Our performance

Safety, health and wellbeing

In 2023 there were just six lost time incidents worldwide, one of the best years on record for the physical safety of our staff, continuing the long term trend of safety improvement.

It is the product of 20 years’ continuous focus on safety, health and wellbeing, which is reflected in the ongoing rise of near miss reporting and positive interventions: nearly 73% of our 20,000 people logged an incident or made an intervention in 2023.

Reporting and interventions reflect improving awareness of safety, health and wellbeing, and our expectation of every person working for us that they will challenge any unsafe situation or act.

Group managing director Cathy Travers has shown particularly strong personal leadership on safety, health and wellbeing.

This reinforces the importance of constant vigilance and requiring all parts of the company to match those that perform best. Performance gaps between different regions and countries are being closed.

Performance gaps between different regions and countries are being closed.

Against improving safety, we have seen an increase in time lost due to ill health and wellbeing issues. This is a challenge for all our competitors too.

We addressed it in 2023 by making an award-winning short film, The Challenge, to highlight the causes and effects of stress, and the potential knock-on risk to physical safety. Stressed colleagues are more prone to human error, which may result in accidents in the worker’s own environment or translate into dangers on a construction site.

And in the UK we co-hosted a summit with the Association of Consultancy & Engineering, along with health and security specialist International SOS, that set out the need for a consultancy sector wellbeing standard. We started work developing that standard in September; it launches later in 2024. Aimed at employers and clients, the standard addresses environmental, situational, procedural and behavioural causes of stress, and sets out recommendations for mitigating them.

Measuring our progress on health and safety

Our work to address the causes and effects of climate change, by calculating our clients’ and our own carbon emissions and assessing exposure to risk of physical impacts, began two decades ago. Our climate expertise is widely recognised as industry leading.

Climate

Our work to address the causes and effects of climate change, by calculating our clients’ and our own carbon emissions and assessing exposure to risk of physical impacts, began two decades ago. 

Our climate expertise is widely recognised as industry leading.

The greatest influence we can have on carbon reduction and climate resilience is through the projects we plan, design and help deliver.

We co-authored a major update to PAS 2080, the international specification for managing whole life carbon across the built environment.

In support of this we co-authored a major update to PAS 2080, the international specification for managing whole life carbon across the built environment, launched in April 2023. It provides guidance for clients, contractors, consultants and suppliers – the whole value chain. PAS 2080 can be used internationally.

We also launched two digital solutions, Moata Global and Moata Flood Data Explorer, designed to help infrastructure owners assess the physical risks of climate change, identify resilience options and prioritise investment decisions. Both have been developed to help implement an approach based on the Physical Climate Risk Assessment Methodology, which we co-authored in 2021 for the Coalition for Climate Resilient Investment.

In July 2023 we published our climate change policy, setting out our mitigation and adaptation commitments and approach. This policy is supported by carbon reduction targets that have been validated by the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi) against its Corporate Net-Zero Standard.

Carbon footprint

Our 2023 carbon footprint was calculated using a digital solution, developed in-house, to negotiate the industry wide challenge of improving the accuracy and robustness of data collection and processing. Our footprint was verified as compliant with ISO 14064, the international standard for reporting greenhouse gas emissions.

In addition to calculating our 2023 footprint, we recalculated our emissions for the last four years, taking into account improved data.

Our carbon emissions reduction trajectory

20% of emissions cut in four years

From our baseline year in 2019 to 2023, our total scope 1, 2 and 3 emissions reduced by 20%. This is set against the 33% growth of our business over the same period. We are on track to meet our science based targets.

The reduction in scope 1 and 2 emissions is due to our ongoing programme to procure renewable electricity for our offices and low carbon fuels for our construction plant. The decrease in scope 3 emissions has been achieved by reducing business travel and commuting to offices.

We are putting in place additional measures, including engaging with our supply chain, to reduce our wider scope 3 emissions.

Physical resilience

In 2023 we embedded climate change into our enterprise risk management process. We assessed our exposure to the physical impacts of climate change on our operations under three different future scenarios, and published the findings in line with the Task Force on Climate-Related Financial Disclosures (TCFD) international framework for climate-related financial disclosures. Annual assessments will inform our climate adaptation strategy.

Communities

We are passionate about contributing positively to our communities, everywhere we operate.

We seek opportunities to add value for our clients and their communities on every project, but also work to engage with people and open local opportunities beyond the scope of our commissioned work. We support our many staff who volunteer their energy and skill to causes that matter to them and us – for example, by providing them with flexibility and time within working hours as well as helpful resources and financial support.

In both our work for clients and the activities we support as part of our corporate social responsibility, we use our social outcomes framework, addressing accessibility, inclusion, empowerment, resilience and wellbeing.

In 2023 we became the first engineering company to be awarded the Social Value Management Certificate by Social Value International, a global business network.

Improving accessibility

We are playing an active role in a range of projects to strengthen infrastructure and improve access to essential services for communities across the world.

In Uttar Pradesh, India, we launched a three-year programme in partnership with the Aroh Foundation to improve water quality and provide solar powered street lighting for a village of 5000 people. We allocated £100,000 to this programme in 2023 and will continue our support until at least the end of 2025.

In West Darfur, Sudan, our staff mapped 18,500 buildings for Medicins Sans Frontiers. This information will improve the international medical charity’s ability to provide aid in the event of future humanitarian emergencies in the area, which has suffered repeatedly from conflict.

Meanwhile in Rwanda we continued our decade of work with partner Balfour Beatty on the Bridges to Prosperity programme, successfully designing and building a 77m bridge over the Gasayo River, to improve the local community’s access to education, healthcare and local markets.

Boosting inclusion

We support initiatives to open up professional pathways to careers in science, technology, engineering and mathematics for underrepresented and vulnerable groups.

This includes continuing sponsorship of the Calculus Project in Boston, USA, which provides students of colour from lower socioeconomic backgrounds with training in advanced mathematics.

And in an ongoing partnership with the Social Mobility Foundation, we offer work experience placements and mentoring to students from low income families in the UK.

Fostering empowerment

We coach and mentor underprivileged and marginalised people to find work suited to their skills.

This includes partnerships with UK charities Renaisi and Migrant Help, providing professional mentoring to unemployed and underemployed refugees to help them secure a job.

We also support a programme to help people from underprivileged local communities develop workplace and job application skills, in partnership with the company Flight Works Alabama, in the USA.

Helping strengthen resilience

We help communities to adapt, prepare for and respond to crises, including climate change.

In collaboration with Wageningen University in the Netherlands, we helped university students in Bangladesh to develop a business case for nature based solutions to improve climate resilience.

We have been patrons of the register of engineers for disaster relief, RedR, since it was founded, and continue to provide financial support, as well as supporting staff who volunteer for RedR service.

We have also signed a memorandum of understanding with WaterAid to support clean water and sanitation programmes that reduce poverty, promote sustainable development and combat climate change.

Working for wellbeing

Our approach to wellbeing encompasses not only that of our own staff but also the wellbeing of wider society.

In the UK we run a community support programme called Brilliant Neighbours, under which staff have designed and built a rain garden for a local primary school in Cambridge, a garden for hospital staff at Berkshire Hospital, Reading, and many other activities to promote wellbeing and combat food poverty.

More globally, in the wake of the earthquakes that struck Turkey and Syria in February 2023, we match funded contributions to support the humanitarian response organised by the Disaster Emergency Committee, collectively raising £108,000.