What's going on within Hochtief Construction

How many days annual leave?

25, plus Bank Holidays.

Can you take them when you want?

Pretty much so our general intent is to achieve the traditional holidays within the construction industry, which means a week-long shutdown at Christmas and the same at Easter.

But we're pragmatic, so a rail project that calls on us to work vigorously through a rail possession means all hands on deck, likewise where a road projects involves working through the night.

How long is the standard working week?

37½ hours in the office and 45 hours on site.

What is the average weekly number of hours worked?

The average for everyone is 48 to 50 hours a week.

Incentivisation - what percentage of staff can earn a bonus?

There isn't a formal bonus for all at this moment. What we do have is ad hoc. Our German parent is encouraging something wide-ranging, but this remains under development at this time.

What is your churn rate?

15%, which I feel is reasonably good as the construction industry is so hot that individuals not wanting to move locations after a project ends are quickly poached by competitors. For our internal KPIs, we're aiming for a 10% churn rate.

Many of Hochtief's projects are in London and the South East, so many of our workers are in that region and they have, effectively, the pick of working for each or every major contractor.

Is there a good work-life balance?

It's great. We have fun. It struck me right away when I arrived here. Home working is ok too - I have trust and faith in people to respond positively to the benefits it can bring.

What help is there towards employees' fitness?

Our main office is on a landscaped business park and our people take the opportunity to get outside and walk. We also have five-a-side football teams and some runners.

Occupational health provision means that there is a medical scheme on call, so if anyone is struggling we can refer them to the right help.

Is there a physio you can turn to?

Yes, if you have a back injury, for instance, we refer them through our private health scheme. It's heavily subsidised by the company, leaving only a small contribution from the employee. There are two levels - either for the individual, or covering their whole family.

Is there a free annual eye sight check-up?

Yes. For support staff looking at a screen all day, there is a free eyesight check once a year and a contribution to the cost of glasses or contact lenses.

How do you ensure employees are comfortable while at their place of work?

We have individual work-station assessments and we encourage people to take breaks by providing pleasant rest areas.

What is Hochtief Construction's average days sick/year?

2 days per employee. This is very low.

Are private emails allowed/frowned on/censored?

Limited private emails are permitted so long as the content and source is within our security policy. Controlling this sort of traffic is a headache, hence we have a lot of security controls in place. The staff respect the balance. We like to compare emailing to the light banter that you get within a team.

Is the virus checker kept busy?

In the UK, all messages come in/out via a firewall in Germany. Thankfully we've not had any major service outages as a result of a virus, though spam is a major headache. We try to filter spam out in Germany, but it's a battle.

Do you have an integrated network connecting all parts of your business?

Yes. It was installed years ago as we could see it wasn't practical for sites to be autonomous. Today, people have this expectation of an instant solution to almost everything so we have VPN (virtual private network) on sites, all with links back to the main office in Germany.

It makes me laugh this need for instant information as I well remember the days of walking down to the nearest phone with a pile of 10p coins in your pocket when we needed to order up concrete.

Do you have a high-speed internet connection?

Yes, we've recently upgraded our main backbone line to a 10mb capacity

What proportion of your employees has access to the internet?

In the offices, everyone. On the sites, most people have, but internet access is a privilege, not a right, so the project managers must decide on this. If you don't need it, it's not a God-given right to have it.

When staff join Hochtief (UK), they sign up to an agreement that covers correct usage.

Are there any restrictions on internet use, for example restrictions on the downloading of software, or rich media presentations?

Anything downloaded gets monitored. The company rule is that you need authorisation. For example, someone finds a new lead generation source and asks for an upgrade via the internet to give them access, then the company is going to say "yes", but the person has to get permission.

Do you [Mike] make use of the internet and, if so, what type of information do you access most often?

I use it all the time. It improves my efficiency. Company searches, DTI forecasts, industry forecast, market information, the lot. Also to analyse competitors, and Multimap to get me to where I'm going.

What is your favourite website?

Our own intranet. Outside of that, then Ask and Google.

Do you see the internet as an aid to productivity or a hindrance?

An aid.

Does your company make use of project collaboration tools or engage in e-procurement?

For projects, we use one of three tools: Business Collaborator or Asite or, on our Glendoe site, we have Eplass. Some clients have open data rooms and we're getting used to using them.

At Christmas, we'll be unveiling an Oracle collaboration tool. It will be a bespoke in-house system running across Hochtief throughout Europe.

Do you have access to mobile devices such as a PDA/hand-held computer or a smart phone?

BlackBerries are widespread throughout our senior management team, while most on-site staff have 3G data cards and people working from home have a VPN connection as we offer access to the hub portal to nearly everyone.

Do you regularly use mobile devices as part of your daily working life?

Absolutely, though I try not to send emails from it as I feel it's better, and more personal, to have a discussion with someone.

How do you see the role of mobile technology evolving over the next few years?

The drawback with a Blackberry is the inability to download larger files.

With wireless devices, now part of our life I guess, I'd hope to see their speeds pick up and parts of the UK are still blacked out even now.

Where do you see future challenges?

IT successes can be unrecognised. If everything goes right, no-one steps forward and pats you on the back. The challenge is getting seamless integration, so no matter which country you are in, you can plug in and get access to Hochtief projects around the globe.

As we start firing up the building division in the UK, and expand Hochtief Concepts, we'll be drawing on the group's fantastic software. It will be coming to the UK.

What successes can you report?

Our security certified to the FAST Gold standard - we've just had our second audit, which lasts us until June 2007.

We always shadow copy files every few hours.