 30% of our workforce. At board level, women comprised 13% of the Board of Directors (two Board members).

The second priority of how we manage diversity is the inclusion of employees with disabilities. There Group currently employs 27 individuals with disabilities whose daily contributions help the Group meet its business goals and achieve success.

Nothing can be achieved without our people. In order to demonstrate strong results and achievements, we have to keep our workforce engaged, enthusiastic about what they do and highly motivated. These are critical drivers of sustainable business success.

Globaltrans strives to offer the best employee experience. Our goal is to inspire and motivate our people and provide them with a safe, creative and collaborative workplace and culture. We are determined to stay closely in touch with our colleagues and respond to their needs. We can best serve our people by listening carefully, collaborating together and adapting. We help them monitor their performance and achievements through ongoing feedback.

The pandemic created a very different social environment for our people, which prompted us to reassess and strengthen our support for them. We arranged flexible working arrangements for our staff, ensured their well-being, provided learning opportunities, communicated frequently and shared feedback.

Globaltrans did not make any COVID-related redundancies and, most importantly, kept salaries at pre-COVID levels.

We are committed to maintaining a motivated and productive workforce that values being part of Globaltrans. To retain talent within the organisation, we must continually improve working conditions and offer attractive compensation and benefits as well as rewarding work and opportunities for learning and development. Our staff reward packages include health insurance, childcare support, extra holidays and other benefits. Eligible employees can participate in various incentive schemes operated by the Group.

In 2021 our overall staff turnover rate increased slightly to 16% (12% for men and 3% for women) (2020:14%). We still regard it as a low figure, but nevertheless, the Group will work in future to reduce the level of employee exits. The HR function of each subsidiary conducts exit interviews when colleagues leave to analyse the reasons for leaving and improve the loyalty of our employees.

Our culture is built around what we value: respect, mutual appreciation, transparency and collaboration. We believe that they contribute to sound business decisions, foster a trustworthy and supportive workplace, and help us achieve better outcomes in everything we do.

At Globaltrans, we listen to every employee’s voice. For us, it is a powerful way of helping our business grow and progress. That is why we prioritise, promote and practice open communication with our people.

All employees are encouraged to raise any issues and concerns and provide input and feedback to improve the business. Our communication channels enable everyone to learn more about our performance, major events and projects, and to connect with senior management. To understand our employees’ needs and improve their experience, we conduct various surveys and some Group subsidiaries have employee helplines.

To encourage a sense of community and promote better teamwork, we also regularly host sports, cultural and recreational events for our employees and their families.

During COVID-19, taking care of people became our everyday priority. We did our best to make our employees feel connected and engaged. The Group communicated regularly with staff via reports and updates, management calls, webinars, and formal and informal virtual meetings.

Health and safety are a fundamental part of our philosophy. We strongly believe that supporting the physical and mental health and well-being of our employees is the correct thing to do for us and our business. The Group has always been committed to maintaining high standards of occupational safety and to complying with all applicable health and safety regulations and legislation.

However, during the pandemic, safety took on a new meaning and became an entirely new level of concern. In 2021, Globaltrans continued to apply safety management and distancing measures to support our employees and suppliers. We provided our office-based staff with flexible working arrangements and the option to continue working remotely. For our on-site (repair depot) employees, we revised our work procedures to ensure their safety, implementing precautions that included workplace disinfection, shift rotations, social distancing, mask-wearing, and the use of temperature scans and hand sanitisers.

Our Code of Conduct and Human Rights Policy sets out our commitment to act in a socially responsible manner that protects our people, suppliers and partners, all of whom we expect to share that commitment. Globaltrans has health and safety procedures, practices and policies which are being continuously reviewed. We strive to ensure that all levels of the Group conform to the rules. Our Group companies are implementing the following policies:

• ​​​​​​​Fire-safety instructions; 
• Instruction for carrying out health and safety briefings; 
• Instruction on pre-medical first aid; 
• Occupational safety regulations; 
• Workplace safety guidance for PC users. 

In 2022, following the pandemic, in order to formalise our commitment to safety at the Group level and strengthen our workplace safety programme we introduced a Group Health and Safety Policy. We believe this will help us improve and promote our culture of zero harm and risk awareness among our people, thereby reducing the number of work-related incidents. While we have a positive occupational health and safety track record, as typically most of our employees work in a low risk environment, we remained focused on our ultimate target of zero incidents.

Safety is always a team effort. We encourage our employees to adopt good health and safety practices and to make the right decisions about their everyday wellbeing. As a responsible employer, we provide appropriate information and training opportunities to all employees to prevent future workplace incidents.

We conduct regular safety spot-checks at our operations to ensure that they continue to meet high standards. In 2021, due to the pandemic and the move to remote working, we reduced the number of workplace safety audits to 173 visits (2020: 341 visits). Instead, we focused on providing on-line training sessions on occupational health and safety, the numbers of which increased significantly across the Group.

We are glad to report that there were no work-related incidents or fatalities in 2021. Following our first-ever workforce fatality at one of our repair depots in 2020, the Group made every effort to prevent the recurrence of such tragic incidents. The Group immediately investigated the incident, took corrective measures and improved internal safety protocols. All employees underwent extensive training following the incident. We also enhanced our expertise in the area of health and safety by hiring specialists to help implement a continuous improvement plan for occupational safety management.

Our continued focus on safety and proactive measures allowed us to improve our overall safety performance in 2021 and achieve a zero Loss Time Injury Frequency Rate (LTIFR¹). In 2020, the LTIFR (per million hours worked) performance of the Group stood at 0.66.

In 2022, our approach to health and safety will continue to be proactive and preventative. We will continually reinforce employees’ risk awareness, increase internal audits and improve accountability.

^{1 LTIFR (Lost-Time Injury Frequency Rate) is the number of lost time injuries multiplied by 1,000,000, divided by the employee total hours worked in the reporting period.}