Situation: AstraZeneca, a leader in pharmaceutical, agrochemicals, and specialty products, wanted an employee reward solution that would maximize the potential of their 3000 full-time and part-time employees.
Challenge: The goal was to increase the employees' problem solving skills, educate them on cost reduction awareness, improve internal and external customer satisfaction and deploy best practices throughout the organization.
Solution: Working hand in hand with AstraZeneca to assess and analyze their client's needs, Maritz developed and implemented a team-based employee suggestion program designed to improve performance. The program was rolled out in two phases; phase one included headquarters and field sales personnel and phase two included manufacturing plant employees. To capture the employee interest and enthusiasm, the program was launched at AstraZeneca's annual all-employee, corporate meeting.
Employees were invited to enroll in the program and form self-selected, idea-generating teams, typically with seven members. Participating teams were responsible for researching, developing, valuing, and submitting cost saving and/or new revenue generating ideas to an evaluation team. Evaluation teams were made up of management-level employees responsible for reviewing the viability of each submitted idea and assigning an implementation timeline and budget for each approved idea. To encourage participation in the inventive program, teams received small rewards for submitting their first idea.
All approved ideas earned the submitting team employees recognition and reward points based on the approved value of the idea. The evaluation teams were rewarded for assessing the ideas and communicating results back to the submitting team within a set time frame.
Results: Over 1200 ideas were submitted during the 12-week program. Cost-savings resulted in an ROI of 4.1 to 1. The employee suggestion system led to the implementation of an ongoing, continuous improvement process.
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