Accountability
Corporate Governance concerns a number of fundamental matters. Firstly it relates to the strategy and realisation of company goals. But it also concerns effective administration: or rather the relationships between management, supervisors and others involved, such as shareholders and the Works Council, as well as customers and suppliers. The third element is corporate culture, where it concerns sound business practices within the organisation. Next, monitoring and evaluation is of importance. And finally, it concerns the element of responsibility and transparency of internal and external communications.
Strategy
Heijmans' ambition is to become the best player in our field. We are achieving this by improving and renewing our core activities through purchasing, commerce, tender and project management. And by doing so to expand our share in existing markets and conquer new markets. This requires a culture of discipline and unity.
Culture
There is a code of conduct within Heijmans. This code of conduct details the eight values for integrity that Heijmans expects its staff to respect while carrying out their activities for Heijmans. This is based on three values for conduct: professional-inventive-cooperation. A condition for sound business practices is the openness that is, amongst others, stimulated by exemplary behaviour by the management. In addition, staff are given the opportunity to report any issues relating to behaviour and integrity. Staff can speak to appointed confidential advisors. In the Integrity Committee, issues, dilemmas, themes relating to integrity and all other related subjects are discussed twice a year. Based on that, this committee then makes recommendations to the management about the policy that should be implemented.
Governance structure
The outline of Heijmans' governance structure is determined through shares certification by Heijmans' Stichting Administratiekantoor (Administrative Trust Office). This aims to ensure that decisions are passed at a shareholders' meeting and not by a random majority. The shares certificates may be freely exchanged for normal shares. The underlying principles of the corporate governance code are underwritten by Heijmans and as such are implemented into the corporate governance structure.
Within the corporate governance policy, Heijmans also uses a number of devices, subdivided into rules, regulations, codes and supervision on the one hand and tools (such as training, meetings, education, social media) on the other. The effort made depends on the envisaged goal and the stakeholders' group.