About AxiCom

This year Axicom launched their ‘Leadership Development Programme’, which aims to recognise and develop the pivotal role their Leaders play across the organisation. The annual programme covers topics ranging from developing a leadership mind-set and being a good agency role model to improving personal and team effectiveness, to name but a few. External coaching sessions are also offered to the Leadership Team and the internal HR team are constantly on hand to provide support, guidance and assistance to them. AxiCom is a meritocratic environment and is consistently rewarding all of their employees, not just Managers, for their great work and achievements. Performance across the business is measured through Personal Development Plans. Whether an employee or Manager, staff are appraised formally once a year and are continually set challenging objectives in consultation with their own Line Managers through ongoing quarterly review meetings. From a management point of view, AxiCom measure performance through setting challenging KPIs against AxiCom's overall business objectives. These are set by the UK MD and CEO, who personally sit with the Senior Managers to discuss and plan their career progression and performance against the business strategy. The UK MD runs a weekly leadership meeting where Senior Leaders within each practice get together to discuss how they are tracking against our targets, recruitment needs and ensuring people who are in the pipeline for promotions are on track and have the support they need in order to achieve this.

AxiCom are proud of their level of investment into learning and development of their staff. They run a comprehensive programme entitled Challenge40, which emphasises the company’s commitment for all staff to undertake at least 40 hours of training per year. The Challenge40 programme includes a mix of internal, external and online training modules, with the aim for this to be as flexible as possible in order to satisfy the differences in learning styles across the agency. The programme also covers Fundamentals, Digital, Creativity, People Management, Leadership Development and Professional Development. Whilst AxiCom continue to deliver a robust training programme, they are always continuously striving to improve it; therefore they regularly collect employee feedback after each session to help the company develop the programme for the future and to ensure it continues to align with employee needs and the long-term business strategy. At the end of each year, AxiCom celebrate their Challenge40 ‘achievers’ at a company meeting. Employees who reach or surpass 40 hours of training are always rewarded with a sum of investment for them to put towards a personal development activity of their choice.

To ensure regular team interaction and communication, AxiCom host a lively monthly company meeting at the local boutique cinema. They even provide a yummy breakfast to enjoy whilst the meeting takes place! The meeting is used to showcase the great work each team has been doing that month and to update all on the company’s European offices to ensure the communications that are cascaded are not just regarding the UK. AxiCom often invite guest speakers to the monthly company meetings to ignite debate, curiosity and ideas amongst staff. The CEO and UK MD use this monthly slot to ensure the company’s vision and long-term strategy is continuously articulated and understood. AxiCom’s Global Cohn & Wolfe Group CEO also attends around once a year to cascade the Group vision and strategy. As a company AxiCom promote lots of interaction in the meeting for people to ask questions and seek any clarity that is needed. After the meeting staff have a chance to socialise and discuss what they have learned.