Florin Grama, Director Euromaster Business Services, Bucharest
- Tell us a few words about your company, services provided and type of roles you a
EBS (Euromaster Business Services) is the shared services center of Euromaster Group. It was opened in 2015. Today we provide to the group services for finance and accounting (AP, AR, GL, Treasury, Credit Management), controlling, business intelligence, supply chain, data management, internal control, and also IT & SAP support for all Euromaster entities. EBS is in the driving seat of the digitalization and optimization of the business back-office processes for Euromaster Group.
- What makes your company a great place to work for?
Our team. Because services are being defined, implemented, optimized by the people. Because our colleagues are those supporting each other so that we achieve our goals. Because people create the work climate, they generate trust, they offer respect, honesty and empathy, they have the expertise or are willing to learn and grow for both their and the company’s success. No matter if they are managers or individual contributors, they all contribute to the final results.
- Give us more details about the company’s culture and working vibe/atmosphere.
This year we implemented an extensive program on the topic of leadership and organizational culture. In order to be able to successfully implement a strategy, each company should take a look at its organizational culture. How we do things in the organization each day will determine the results of the company. We have clarified the mission, the vision and the strategic directions of our shared services centre, we identified what makes us proud to work in our organization, what are desired behaviors that we need to foster and what are the toxic ones, which we must eliminate. It wasn’t easy and we know that this is just the beginning of the process of building a healthy culture. At this moment all departments organize workshops in order to clarify, align and commit to working together towards the desired culture. Luckily, the starting point of this process is quite satisfying, as we already have a work environment based on trust, respect, support and willingness to go the extra mile.
- Do you ensure career paths to your employees?
There are frameworks and programs in our organization that help and provide guidance to the management team and to all members of the organization to build career paths. But we also know that there are stages in one’s development that change the plans or redefine the job aspirations. Flexibility is very important to us, because this brings value for our colleagues’ careers as well. We have 121 frequent feedbacks, job aspirations defined by the employees and documented by the managers, but in the end each individual is its own career manager, because each person has to define his/her interests, aspirations and objectives. The belief that companies are responsible for career development is only partially true. Indeed, companies must provide the framework/programs for people’s growth and to offer guidance in the process. But each individual is accountable for defining their needs.
- What trainings do you offer?
People growth is part of our strategic plan, so training plays a big role in our organization. Before the pandemic, in-class training with customized content was our favorite approach when addressing the needs of our employees. After a few months from the lockdown, we relaunched training using formats suitable to the new reality, meaning online instructor-led training, while keeping a big focus on the content, duration. Technical training proved to be very suitable for online delivery, but soft skills training needs careful approach and not all topics can be addressed in a video call.
This year we have also launched a game-based elearning training platform, giving to our colleagues the possibility to plan their courses according to their schedule while guiding them through the content so that we make sure we gain or improve key skills needed within our organization.
We offer to our employees all the courses required to their professional development, either we are talking about soft or hard skills.
A key program that we have finished recently was addressed to our management team and aimed to develop the leadership skills that would help us to implement the strategic plan of our organization and to set up a healthy organizational culture. Of course, it was held in-class.
- You know how dynamic our industry is – so what is your strategy to keep your employees engaged, motivated and boost their creativity so they can innovate?
Indeed, innovation is a word that our colleagues hear very often these days. Communication is key for the engagement and involvement of our colleagues, because we need to give clarity over the strategy, to be transparent about why and how we do things, to get people’s commitment that we are in the same boat in implementing the strategy of the group. Once we are aligned, they have the freedom to come up with improvements, new better ways of doing things and achieve the objectives. Freedom allows people to grow, to take initiative, to reveal their potential, while also ensuring company’s performance. So this is why freedom is another important pillar in boosting engagement and creativity.
- We’re all unique, so how do you succeed in answering different needs that your employees might have?
First of all, we listen – we have pulse surveys, recurrent meetings with all employees, department meetings, 121 meetings, so that our colleagues can share their thoughts, ideas, and needs. Secondly, the management team has the responsibility to evaluate and address specific needs of the employees. We are being very flexible trying to fulfill these needs, as long as we treat everybody equally, we stick to our commitments and our values and we have the necessary resources.
- Tell us more about your diversity and inclusion strategy.
This year we’ve taken a closer look at how we do things in our organization, what are the behaviors that we want to foster and those that need to be changed, what are our values. Luckily, it looks that we are on the right track to support diversity and inclusion. We really invite all our employees to be part of the success of our organization, to speak their mind, to constructively challenge the way we do things in the company so that we can improve them constantly. Furthermore, we cultivate a culture of supporting each other both professionally and personally, at all levels of the organization. Diversity often means fresh perspectives and these are at the core of evolution and innovation.
- Our industry is well known for the employee’s benefits. Tell us more about the ones that you are offering (maybe something rare or unique).
We offer our employees a competitive package of benefits and we are in direct contact with them all the time so that we better understand their needs and wishes. On the other hand, we know for sure that payment and benefits are not the most important things that will keep an employee in the organization. Our culture, leadership skills and work environment are key to the satisfaction, motivation and engagement of our colleagues. We had people leaving the company for benefits and payment over the average of the market and they decided to come back in a few weeks. Of course we are not perfect either, but we listen and we aim to improve each day for and with our employees.
- What did your employees appreciate in your offices and how do you think the working (from the office) environment will change post pandemic? What are the new top features?
Since the lockdown, in March 2020, our colleagues have worked from home. The office was closed until June 2020. Reopening the office meant implementing a very strict safety protocol and ensuring all the necessary supplies. We are very proud today, after a year, about the way we handled the situation at that moment and during the entire pandemic period – no compromise on safety. Reopening the office meant that colleagues could come to the office if they wanted to. Some of them were glad to get a glimpse of the former normality, the majority remained to work from home. Those who came felt safe in the office and we are glad for that. Today we have the same way of working – the office is open for those wanting to come, but all employees can work entirely remote.
We had teleworking before the pandemic – colleagues could work from home 2 days per week. Of course, after the pandemic we will keep this benefit for our employees, but it is not decided at this moment the exact format. We know that the majority of our colleagues desire to work from home and we will try to be as flexible as possible, as long as we can reach our performance objectives and we have no other negative side effects. For sure this is and will remain one of our competitive advantages on the labor market.
- Some of the employees appreciate WFH and also the flexibility it comes with when choosing their location and program. Besides that, it’s a huge opportunity for companies to access new talent pools. Did your company consider working from anywhere? This includes anywhere in Romania or also abroad?
At this moment our policy is to work from home. At some point we might consider other locations as well, but there is not a clear plan in that direction.
- Do you intend to have specific benefits for the ones that choose one way of working or another?
We do not have an analysis about such scenarios, so it is too early to discuss this topic.
- Is there a channel/web page where people can learn more about your company and career opportunities?
Yes, as a matter of fact we have recently launched a dedicated website for our shared services center, ebs.euromaster.ro, where we have updated information about the positions available. There are also dedicated pages about EBS on Facebook, Instagram, Linkedin. Internally we use other dedicated tools to communicate about the positions and we are working on reshaping the career framework program.