Jacques Whitford Group - Dartmouth, Nova Scotia
www.jacqueswhitford.com
A dynamic and innovative human resource (HR) strategy has made the Jacques Whitford Group what it is today Ñ an environmental, geotechnical and risk management consulting firm with 900 employees and 30 offices throughout Canada, the United States and around the world.
From the time it was established in Halifax in 1972, co-founder Hector Jacques had a vision: "It's the people in any organization who innovate. And you can't have innovative people if you have a 19th-century human resources policy."
From the start, the emphasis was on hiring the brightest and the best because of their vision and creativity, not because there were jobs to fill. "And then you empower them," Jacques says, "and let them do their job. You give them the tools to do their job, you support them and the ideas and concepts they come up with, and you let them make mistakes."
A critical element of the HR strategy has been training. The company sends people out on a regular basis to take courses and to attend conferences. It also has its own in-house training institute where newcomers undergo a rigorous program to learn the company culture.
In a firm where the average professional employee has eight years of post-secondary education, the emphasis is on "soft skills" such as communications. "We had a young chap out west, extremely bright but a little shy," says Jacques. "We said, 'We're going to support him, put him through a Dale Carnegie course to help him build his self-confidence.' Lifelong learning has never been more important than it is today."
Another vital element has been a reward system, which includes profit sharing and a chance to become a shareholder. "The reward system has to be designed to reward the behaviour that you're looking for," Jacques cautions. "This means rewarding people because they're innovative, not necessarily because they've stuck with the company for 30 years."
From its origins as a geotechnical-based engineering firm, Jacques Whitford is now an employee-owned, multidisciplinary engineering firm that has been a key player in developing the oil and gas industry in Atlantic Canada as well as internationally. In 1997, Hector Jacques won Ernst and Young 's "Entrepreneur of the Year" award for Atlantic Canada and in 2001, he was inducted into the Nova Scotia Business Hall of Fame. He has also received three honorary university degrees because of the firm's accomplishments.
Innovation is extremely important in the offshore and environmental industries where technology is changing rapidly. "If we look at the Jacques Whitford progression over the past 30 years," says Jacques, "50 per cent of what we're doing today we weren't doing five years ago." And growth is essential, if a company hopes to hang on to its dynamic and empowered workforce. "If someone is gifted, with a great deal of skill, they won't be content to be in a routine job. They'll need continual challenges."
It has never been more obvious than it is today, says Jacques, that innovation starts with an innovative human resources policy. The company's goal has always been to be the employer of choice in Atlantic Canada. "We want to say to all the winning lights out there, 'We are your safe harbour, where you should bring in your ship.'"
