The group has achieved full compliance with all aspects of the Employment Equity Act.
In compiling our original employment equity plan that ended in October 2005, Foschini first commissioned an employment equity audit by a South African labour law consultancy. This involved a comprehensive audit of business practices across all trading and service divisions through a process of employee and management questionnaires and interviews.
Our two largest office centres – in Cape Town and Johannesburg – have had full disability audits conducted by a specialist consultant to ensure that these facilities are suitable for and accessible to physically-disabled employees.
In addition, all staff at our head offices and stores were consulted in drawing up the original employment equity plan which detailed both qualitative and quantitative goals and the measures to ensure their attainment.
During 2006 we revised our employment equity plan that will be effective for the forthcoming three-year period. The substance of this plan was formulated from a survey conducted on the group’s behalf by a South African labour law consultancy. This survey gathered confidential feedback from all employees to gauge employee perceptions of fairness across all employment practices, ranging from pay and promotional opportunities to the attitude of line management.
Whilst the monitoring of numerical goals has been an important part of our assessment of progress, regular feedback from employees is invaluable in gaining a complete understanding of the qualitative successes and challenges that we face. To this end, a group consultative forum has been established which meets regularly to ensure that progress towards all objectives is made.
Namibian legislation requires that all employees and the representative union are consulted and the group has instituted an efficient and effective set of consultative structures to ensure compliance.
A great deal of focus has been placed on the identification and development of in-house talent. Our trading divisions have run various national change initiatives to achieve this, such as the Foschini Retail Academy. Part of the benefit of these programmes has been the identification of skills, talents and potential in previously disadvantaged groups across all divisions. In our service divisions, similar programmes, such as the Foschinidata Accelerated Development Programme, have achieved similar goals.
Coupled to this, we recognise that it is vital for all employees to have equal access to promotional opportunities. The challenges that a large and geographically diverse distribution of stores and offices present have been taken into account by ensuring that the advertising of vacancies is accessible to all staff.
Previously disadvantaged employees as per our October 2006 Employment Equity Submission comprised 80,7% of our workforce, compared to 78,4% in October 2005 and 76,4% in the year prior.
As noted above, the group has finalised its new employment equity plan for the three-year period ending October 2009.
The composition of Namibian employees is 92,8% representative of previously disadvantaged groups in that country.
Evidence of our overall progress towards addressing imbalances in the racial composition of the group over the past seven years is depicted below:
Note that these figures exclude employees of RCS Investment Holdings (Pty) Ltd and its subsidiaries, as the target date of their plan differs by three years from the rest of the group’s and is thus non-comparable. These employees total 3,5% of headcount and thus do not significantly affect these statistics.
In addition, the overall achievement of targets set for October 2009, compared to the actual employee status in October 2006, is reflected in the graph below. This depicts that our planned increase in previously disadvantaged employees will pose a challenge over the next three years. Further efforts are required at senior and middle management levels to address imbalances that still exist.
A breakdown indicating the change in representation of previously disadvantaged groups amongst permanent employees is depicted below.
| October | October | October | October | |
| 2006 | 2005 | 2004 | 2003 | |
| % | % | % | % | |
| Senior management | 6,3 | 4,6 | 5,9 | 4,6 |
| Specialists and middle management | 29,8 | 30,0 | 27,7 | 24,9 |
| Skilled technical and junior management | 63,0 | 59,3 | 56,5 | 53,5 |
| Semi- and unskilled employees | 88,6 | 86,6 | 84,9 | 82,4 |
| A breakdown indicating the change representation of women amongst permanent employees is depicted below. | ||||
| October | October | October | October | |
| 2006 | 2005 | 2004 | 2003 | |
| % | % | % | % | |
| Senior management | 38,4 | 39,9 | 31,1 | 28,4 |
| Specialists and middle management | 63,7 | 63,4 | 63,0 | 61,4 |
| Skilled technical and junior management | 79,3 | 80,1 | 80,3 | 82,2 |
| Semi- and unskilled employees | 79,4 | 79,1 | 79,1 | 80,4 |
Recruitment is one key focus area in ensuring that representivity is achieved. Psychometric tests used in the recruitment process have been selected to be valid and fair in the South African environment. In addition, the group also makes use of a psychometric test that specifically assesses potential as opposed to current competency and skills.
The change in the percentage of employees recruited from previously disadvantaged groups is as follows:
| October 2003: | 75% |
| October 2004: | 80% |
| October 2005: | 81% |
| October 2006: | 83% |
A breakdown of recruitment by race as indicated in our most recent employment equity progress report is depicted alongside.
