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Our corporate commitments |
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Eager to retain its employees over the long term and to continuously improve working conditions, Eurazeo has a very active human resources policy. It offers its employees the opportunity to follow high-quality career paths, to durably strengthen their skills and continually raise the bar required by their participation, particularly with regard to the Group’s investments.
A diverse, experienced and qualified team
Eurazeo, the Group’s parent company, had a 51-member team at December 31, 2009, including the members of the investment team of course, as well as the staff of the financial communication, accounting, internal audit, treasury and legal departments, as well as all support functions for the investment activity.
An Investment Committee comprised of twenty professionals, including members of the Executive Board, is charged with the implementation of Eurazeo’s strategy. These specialists, who source the deal flow, have recognized expertise in financial engineering and industry expertise.
Eurazeo has a seven-member Executive Board (1) chaired by Patrick Sayer. It federates the skills of investors and managers, which have been enhanced in light of the context of the past two years.
Optimization of skills
The objective of Eurazeo’s training program is to offer employees the opportunity to be and remain at their best. The courses are designed to fit with investment projects in progress or issues affecting the profession as a whole. The courses most often taken are private equity investing, law, accounting and foreign languages. Eurazeo also allows employees to participate in external training courses, seminars and trade conferences.
Motivation and retention over the long term
An employee prof t-sharing program was established in 1998. A discretionary profit-sharing agreement gives all staff members an interest in the Group’s results, with different objectives by function. All incentive bonuses paid into a Company savings plan (PEE) or a collective retirement savings plan (PERCO) receive a significant matching contribution from Eurazeo: the size of the matching contribution has been maxed out since 2008. In 2009, the entire staff benefited from the stock grant plan established in 2007.
(1) Six people as of December 31, 2009, and seven since the appointment of Fabrice de Gaudemar by the Supervisory Board on March 19, 2010.
Questions for Bruno Keller, Chief Operating Officer
How would you define Eurazeo’s teams?
I would say the Eurazeo team, rather than the Eurazeo teams.
What sets Eurazeo apart from many other listed companies of the same magnitude is the size of its team. Fifty people is not a lot: it means that everyone knows everyone else, and that every employee’s work is crucial to the proper functioning of the Company. The diversity of ages and profiles contributes to the effectiveness of this team, which is entirely devoted to our business of being an investment company.
What do you consider to be the chief qualities possessed by the men and women of Eurazeo?
Eurazeo’s recruitment policy has always promoted the maintenance of the solidarity of our teams. Each man and each woman who works for Eurazeo has been selected on the basis of the individual contribution he or she can make to keeping the “HMS Eurazeo” on its established course.
I am not, of course, even mentioning their qualities of professional integrity, which are an absolute necessity in our profession and to which not even the slightest exception is allowed. What I am talking about is how we have sought to staff each position, from the most simple to those of the Company’s senior executives, with men and women with the same enthusiasm, the same ethic, the same mutual respect and the same sense of professionalism.
Our ambition is for the men and women of Eurazeo to form a single, unified team, one that can stand up to challenges like those we faced in 2009 because of the economic crisis, but which can also demonstrate the enthusiasm necessary to meet the challenges that await us tomorrow.
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Spurring on our investments |
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For Eurazeo, being a responsible shareholder means that any decision must include a vision that extends far beyond mere financial issues and takes into account the impact our investments will have on their employees, the environment and society as a whole. In this spirit - and with a view to creating long term value - Eurazeo assists the companies in which it invests with the implementation and optimization of their sustainable development strategy.
From an audit-based approach to a leadership role
Convinced that sustainable development is an important source of value creation, in late 2008 Eurazeo began identifying the initiatives undertaken by its investments in this area, with a focus on the environment. With the help of an independent firm, a status report was produced, the benefits of which were seen in 2009: it helped animate constructive discussion about these issues, and inspired further discussion with some companies that were already well advanced in their sustainable development action plan. For example, Eurazeo gave new impetus to Europcar, which combined all of the initiatives it was already engaged in under one tent, in order to increase their impact. Among others, in order to build “the greenest fleet possible,” Europcar signed a partnership agreement with Nissan and Renault in 2009 and is preparing to launch the rental of electric vehicles in the near future. Eurazeo also motivated ANF to structure its ideas, formalize them into a coherent, comprehensive policy, and undertake new environmental initiatives.
In 2010, the objectives are to develop a comprehensive strategy for sustainable development for Eurazeo itself, in order to build a set of guidelines formalizing what the Company expects of the companies in which it invests.
Eurazeo will also launch an in-depth corporate responsibility review with each company, to provide better visibility of all issues that need to be addressed.
Well-established, stronger corporate governance
Eurazeo implements the same corporate governance structures as its own in all of its private equity investments, establishing Audit Committees and Compensation Committees after each acquisition. These committees play an important role in overseeing the effectiveness of internal controls over transactions and risk management.
This year, Eurazeo has enhanced its monitoring of internal controls and risk in its investments. Emphasis has been placed notably on self-assessment of internal control by the companies in which Eurazeo invests, with the development of a tool that allows them to evaluate themselves against a standardized reference system of principles and best practices. A project to standardize the approach taken to the identification and formalization of risk monitoring was also initiated in Eurazeo’s holdings.
These measures form the pillars upon which Eurazeo’s corporate governance is based, as a professional and responsible long-term shareholder.
Questions for Luis Marini-Portugal, Director of Investments
What does “being a responsible shareholder” actually mean for Eurazeo?
Our first responsibility lies in the choice of our investments. Each investment is analyzed in great depth, and comprehensive due diligences are performed not only on all strategic, financial and legal aspects of the companies in which we invest, but also on all labor and environmental issues. The rigor of this preliminary analysis allows us to build lasting, trusting relationships with the companies’ management teams, with whom we share a common corporate vision. This partnership is central to the development and increased competitiveness of our investments, while taking into account the interests of their employees, customers and suppliers as well as those of any government agencies. We are particularly sensitive to the establishment of the right balance between debt and equity, to enable our investments to withstand changes in the economic environment and their teams to deliver sustainable results over the long term.
In 2008, you initiated a process to identify and measure the sustainable development policies in place within your investments. To what extent did they truly implicate themselves in the process?
In the area of sustainable development, our role is to spur others to action. This is why we wanted to identify what initiatives our investments were undertaking in the matter. We wanted to share this status report with each of them and help them to challenge themselves on the basis of defined targets, which are to be set at a later date. Some companies caught the ball on the fly and went even further, recognizing the opportunities this presented in terms of commercial development.
Sustainable development is a key responsibility for each of our investments, in both its social - due to the preponderance of service providers in our portfolio - and its environmental aspects - such as with the conservation of water at Elis or energy at Europcar and Rexel. Our role is first to understand and help clarify these issues and then to encourage new initiatives, including through the sharing of best practices among companies.
For example, in the last quarter of 2009 ANF decided to formalize a sustainable development strategy, in consultation with all of its employees. The strategy is intended to create a coherent roadmap for the years to come, giving the company specific tools and indicators to anticipate future opportunities and to drive innovation on environmental issues. ANF’s 2010 “sustainable development” action plan will address notably policies regarding new construction and the green renovation of historic buildings. The front lines of attack have already been defined. The same sort of enthusiasm is seen at Europcar, which signed a partnership with Nissan and Renault to supply electric vehicles and is identifying the CO2 emitted by all of the vehicles in its fleet. Lastly, APCOA finalized an agreement with RWE for the development of recharging stations for electric vehicles at public parking lots.
For several years, Eurazeo has undertaken a policy of sponsorship by supporting associations working for the general interest in various fields (medical, social, youthrelated issues, etc.). The Company provides assistance in the form of financial aid for a period of two to three years. This is part of a true strategy of sharing the value created.
L’ENVOL: helping children in the fight against serious chronic diseases www.lenvol.asso.fr
L’ENVOL’s mission is to provide seriously ill children with an enjoyable vacation while allowing them to continue to receive medical care. Located in an exceptionally beautiful site, the one-of-a-kind center in France hosted 559 children in 2009. Each young person spent approximately 12 days escaping his isolation and getting back in touch with all kinds of activities that had hitherto been excluded by their illness, to discover the joys of friendship and vacation. The children recharge their batteries, regain confidence in themselves and in life, and always leave L’ENVOL stronger and better equipped to fight their disease. The families, who know their children are in good hands and happy, also take full advantage of the break.
ELA: promoting research to cure leukodystrophies and myelin disorders
www.ela-asso.com
Leukodystrophies are genetic disorders that destroy the myelin sheath that protects the central nervous system. When this sheath is damaged, nerve impulses cannot be transferred and the messages being sent are interrupted. Founded in 1992, the association is made up of families rallying together to defeat these diseases. It has already funded 350 research programs for a total of €30 million. Today, scientific advances have made the prospect of treatment a reality. Several trials have already been launched: this the first time in 17 years that such initiatives have seen the light of day. Thanks to the commitment of partners like Eurazeo and sponsors such as French soccer hero Zinedine Zidane, ELA is able to do even more.
Association Primo Levi: care and support for victims of torture and political violence
www.primolevi.asso.fr
Très sensible à la cause de la torture et de la violence politique, Eurazeo continue
de soutenir l’association Primo Levi.
The Primo Levi Association provides medical and psychological care as well as social and legal support to men, women and children who are victims of torture and refugees in France. Its care center hosts over 300 patients every year, and provides over 4,500 free consultations. With clinical care providers who have acquired specialized experience in this type of trauma, the Association runs numerous training programs in France and abroad for professionals working in proximity with these types of patients. To raise awareness of this issue, it publishes a quarterly journal entitled “Memoirs,” organizes conferences and conducts awareness campaigns for better reception and an appropriate treatment for victims of torture.
SNC/New solidarity in the fight against unemployment: unemployment, an evil that must be fought
www.snc.asso.fr
Created by Jean-Baptiste de Foucauld, SNC is a non-profit association that is not aligned with any political party or religious community. Since 1985, it is committed to building a social bond and active citizenship through the mobilization of and development of solidarity initiatives for the unemployed..
