AND Digital’s Reading office consider what it takes to create a happy, high-performance digital team

Shan Beerstecher, Club Executive for the AND Digital’s Reading office, is a passionate people pioneer. As well as being an expert in digital innovation, having led global transformation projects for almost a decade, she’s also worked in change management across multiple industries for over 16 years.

Shan takes a look at how happy people make for high-performance, and, in turn, more resilient and profitable companies.

What makes a successful company?

A common answer is growing revenue and profit Shan explains. It’s true, however, to achieve this you need to place equal focus on people.

Happiness matters to your bottom line. When your people are engaged, they’re more productive and more likely to act as advocates. That translates into good business and commercials in numerous ways:

• You can attract and retain top talent, enabling you to equally provide the best services and products.
• When engagement levels are high, it’s easier to stand out - a study comes to mind that found that companies with happier people outperform the competition by up to 20%.
• I always say, if you look after your people, they’ll look after your clients, and the revenue takes care of itself. One report found that engaged employees are 18% more productive and 12% more profitable.

How does an organisation create a positive work culture?

It’s key to have company values in place, and bought into. Without these, it’s hard to keep your people engaged with, and working towards, a common goal.

At AND Digital we have three values embedded in our culture:

• WONDER - We love to explore the impossible and the ‘what ifs’, and make them a reality.
• SHARE - We want to raise the bar by giving back and helping others grow.
• DELIGHT - We find joy in our work, delivering services and products that people love.

Every five years, we set a mission that we call our BHAG: a big, hairy, audacious goal that exists to dare us and encourages us to do more. It provides clarity of direction and purpose for our whole team, which is so essential when a company grows as fast as AND.

Personally as a leader, I also aim to embody the South African concept of ‘ubuntu’. It means ‘I am because we are’, and encapsulates a key value for me: to create a team ecosystem that focuses on ‘we’ over ‘me’.

How do you embody ubuntu in AND’s Reading office?

 I like to think of ubuntu as the DNA that runs through all of us.  It’s important that everyone I work with understands the value I see in them, as well as the shared value we create together. Ubuntu steers every decision I make, and places people central in everything we do.

We use it every day through little things like the shoutouts we give, daily check-ins, and how welcome and included we make everyone feel.

Get in touch with a member of the team to find out how we can help your company create a winning team at [email protected]

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AND Digital have offices across the UK. The Reading office covers the counties of Berkshire, Buckinghamshire and Oxfordshire and The Thames Valley.