We conduct annual performance reviews and career discussions that focus on work-life balance, career development, training needs and opportunities. To support our tradition of fostering long-term employment by promoting from within, team members receive formal training throughout their careers at Hormel Foods.
Training
Training is an integral part of developing and growing the skills that foster long-term careers and team member satisfaction at Hormel Foods. Training is based on applicability to team members’ position responsibilities. Thus, the number of training hours per team member varies across the company. Some of our training programs are:
- Accountability
- Accounting
- Benefits
- Communication skills
- Computer skills
- Diversity and inclusion
- Executive leadership
- Food safety
- Interpersonal skills
- Management/leadership
- Negotiation
- Operations
- Reliability/maintenance
- Sales
- Six Sigma
- Workplace safety
Safety Training
Safety comes first at Hormel Foods. With that in mind, we equip our team members with the resources they need to remain safe.
Examples of topics covered by the trainings include:
- Electrical safety
- Emergency action plans
- Ergonomics
- The global harmonized system for hazard communication
- Inclement weather
- Lockout–control of hazardous energy
- Machine guarding
- Personal protective equipment
Diversity Training
To nurture and strengthen our culture of diversity, equity and inclusion, we offer relevant training and programs, and maintain relationships with organizations at colleges and universities to increase the diversity of our talent pools.
Human Rights Training
Hormel Foods team members are trained on policies and procedures concerning aspects of human rights that are relevant to our operations.
Our career development efforts facilitate and encourage career enhancement and advancement. We also offer educational assistance to reimburse eligible employees for undergraduate, graduate and preparatory courses.
Team Member Engagement
We believe an engaged workforce leads to a more innovative, productive and profitable company.
Our team members are the heart and soul of our company. In 2020, in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, we held our first Spirit Week to help our 20,000 team members across the globe feel more engaged and connected.
Each year, we celebrate the spirit of our company, our inspired people and our inspired food by having in-person and virtual events, storytelling, concerts, celebrations and philanthropic opportunities. We use these events to donate to and volunteer with food-security organizations in all our communities and around the world. It’s just one of the ways we demonstrate we’re not just inspired to make great food, we’re inspired to make a difference.
These events contribute to our social impact goals of working toward zero food waste, fostering a sense of belonging, and providing the equivalent of 70 million meals to those in need through cash and product donations.
We understand that our team members won’t be engaged if they don’t feel valued and challenged, so we conduct annual performance reviews with more than 99% of salaried team members, 100% of office hourly team members and 100 percent (informal) of hourly team members in our production facilities.
We also conduct team member engagement surveys to better understand what engagement at Hormel Foods means to our workforce and how it can be enhanced.