TORONTO, October 20, 2011 – Results from the annual Best Employers in Canada study, conducted by Aon Hewitt, the global human resources consulting and outsourcing solutions business of Aon Corporation (NYSE: AON), identify those organizations with the highest employee engagement. At the same time, the data provides insight into the types of workers that are least engaged and thus more likely to leave to join competitors and other organizations. The list of 2012’s 50 Best Employers (attached) appears in the October 31 issue of Maclean’s magazine, available on newsstands today, and the November 3 edition of La Presse.

Two hundred and sixty-one Canadian employers took part in the 2012 Best Employers studies. Organizations were selected as Best Employers primarily on the basis of survey responses from more than 112,000 Canadian employees to gauge their level of engagement.
According to Aon Hewitt’s definition, employees are engaged when they “say, stay and strive”: they speak positively about the organization to others, are committed to remaining with their current employer, and are motivated by their organizations’ leaders, managers, culture and values to go “above and beyond” to contribute to business success. The average engagement score for the 50 Best Employer organizations was 78 per cent; the average for other participants was 58 per cent.

“Those organizations ranked highest on the list have employee engagement of close to 90 per cent,” said Neil Crawford, Aon Hewitt’s leader of the Best Employers in Canada study. “That’s an impressive accomplishment, particularly now when many parts of the Canadian economy are showing signs of recovery and employee attraction and retention is becoming more challenging.”

Charting Flight Risks
Participants in the Best Employers study are able use the engagement scores they receive to identify whether any segment of their workforce is a potential retention risk – and then take action. However, when the study data is considered in the aggregate, certain trends emerge regarding the most and least engaged employees, using various demographic factors.

Years of service: Employees with less than one year of service have the highest average engagement score (75 per cent), but that number drops dramatically – to 65 per cent – in the second year. It then dips further to 59 per cent between two to five years of service, before gradually starting to rise. This trend holds true for even the 50 Best Employers, but in their case, engagement is higher in the first year of service, and the decline through the second to fifth years of service is more modest  “This information clearly shows that once the honeymoon is over, organizations that don’t focus on engagement run the risk of losing experienced, trained staff along with the significant financial investment that accompanies the hiring and onboarding of new employees,” said Todd Mathers, a principal with Aon Hewitt in Toronto.

Generation: Generally speaking, engagement levels increase with age. The youngest employees are most likely to consider alternate job opportunities. However, Best Employers are better at engaging younger (Millennial) employees and consequently are more successful in retaining them.

Job role: Perhaps not surprisingly, employees in executive roles are more engaged than those in more junior positions. The exception is administrative/clerical support workers, who may be the least senior, but are more engaged than front-line employees or those in professional/specialist/technician roles. Best Employers distinguish themselves from other organizations by creating consistently high levels of engagement across all roles.

Company size: The number of employees in an organization seems to have little impact on engagement levels. Organizations with 10,000 or more employees have an average engagement level of 67 per cent, while those with 200 or fewer workers score 66 per cent, on average,

“We also see that average engagement is higher in certain industries,” said Mathers. “Employee engagement is high at construction and engineering firms, as well as at pharmaceutical companies and banks. IT services and the retail industry have lower engagement on average, although there are companies within these segments that have highly engaged workforces.”

In-depth Research
The Best Employers in Canada study, now in its 13th year, provides an opportunity to not only measure employee engagement, but to conduct special research. “We take advantage of the opportunity to ask the opinion of over 100,000 employees each year to test theories on what impacts and drives employee engagement,” stated Crawford. “One area that our research has shown is critical to high engagement is manager effectiveness – how people are coached and motivated by their direct supervisor. We gathered feedback from employees who believe they have effective managers and those who don’t, and also asked managers what support, coaching and resources they receive to manage people effectively.”

In addition, the Best Employers study looked at human capital risk this year, surveying leaders on how vulnerable they were to various people risks (attraction, retention, leadership shortage, etc.), and what their organization was doing to mitigate these risks. Aon Hewitt will release the results of both the manager effectiveness and human capital risk research within the next month. 

To learn more about the Best Employers studies and register online to participate, please visit the Best Employers Web site at www.hewitt.com/bestemployerscanada.

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About Aon Hewitt
Aon Hewitt is the global leader in human resource consulting and outsourcing solutions.  The company partners with organizations to solve their most complex benefits, talent and related financial challenges, and improve business performance.  Aon Hewitt designs, implements, communicates and administers a wide range of human capital, retirement, investment management, health care, compensation and talent management strategies.  With more than 29,000 professionals in 90 countries, Aon Hewitt makes the world a better place to work for clients and their employees.  For more information on Aon Hewitt, please visit www.aonhewitt.com.

About Aon
Aon Corporation (NYSE: AON) is the leading global provider of risk management services, insurance and reinsurance brokerage, and human resources solutions and outsourcing. Through its more than 59,000 colleagues worldwide, Aon unites to deliver distinctive client value via innovative and effective risk management and workforce productivity solutions. Aon's industry-leading global resources and technical expertise are delivered locally in over 120 countries. Named the world's best broker by Euromoney magazine's 2008, 2009 and 2010 Insurance Survey, Aon also ranked highest on Business Insurance's listing of the world's insurance brokers based on commercial retail, wholesale, reinsurance and personal lines brokerage revenues in 2008 and 2009. A.M. Best deemed Aon the number one insurance broker based on revenues in 2007, 2008 and 2009, and Aon was voted best insurance intermediary 2007-2010, best reinsurance intermediary 2006-2010, best captives manager 2009-2010, and best employee benefits consulting firm 2007-2009 by the readers of Business Insurance. Visit http://www.aon.com for more information on Aon and http://www.aon.com/manchesterunited to learn about Aon's global partnership and shirt sponsorship with Manchester United.

Aon Hewitt’s 2012 List of the Best Employers in Canada

Media Contact: 
Marcia McDougall
416-227-5713
marcia.mcdougall@aonhewitt.com