Sopra Steria - 2019 Universal registration document

2 RISK FACTORS AND INTERNAL CONTROL Risk factors

1.3.2

RISKS RELATED TO OPERATIONAL ACTIVITIES

DIFFICULTIES IN ATTRACTING, DEVELOPING OR RETAINING TALENT AND/OR LOSS OF PERSONNEL IN KEY ROLES ❙

Risk description

Risk management

Sopra Steria places its employees at the centre of its drive to create value, improve its competitive position and increase market share. The Group’s growth objectives must be acheived against the backdrop of the war for talent as well as the need for critical and rare expertise, particularly in the area of new technologies. Recruitment difficulties and/or a continuing rise in the employee attrition rate (which was 17.7% in 2019, compared with 16.9% in 2018) may prevent the Group from delivering on its strategy or meeting its targets for growth and financial performance. The transformations engendered by the digital revolution for the businesses of our clients require us to constantly adapt our skills to ensure that we can support them over the long term. In this respect, any deficiency and/or difficulty in developing the skills of its employees might hinder the Group’s ability to deliver on its strategy, thereby adversely affecting its financial performance.

Sopra Steria’s employees are the motor fuelling its growth and value creation. Employee engagement and retention are two key focuses of its human resources policy. They have been translated into the following priorities: an ambitious recruitment drive with 10,844 new hires in 2019 p (compared with 11,662 in 2018), including 4,112 hires across all types of employment contract in France; a revisited employer brand in 2019, conveying the image of an p attractive and captivating Group, inspiring its staff with a singular and responsible collective ambition; an improved candidate experience (interactive platforms for job p seekers, new Careers site, videos on business lines, live chat); an updated onboarding process based on the Group’s Immediate p Boarding Charter and specific training programmes; strengthened relationships with universities (more than 1,000 p events and other initiatives at universities in 2019); ever-expanding civic engagement through iconic projects p (HandiTutorat, Prix Étudiants awarded by Fondation Sopra Steria – Institut de France, etc.); an optimised recruitment process and organisation, particularly p in France; a special focus on well-being in the workplace (preventive p approach to occupational risks) and employee engagement in this area (2019 people survey conducted across the Group in partnership with Great Place to Work). To support its growth, Sopra Steria implements a human resources strategy centred on skills development, employability and the engagement of all employees. This strategy has several pillars: an updated and digital Core Competency Reference Guide, p providing a shared framework for understanding the Group’s businesses, for employee evaluation, and for career development; a performance appraisal based on open communication between p managers and their team members, shared with the human resources function and resulting in an individual development plan; a “people dynamics” approach, which involves identifying p transformations in the Group’s businesses over a time frame of one to three years (emerging occupations, sustainable jobs, sensitive jobs, areas in which job offers exceed the number of applicants) and drawing up human resources action plans to integrate, maintain and develop the necessary current and future skills; a proactive training policy, whose objectives are reviewed and p approved by the Group’s Executive Committee, supported by a revamped Sopra Steria Academy training organisation, with adjustments made to its structure (governance, creation of specific Group and business line academies) as well as its offerings (more streamlined, focused on the corporate plan and the Group’s strategic orientations, Learning Manengement System). In 2019, 180,475 days of training were delivered, an increase of 1.5% compared with 2018.

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SOPRA STERIA UNIVERSAL REGISTRATION DOCUMENT 2019