EXCLUSIVE: Motorway and A-road maintenance and operations organisation Highways England has launched a new employee engagement platform for its 5,650 staff.
The Extra Mile platform, provided by Xexec, was implemented on 1 April 2019 to offer employees access to more than 3,000 discounts and lifestyle services, as well as a dedicated reward and recognition site.
Available through a mobile-optimised online portal, Extra Mile was introduced in response to employee feedback gathered from the organisation’s annual engagement survey. This found that staff wanted a more comprehensive and easy to use system.
Furthermore, Highways England wished to introduce a platform that would improve employees’ understanding of the benefits package as well as support its transition from a civil service body to a government-owned organisation and its need to attract and retain talent as the business expands and grows.
The new platform replaces a previous system that administered discounts, recognition and other benefits across four separate schemes via different providers. This is now collated and delivered through the Extra Mile platform solely, making it simpler to access for the organisation’s diverse workforce, which includes engineers working remotely as well as office-based staff.
Highways England communicated the Extra Mile portal to employees using the staff intranet, emails, employee networks and a series of 18 national roadshows, conducted by the provider.
Lucy Mason, HR performance specialist at Highways England, said: “In 2015, we changed from being a civil service body to becoming a government-owned [organisation]. This gave us more freedom to think about what we can offer in terms of employee benefits.
“At the same time, we have been investing in our network across the country to meet increasing demand for our services and it’s becoming more important than ever to attract and retain the right people in what is an increasingly competitive market place. With this in mind, we needed to ensure that our benefits offering was fit for purpose and Xexec’s offering was the perfect fit for us.”