October 22, 2005
Leader-Post staff

SaskTel, Conexus Credit Union and CUETS Financial Inc. (CUETS) made the list, selected from more than 1,200 applicants who applied.

The honour recognizes outstanding Canadian employers that lead the way in attracting and retaining quality employees.

Companies who make the list are then profiled in the Canada's Top 100 Employers book, which hits bookstores in mid-October.

This is CUETS' third time on the list in the last four years while SaskTel makes the list for the sixth consecutive year.

Two Saskatoon companies, Cronus Technologies and Yanke Group of Companies also made the list.

All five companies are featured in today's Working section.

Community care important to CUETS
By David Freeman, Leader-Post

As the maxim goes “charity begins at home”, but it shouldn't be surprising to learn that it can find a home at the office too.

At Regina's CUETS Financial Inc. (CUETS), charity finds just that --- a warm, inviting home --- helping the company find its way on to the list of top 100 employers in the country for the third year in the last four.

“I think it's important to mention that one of the things that separates CUETS from many other companies is the role community care plays in the fabric of the company's life,” said Bob Lane, CUETS vice-president of human resources and corporate support.

He says CUETS, which does national advertising and data management for MasterCard, supports several local and national charities --- from the United Way to the Canadian Cancer Society --- not only from a corporate perspective but it also encourages employees to volunteer their time. The company gives employees “work” time to volunteer or fundraise, heightening the company's profile in the community and showing employees the business cares about what they care about.

“It's important to the company and the employees understand that and they sort of embody that spirit,” said Lane. “We reward that kind of community spirit in our policies and in our actions and we really do celebrate it. So what happens is you end up with a workplace with people who make a difference both for our clients and for each other, but also for the community.”

“The atmosphere is somewhat more buoyant and positive because community involvement is really important stuff,” he added. “We do a lot of it and it really has an effect on employee involvement and in everything they do.”"

“They see the organization as a caring kind of company,” agreed CUETS CEO Stan Kuss. “And that says all kinds of things about the integrity of the organization. It translates into how they deal with each other, how they deal with clients, with customers, vendors, partners...”

“To allow staff members from here to participate in charitable foundations throughout the community it definitely is a big perk for a lot of people,” said marketing coordinator Andrea Ford. “It makes us excited, happy to be from a company that supports the community.“

“Most of us like to help with charities,” Ford continued, “...If there's something that needs to be done during the day, you have time to promote that for CUETS, as CUETS, which accomplishes both your individual need to give and from a corporate need to give back to the community.”

But charitable work is only one part of a bigger philosophy for the company this commitment to community care and the well being of its employees --- body, mind and spirit --- that keeps CUETS at the top of the corporate hierarchy.

“A lot of organizations talk about their employees being their biggest asset, but there are many organizations that don't walk that talk,” said Kuss. “I think the fundamental underlying belief that's driven a lot of our human resources practices is that employees do make the difference in whether or not an organization is successful or not in the long term.”

“We believe that if we have an environment that's a positive work environment our employees are going to be happy, more stable, have less turnover,” he said. “It reduces our recruitment and training costs and gives us an edge over competition when we have knowledgeable, skilled employees that we've been able to retain.”

“There's all kinds of reasons for the company to do that, but it's also just the right thing to do for the kind of organization that we want to be,” Kuss said, which adds to that integrity and flows through employees to clients. “Their degree of engagement, I think, is substantially better through the way we treat them and we get it back in spades.”

Among the incentives employees receive at CUETS are a vacation buy/sell program allowing them to have a flexible week of vacation time each year as well as a health wellness program which includes a free membership to the local YMCA, stop smoking and weight loss programs and crisis counseling.

“We believe by trying to have good work/life balance and having good healthy employees, in the long run again that will pay back dividends to the company,” said Kuss, “but also again it's the right thing to do sort of approach. What we try to do is take more of a holistic view of how as an organization we can help our employees to lead healthy lives.”

Our health is important, said Joanne Powers, another marketing co-coordinator at CUETS. “It's trying to maintain a balance. It's a good perk.”