Agrium Inc. growing a caring workforce.

• Author: Stewart, Nick
• Position: BEST PLACES TO WORK

With a rising demand for its products, an open-pit phosphate mine in far-flung northeastern Ontario strives not only for the future growth of agriculture, but for its people as well.

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Located 38 kilometres southwest of the Town of Kapuskasing, the Agrium Inc. site has grown steadily in recent years as the miner continues to see success.

Since kicking off as Canada's first phosphate mine in 1999, its fleet of vehicles has expanded from two to 16, including a range of trucks and diggers. Its manpower has similarly grown, with a variety of high-level jobs in engineering and planning.

Now with 90 direct staff and some 180 contractors through the U.S.-based URS Limited, Agrium is the second-largest employer in the Kapuskasing area.

This status is something management takes' to heart as it strives to ensure that everyone--from the bottom of the mine to the concentrator floor--is personally invested, says plant manager Guylain Baril. "It's not just a good place to work; it's the best place," says Baril.

"We think it's a really important factor to be accommodating. We've got business needs to meet, and we can't deviate from that too much, but following that, we think, 'How can we make this attractive for employees?'"

Part of that approach has involved a company-wide performance-based compensation system, which provides rewards for actions taken at both the individual and the corporate levels.

At the end of the year, each employee is evaluated through an in-house rating system that compares their accomplishments against certain metrics, allowing for varying degrees of payout bonuses.

The performance of the company as a whole feeds into the profit-sharing system, which can rise as high as 10 per cent per year provided Agrium reaches a certain threshold. As times have been good for the company employees have been paid out at the top end of this system for four years running, with things on track to achieve that maximum once more in 2010.

This leads to what Baril refers to as a "high-performance culture," something he says to be more than just a buzzword in Kapuskasing. This is important in a dynamic environment featuring a mix of young and old alike, energy with experience, he says.

To better work around that range of lifestyles, the company has implemented flexible scheduling, including what Baril refers to as the "9-80 schedule." In this system...