Noble Systems Corporation
Atlanta, GA
Grade: A
| Summary: Room for advancement, great benefits and training. Nap pod, employee suggestion program, yoga classes, established company, impressive tenure, great perks and options for fun. |
| Intro: Noble Systems’ employees enjoy the opportunity to gain new technical skills and learn on the job. For most, it’s not too big, not too small, just the right size environment. Because of the size, employees are more visible, more opportunity to wear more hats, gain new skills, contribute to the company’s success, build a career, and grow professionally. |
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Impact statements:
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Compensation:
Market rate of role, skill/experience level, and individual performance/achievement of goals.
Advancement Opportunities:
Organic Gardening: We hire smart people in areas like technical training and technical support with the understanding that they will learn about our company and products in those areas and grow into positions they ultimately want to be in, like Software Development, Account Management, Project Management, etc. The same applies to administrative employees. We have had team members who started in reception or administrative assistant who have progressed through the company (sometimes while working a degree) to become Administrators, Project Managers, Vice Presidents, and even a Lawyer on our legal team.
Training opportunities:
Online training that is available to employees. Regardless of position, employees can access training materials and learn about our products to help improve their knowledge about our business and our industry. We also support employees who want to attend special seminars and courses that apply to their responsibilities and roles.
Medical benefits:
Noble Systems sponsors a Wellness program wherein employees can earn discounted premiums on health insurance. We also offer a smoking cessation program, as well as a wellness hotline. We also offer a yoga class twice a week during the work day, and our corporate office has access to an on-site gym, as well as walking/jogging trails, and employees can request stand-up desks.
Special accommodations:
- Provide a Smart Car for our top Software Engineering Co-op student.
- Financial assistance to employees for medical assistance or addiction issues that medical coverage does not provide
- Paid an intern’s tuition for a month.
- We have gifts to recognize employees who reach 1, 5 and 10 years of employment.
- For every employee who reaches 20 years of employment we do something special that is unique to that individual; for example, we flew a group of three employees for lunch on a beach, one employee received 3rd row seats to a concert, while another employee was given an all-expense paid trip to a National Soccer event.
Community service/charitable causes:
Our Social Events committee endorses a charity every month.
Here are a few:
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Cause |
Action |
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Technology Association of GA |
10k as a sponsor with proceeds going to charity |
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Atlanta Food Bank |
Supported activities to contribute to |
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American Heart Association |
Supported activities to contribute to |
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St. Jude Children’s Hospital |
Supported activities to contribute to |
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Toys for Tots |
Supported activities to contribute to |
Measuring satisfaction:
We utilize new hire surveys, turnover analysis, average tenure metrics, satisfaction surveys, and employee exit interviews. Employees can also submit suggestions for new ideas, policy/procedure modifications, etc., at any time.
Creative meeting places:
Individual departments are encouraged to promote team building, and have held activities such as:
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Hotel banquet rooms where we will have themes like Carnival, Mardi Gras, Casino night |
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Buying out a movie theatre for the Star Wars movie premiere |
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Bowling night |
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Top Golf outings |
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Poker Nights in their own homes |
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Fun Runs |
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We also had a 25th anniversary party at the Fernbank Museum |
Perks:
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Lunch for employees from local restaurants for special events, such as employee appreciation days, Cinco de Mayo, Halloween, etc. |
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We bring in donuts for breakfast, or have waffle/pancake breakfasts cooked by employees. |
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We also use just about any reason for cake: Birthdays, engagements, weddings, baby showers, births, new Citizenship, new professional certifications, etc. |
Fun:
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We offer mid-day yoga classes twice a week. |
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We have a ping-pong table, pool table, and big screen tvs in the break room. |
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Breakroom with games. |
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We also offer a nap pod. |
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And employees can take advantage of walking trails around building with a pond or the building fitness center. |
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We also have special events such as holiday potluck lunches, Halloween trick-or-treats for employees’ children, and chili and dessert cook-offs. |
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We also organize pool and ping-pong tournaments resulting in a Friday night “finals” night that include drinks and snacks. |
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For special events, such as inaugurations, elections, athletic tournaments, etc, we’ll show the programming on tvs in the office and employees can take breaks to watch, as their workloads allow. |
Collaboration tools:
Noble Systems offers an online “university” for internal training. We also have a published knowledgebase to which any employee can make recommendations or contribute content to share information, experience, and collaborate to improve team knowledge and training – so that we can provide better service for our customers. (And happier customers make for happier employees, especially in technical support and development!)
How corporate vision is communicated:
We have an annual employee meeting where most employees attend; we record the CEO addresses for those that cannot attend. We also have management visit our remote offices on a regular basis to facilitate communication of vision, goals, and challenges and solutions.
Teamwork:
Team work is very important. We have departmental team building events throughout the year such as bowling, golf, poker nights, etc. It is important for employees to interact with one another outside the office. Inside the office, we have weekly meetings where all departments are represented and issues are discussed that affect everyone. We also have a Social Committee that is represented by each department, where members suggest events that ultimately reward employees, improve satisfaction, build a sense of environment, and foster an atmosphere that helps retain existing employees and attract new ones.
Empowering employees:
We have an employee suggestion program which allows any employee to submit a suggestion at any time, whether it be related to snack options in the vending machine, changes to improve policies and procedures, ideas to better serve clients, or social events to build relationships. Our managers have open door policies to encourage team members to address concerns or new ideas. We expect our employees to be problem-solvers, and we give them the ability to come up with creative solutions to customer needs or challenges.
Our employees go above and beyond every day to help the company meet its goals. It’s the sales manager who makes a last-minute flight to do a demo to win new business. It’s the corporate attorney who spends hours hammering out a large contract at the end of the month. It’s the Project Manager and Implementation Team who works on a weekend to get a customer up and running and minimize disruptions to their business. It’s the developer who works overnight to bug fix a new release. It’s the support technician who comes in on their day off to troubleshoot a customer issue and walk them through the resolution. It’s the travel manager who takes after-hours calls to get field service techs to a customer site in an emergency. It’s the admin who orders dinner for the team, so they have the fuel to work the problem. It’s the employee who takes time out of their already busy schedule to help another employee – whether it’s answering a question, sharing a common experience, showing them a new tool or technique, or just being a sounding board. At Noble Systems, giving extra effort is the norm – not the exception.
We have a UMatter/Kudos program where, customers, vendors, management and employees can submit kudos for another employee. Points are awarded for those kudos and recognized employees are announced each week via the company’s intranet. Every year at the annual meeting, the top earning employees are recognized, and receive a plaque, a bonus, and an additional day off.
We have an employee suggestion program and a continual improvement program. We have a Intellectual Property program. Through collaboration with our IP team, identifying or developing new functionality can result in employees getting their name on a patent. Currently, more than 40 different employees have their name on Patents. Employees also receive a plaque and a bonus for any accepted Patent.
Ensuring well-being:
We sponsor an annual Health Fair which includes testing of common health indicators, such as blood pressure, cholesterol, BMI, etc. This also involves education. As an example, we had an employee determine that she had potential for osteoporosis at one of these events and made lifestyle changes as a result. Noble Systems has paid for several smoking cessation programs; we have also created a smoke free zone, and employees must leave the premises of our building campus entirely to smoke. Through our wellness program, we discount health insurance payments for non-smokers and based on health scores gathered at the health fair; we advertise the targets in advance, so that employees know what goals they are working towards. In addition and unknown to most employees, we have assisted specific employees with health issues such as drug and food related addiction. Noble Systems has paid for programs that were not covered by health insurance. And, employees can take advantage of a wellness hotline. We also offer leave of absence programs for a variety of reasons, so that employees can take a break if needed, and still retain tenure and the security of having a job to return to.
We encourage our employees to take breaks during the day, to refresh their creative energies and to network with other employees. Our breakroom fosters this with a pool/ping-pong table, multiple tv’s, and conversation areas.We encourage employees who want to take a break to use the nap pod to regenerate. We also offer the option of stand-up desks for employees, as well as have onsite access to a fitness center and trails.
This is handled on an individual basis. Noble Systems recognizes that a work life balance is important. We provide laptops and cell phones to most employees. Employees use these tools to their advantage to be able to work from remote locations and take time to attend family-related functions or whatever they need to do to achieve that balance. If a special project requires late nights or weekend work, you may often find employees taking a break and playing games on the conference room big screens.
We are a global company that provides 24/7 service to our customers. While we do have general office hours during which our reception desk is open, work hours are defined by the position and responsibility of each individual. All employees are equipped to work remotely if needed. Depending on their role, some team members may have set hours. However, many have the flexibility to work around high-traffic hours, child care hours, work from home for special requests, etc, as long as they are available during a core period.
Many employees can and do make their own schedules, based on their role and preferences (works better in the morning, works better in the afternoon, commute times, etc). We also offer the flexibility for employees to work from home to be able to accept a delivery, be home for a repairman, be home with a sick child, etc. Our entry level policy for new hires is 2 weeks’ vacation and 4 sick/personal days; with tenure, vacation time grows up to 4 weeks annually, plus 4 sick/personal days.
Diversity:
Diversity is a natural occurrence. We hire the best person for the job. We hire young (straight out of school) and not so young, from here and from there. Employees may not start out being “like” each other or best friends. But once they work together, problem solve together, learn from each other, meet a deadline together, or deliver the impossible together for a client, they develop respect, which ultimately fosters an amazing relationship which is the foundation of our culture!
Rather than being constrained by diversity requirements, which may affect our ability to provide the best service for our customers, we make decisions based on factors that are the best fit for our business needs, and for our customers’ business needs.
Longevity:
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The average tenure of employees worldwide is more than 6 years. |
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In the United States the average tenure is more than 7 years. |
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Of 378 employees, 91 employees will have served more than 10 years in 2016, which is 24%, or almost a quarter, of all employees. |
| Closing company statements: It is important that new hires know that we are looking for the A Team. No one wants to work with the B Team. We are looking for hardworking people. Hard works pays off at Noble Systems. If you are someone who wants to do the bare minimum to get by and leave at 5 pm every day, Noble Systems probably isn’t the place for you. We are looking for innovators and creative thinkers – as evidenced by our aggressive IP development program. Opportunities abound at Noble Systems for employees who work hard and want to learn, and who want to contribute to the success of our company. To us, that means helping our customers work smarter, so they make more profits, can buy more products from us, and will recommend us to their colleagues – all of which helps us grow and allows us to reward our employees for their hard work. |
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