Employees keep innovation thriving at 3M

Wednesday, 11 June 2014 00:00 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}

Top performers at 3M Sri Lanka were recently recognised for their outstanding contributions to the success and development of 3M at their annual awards night ceremony. The black tie event, which had all the makings of an Oscar night gala, took place at the Hilton Colombo and was attended by Amit Laroya the regional head of 3M. 3M invests heavily in their employees strongly, and rightly, believing that people play an important role in ensuring that its innovation DNA is always alive and thriving. It also ensures a robust leadership pipeline is in place to help its employees develop and advance further both in their careers and in life.

Nishanthi Fonseka, Head of HR, said: “3M Sri Lanka has in place several initiatives aimed at developing diverse high performing teams, at the heart of which is 3M’s famous 15% rule – wherein employees are encouraged to spend up to 15% of their time to pursue projects outside their scope of work. Moreover, 3M’s recognition programs, its employee fair practices, its rewards system, its focus on work-life balance helps the company attract top talent from across the country and plays a big role in retention and engagement.” On the night of their annual awards ceremony 3M is able to gauge the success of these programs and reward those that have excelled in the previous year. However, while most awards ceremonies look at employee deliverables only 3M goes beyond that and also looks at the leadership attributes they possess. This is part of 3M’s Presidential Club Awards which was established back in 2011 and strongly emphasises the how rather than the what. It is this emphasis that helps 3M employees develop and improve themselves year-on-year. These attributes are based on six categories which are evaluated twice a year at the mid-year and year-end reviews. The categories are strategic thinking, innovation, teamwork, execution, development of others and self, and adherence to the 3M code of conduct. These attributes also help 3M identifying high-potential employees to be developed for leadership roles within the company. These employees have a defined and chalked out development path.

“Externally we’re customer-centric but internally we’re employee-centric. But in the end both situations are the same. We’re a multinational technological firm but our focus has always been, and will always be, people,” said Nishanthi Fonseka. 3M captures the spark of new ideas and transforms them into thousands of ingenious products. Our culture of creative collaboration inspires a never-ending stream of powerful technologies that make life better. 3M is the innovation company that never stops inventing. With $ 30.8 billion in sales, 3M employs about 88,000 people worldwide and has operations in more than 70 countries. 3M Sri Lanka, a fully-owned subsidiary of 3M USA began its operation in 1994 and has since established itself in diverse industries such as healthcare, electro and communication, infrastructure, construction, apparel, woodworking, automotive aftermarkets, personal safety, and security and retail.