Investing in human capital

HZPC keeps you growing. We can fulfil this pledge to the outside world if our employees make the difference. That is why we constantly invest in developing our people: in expertise, well-being and vitality. We create roles around our employees’ specific skills. They are given the freedom to take the initiative and take on responsibility, which we keep ‘low’ within the organisation.

Living up to our values

We have a collective vision: ‘We stimulate the development of responsible food for the global population’ This vision is what we stand for; it proclaims our right to exist as a company and how we want to associate with one another and our environment. Our employees identify with our mission and corporate values.

Our focus areas:

1 – Results and innovation
Innovation is a spearhead in operations. It helps us support the realisation of (long-term) operating results and the continuity of our company. It also requires people who are able to adapt their own contributions to match what we need as a company.

2 – Personal development and responsibility
At HZPC we focus on taking individual responsibility. This requires people who are able to make choices based on their own knowledge and insights. There is sufficient opportunity to take the initiative and responsibility within HZPC. There is a generous training and development budget.

3 – Employability
Long-term employability is central to our HR policy. This calls for people who are able to anticipate (future) changes throughout their career on a constant basis.

Sustainable employability

Since 2018, we have been working with the ‘Huis van werkvermogen’ (House of Workability). This method focuses on emphasising the factors that could impact on current and future employability. On the one hand, this concerns identifying individual strengths. These enable people to realise continued success within HZPC. On the other hand, it's about flagging-up reasons, if there are any, for a diminished ‘fit’ with HZPC’s working environment.

Sustainable employability is stimulated by:

Life-stages schemes (including schemes which make it possible to continue to work to an older age)
The recruitment of new colleagues with a view to the future (or: not just filling the job openings that are available, but getting an idea of the candidate's opportunities for advancement within HZPC)
Offering development opportunities aimed at current positions as well as possible future positions within HZPC.

Diversity

The HZPC team has an international spectrum. There are no fewer than 23 different nationalities employed in our company. The group of inter-cultural colleagues is also stable (compared to previous reporting) at 8%. This concerns colleagues who have completed professional training in a country other than the one in which they are working. Collaboration without borders is evident amongst all the different nationalities. This makes our company unique.

Collectively, they represent 392 FTE (on 31-12-2019). Their average age is 44.6. If we examine the diversity of our teams according to age, it is clear that there is a good (and balanced) spread across the various age categories.

Composition of the personnel base 2018/19

(subdivided per SBA – Strategic Business Area):

Split between male and female within the different locations:

Of all our employees, 83% have a permanent contract and 17% have a fixed term contract.

Training and development

One of the important spearheads in HR policy is the ‘Learning Organisation’ theme. As an organisation, we have embraced the concept of the learning organisation. A project team, made up from colleagues from various roles within the organisation, works with the Directors on further elaborating the concrete steps along the learning pathway that we are following.

We are investing in training and coaching (future) employees in various ways. One of the pillars in our learning range concerns the HZPC Academy. This is a digital learning environment which we set up in 2017. There are also various ‘in-house’ courses which are offered on an ongoing basis. For most people, this involves the learning route in combination with the digital learning environment from the HZPC Academy (blended learning). This includes, among other things, the programmes ‘HZPC career centre’ and ‘HZPC Personal growth programme’.

Young HZPC

Employees up to the age of 30 can take part in Young HZPC. Young HZPC aims to unite our younger colleagues and enable them to grow and develop. Young HZPC is growing too. Young HZPC is now made up of 50 international colleagues and organises various activities throughout the year (which are sometimes open to all colleagues too), such as the Directors lunch, knowledge sessions and an annual study trip.

Sick leave

Sickness absence has increased over the past four years compared to the years before that. In our last report (2017/2018), the sickness absence rate on 31/12/2018 was 3.8%. This increase has drawn our attention and has resulted in a structural discussion with the company doctor about closely monitoring developments in this area. We also offer coaching programmes when we spot mental health issues that could potentially lead to absence. It’s great to see that increases in the sickness absence level have not continued through the 2018-2019 reporting period. Sickness absence on 31/12/2019 had decreased to 3.2%. Absence frequency at 0.7 is relatively low. This indicates that a significant share of the absence rate is made up from just a few long-term sickness cases.