About AMP culture

What sort of culture do we want?

At AMP we want a culture that will support high performance. Our CEO, Craig Dunn, believes that a high performance culture will be characterised by:

• achievement - where our people are encouraged and challenged to be the very best they can be
• external orientation - where we focus on understanding our customers, clients and business partners, and beating our competitors
• open and honest conversations
• creativity and diversity - of thought and approaches, so we can deliver stronger business outcomes
• teamwork and commitment to others.

Developing a constructive culture

In a constructive culture:

everyone is clear on what they are responsible for and how this helps the team achieve its business goals

• people take responsibility for delivering on the objectives they commit to and they are held accountable for this
• people work in teams, they collaborate and they trust each other to deliver
• people are clear on who has the authority to make decisions at each level of the organisation and decisions are made quickly
• people feel comfortable debating issues openly and this leads to better decision-making
• information is shared openly
• effective performance coaching helps people understand where they are performing well and in what ways they can improve their performance and this leads to higher performance
• there are opportunities to learn and grow
• people trust and respect each other

What does AMP's culture look like?

AMP tracks changes in its culture by conducting a company-wide culture survey with employees every two years.

he survey includes an Organisational Culture Inventory (OCI), which measures perceptions of how employees are expected to behave in the workplace. The survey feedback is plotted on a round graph called a “circumplex”.

The circumplex is made up of twelve behaviours, which are grouped into three kinds of styles, each plotted in a different colour:

• 'Constructive' behaviours are in blue
• 'Aggressive/defensive' behaviours (including competitive behaviour) are in red
• 'Passive/defensive' behaviours (including avoidance behaviour) are in green

AMP's goal is to move towards a culture that includes more constructive behaviours.

What do the latest culture survey results show?

In July 2006, a large proportion of employees were asked to complete the two-yearly AMP culture survey. Eighty-two percent of those in the sample responded.

The results showed an increase in constructive behaviours and a decrease in aggressive/defensive and passive/defensive behaviours.

Our culture is more constructive than the average for the financial services industry as a whole.