BITC benchmark shows companies reporting on engagement perform better

Leading British business charity, Business in the Community (BITC) has published the results of its first Workwell FTSE 100 benchmark, which scored the level of publicly available information provided by organisations across 25 employee engagement and wellbeing indicators.

While the average score for all the FTSE 100 organisations was 21 per cent, there was clear leadership from Barclays, British Land Company, BT, Johnson Matthey and RBS who achieved significantly higher scores.
Stephen Howard, BITC Chief Executive, said: “The Workwell benchmark represents a new chapter for CSR reporting and the low average scores are not unexpected at this first stage of development.”

The highest scoring Workwell indicators were Diversity and Inclusion (at 50% of total marks) and Health and Safety (at 44%), showing how compliance drives measurement and reporting. 

Manufacturing and Mining industry sectors scored highest in the Health and Safety reporting indicator, achieving 75% and 67% respectively and reflecting the importance of this area for their business. Lower scoring industry sectors tended to have diverse international workforces with fewer consistent metrics, maintains BITC.

The lowest scoring area was in the provision of Better Specialist Support – which includes provision for mental health support – where the average score was only nine per cent. This raises concerns, says BITC, about organisational resilience as employees face high levels of stress in the current economic climate and the associated costs continue to rise.