W Communications

2024 was a year of transformative employee empowerment for W Communications that saw the agency bravely pursue a strategy of decentralisation – transferring ownership of the business to an Employee-Owned Trust (EOT), empowering the people who have long been a part of the agency’s creative and commercial success to take the reins, and making every employee an owner.

We recognised that with increased empowerment and company ownership comes the need for enhanced reward and support. Despite challenging economic headwinds, we increased salaries by an average of 10%. We focused on revitalising our people strategy, creating a ‘health and wealth’ staff support package, including private healthcare, EOT bonuses and tax savings. Employee ownership set a new bar for sustainability, citizenship, inclusion and innovation, as our team agreed the components that made them feel proud to work at and be invested in the consultancy. We also doubled-down on planning for a future focused on social mobility – breaking the shackles that tie new PR recruits to London, as part of our social enterprise, WX. With a focus on nurturing regional talent, we are identifying regional cold spots (places that either don’t offer PR opportunities or where young people don’t know what a career in PR looks like) and have made a ‘25 by 25’ pledge to create 25 jobs outside London by 2025. We also launched new initiatives including the ‘W Stayover’ programme that allows employees to extend their holidays by working from another W office – and gaining invaluable experience.