How one company’s learning program is helping change the way it does business

By D’Arcy Jenish

In the Cavendish Farms learning Centre: (left to right standing) Learning Centre co-ordinator and instructor Ellyn Lyle and Cavendish HR director Dan Hughes; (sitting) Cavendish employees and students Heather Murray and Diane Stewart
(Photography: John Sylvester)

At 17, Mike Perry was a secondary student on PEI. Facing some seemingly insurmountable obstacles in school, he quit to join the Canadian Armed Forces. He spent three years in the military before returning to PEI, where he found steady work as a labourer in a vegetable-processing plant in New Annan. This plant was eventually purchased by the Irving family, renamed Cavendish Farms, and grew to become North America’s 4th largest processor of French fries. Perry remained with the company, though he was always troubled by the fact that he never completed his formal high-school education.

Twice he enrolled in General Educational Development (GED) programs offered at local schools for adults who wanted to obtain their Grade 12 equivalency, though neither attempt worked out. Then, in 2003, Cavendish Farms opened a learning centre at its New Annan site. Its goal was to help employees who wanted to acquire a GED certificate. Perry jumped at the opportunity. “The program here is great,” he says, after studying English, math, history and science in two-hour sessions, two afternoons a week for a year before writing the seven-hour GED exam. “I haven’t heard a bad word about the program from anyone. I can write a lot better. I’m a lot better at math. It really boosts your self-confidence.”

Others are just as enthusiastic. Heather Murray, 52 and a Cavendish Farms employee for seven years, quit school in Grade 10 at age 17 because her mother was critically ill and she had five younger siblings to look after. “I couldn’t get in quick enough when they started the program,” she says. “I’ve wanted to get my Grade 12 for over 30 years. When you’re working and a mom, it’s pretty hard to go to school.”

Cavendish Farms has also earned outside recognition for its efforts. At the Canadian Chamber of Commerce annual general meeting in Saskatoon last September, Canada Post presented Cavendish with its 2006 Canada Post Literacy Award. The crown corporation noted that the company “offers flexible training schedules to its employees to coexist with shift work, and targeted courses to accommodate each learner’s needs.” Canada Post also noted that besides teaching skills, the centre “develops positive employee attitudes and behaviours such as self-confidence and mutual respect.”

The Learning Centre, a 20-by-60-foot facility with big picture windows overlooking the New Annan operation and scenic Malpeque Bay, has been hugely popular. Learning Coordinator and instructor Ellyn Lyle notes that 220 of the company’s 575 hourly and 115 salaried employees have taken courses. And Dan Hughes, head of human resources, says the program has worked well for the individuals and the company. “I have had the opportunity to speak to employees who have gone through the program, and the most tangible result has been the improvement in their self-confidence. They come out feeling a lot better about themselves.”

Hughes also believes the program has helped make employees much more receptive to changes introduced to make the plant more efficient. “We need to minimize the margins of error and improve our operating efficiencies in order to remain competitive,” he says. “We need employees who understand that and who are actively involved.”

Ron Arsenault, Business Agent for Local 864 of the United Food and Commercial Workers, which represents hourly employees, says those who improve their education increase their opportunity to earn promotions by applying for positions posted within the plant. In an exacting environment that operates 24 hours per day, seven days a week, turnover tends to be quite high. It is the hope that increased mobility within the company will reduce turnover. Those involved in learning are demonstrating the initiative’s possibilities. “It’s surprising how well the program has worked,” says Arsenault. “At one time, Cavendish Farms was a place to work until you found another job. Now people are finding a home there. People who were making $9 an hour are now making $13 because they’ve been hired for better jobs, and they didn’t have that opportunity before.”

The Cavendish Farms initiative grew out of the results of an in-house labour-management survey. This forum allowed employees an opportunity to identify areas of success and room for improvement. In response to the employee feedback in 2000, a Wellness Group was formed. Kathie Drummond, head of training and development, had the chore of finding a way to bring educational opportunities to the employees. Because the PEI Department of Education had been attempting to boost literacy among workers throughout the province, it was pleased to partner with Cavendish Farms by lending the support of Workplace Education PEI. In 2001, a joint steering committee conducted an organizational-needs assessment to find out whether the employees were interested in improving their education and how many might benefit. The results indicated that interest warranted a pilot program.

Cavendish Farms hired Lyle, who has a master’s degree in leadership education and work experience in both the province’s school system and the private sector, to design a program. “I am an Islander,” she says proudly. ”I grew up on a potato farm, and that enabled me to relate to the people here.”

Her first task was to meet one-on-one with employees who had expressed an interest in a workplace literacy program to determine the basic needs. Potential learners expressed the desire to have a centre on-site and staffed by someone who could develop individually-tailored programs. They were also looking for flexible study hours to accommodate their shifts. Initially, the centre focused on traditional literacy areas – reading, writing and arithmetic – aiming to improve the skills of employees so they could obtain their Grade 12 equivalency. With a mandate to teach what they wished to learn, however, it quickly grew to include more than a dozen different programs.

The company also created incentives to encourage workers to upgrade, offering them one half of their hourly rate for each hour of class time. “It alleviates some of the cost of travel because we have people coming from two hours west and two hours east,” says Lyle. “It also helps out with babysitters.” In addition, the company pays for all learning materials, even the $20 fee to complete the GED exam.

In 2004, Cavendish Farms decided to allow family members of employees to take courses at the Learning Centre. This is also offered at no cost to the learners. To date, about 20 employees have taken the GED tests, which cover English reading and writing skills, history, earth, physical and life sciences, and mathematics, both with and without calculators. “Some of the subjects I was quite comfortable with,” recalls Perry. “In the two subjects I was worried about, I did better than I thought I would. I was quite happy with the results.”

In the three years since the centre opened, Lyle has expanded the curricula to include 18 courses that meet a wide variety of needs and interests. After completing his GED, for example, Perry went on to take post-secondary refresher courses in English, math and four modules of computers, and has recently started courses in biology and Canadian history. He is also working toward a workplace-education instructor’s certificate, which is offered by an outside organization and will allow him to serve as a mentor to others.

The Cavendish Farms Learning Centre has 10 computer stations, which are used for courses in computer literacy. To date, about 75 employees have taken these courses, including Diane Stewart, a general labourer in Plant 1. “I had no idea how to turn one on and off,” she says. “I’ve learned so much. It was a real eye-opener.”

Lyle has also developed a professional writing and editing course to assist salaried employees who may have to prepare presentations for internal or external audiences. “Some people are in managerial positions, or are moving into those jobs because of their professional experience, but may not be up-to-date on writing etiquette,” she says to explain the reason for the course.

The workplace learning program has delivered benefits to many individual employees. People often join the company in temporary or contract positions and must pass a general aptitude test before being considered for full-time jobs. “People who pass these exams have more mobility,” says Lyle. The program is also leading to a change in corporate culture, though that process is still underway. “We’re trying to move away from a culture of training, driven by the employer, to a culture of learning in which the employees take the initiative to engage in self-improvement opportunities.” Hughes agrees: “We did not want to do something that was not truly successful. We wanted to ensure that there was integrity to the process, and, secondly, that it was something employees wanted as opposed to something that was imposed from above.”

The Learning Centre now offers courses in Basic French, which helps employees and staff communicate with a sister company in Moncton, NB, where many people are bilingual. Lyle has also developed a prerequisite course for employees entering the Six Sigma program. Six Sigma is a standardized statistical system used widely by business in North America to drive out what Hughes calls “operating variants.” It sets a standard of 3.4 defects per million opportunities for a process, product or service transaction as a standard, a defect being anything that results in customer dissatisfaction. “We’re trying to identify areas where we can improve our business, reduce costs, and deliver a more consistent product to our customers,” he says. “Employees traditionally wouldn’t get involved in this type of initiative, but the Learning Centre provides an environment where they can learn about these concepts. If they understand the processes, they’re more receptive than they would have been in the past.”

But even as the program continues to evolve and grow, there remains a commitment to providing a welcoming milieu for employees who simply want to improve their literacy skills. For some employees, it’s the key to pursuing a better job. And for others, like Mike Perry, it’s mainly to fulfill, finally, a lifelong dream of completing high school.