Dixons Job Vacancies

Dixons Group is a major player in the European retail scene, with sales of £6.5bn and more than 1400 stores across the UK, Ireland and Nordic countries, France, Spain, Italy, Greece, Hungary and the Czech republic. Its companies now serve more than 100 million customers across Europe every year. It includes some of Britain’s best known retail brands including Currys which is the largest electrical chain, PC World being the UK’s biggest computer superstore, The Link is a major player in mobile phones and the Dixons name itself is part of the high street landscape. The group is also a major supplier of IT equipment and mobile telephony services to business and the public sector via PC World Business, augmented by the acquiring B2B IT provider Micro Warehouse; and through Genesis Communications, a leading mobile communications solutions provider to businesses.

Job Salary and Benefits

As you would expect from a large, well-established company, there is plenty on offer for Dixons group employees in terms of benefits – though eligibility for some benefits does depend on length of service and/or job level. The basics include a minimum or 21 days holiday per year for new starters, which rises according to length of employment (at five years it’s 25 days per year).

There are a number of performance-related bonus schemes, increasingly now tied to team performance (rather than the individual’s) and to customer service (rather than sales) so that more employees can and do benefit from success.

Many of them have a tangible stake in that success. Impressively, more than 12,000 people throughout the group, nearly a third of all employees, are participating in discretionary share option schemes. There are several of these, including a Sharesave scheme with around 5,000 participants that provides a fund for buying shares at Dixons Group at a discounted price. In addition, the company grants share options to employees depending on grade and level of service.

There’s free life assurance fro all (with cover at four times basic salary) when someone joins the company pension scheme. That’s a contributory scheme (employees pay between 3% and 5% of earnings depending on age), which is available after a year’s employment.

Discounts include 10% of all group products and services (available after three months employment) plus deals on top brands from around 100 suppliers – from nursery places to wines, and including discounted gym membership.

Flexible working hours have been available for a long time, and within the constraints of the retail environment, people are encouraged to come to their own judgements. Another example of the company’s attitude is the offer of career breaks; employees with at least two years service can take between three and 12 months with the opportunity to return to the company at the end of the break.

The group also operates an Employee Assistance Programme; a confidential advice, information and counselling service available to any staff on a 24/7 basis. This scheme – which is free and unrestricted – is provided via telephone helplines and staffed by specially trained advisers.

Job Promotion and Career Development

There is widespread acknowledgment that Dixons is particularly good at developing managers, not least by the people at the top of many of Britain’s leading retailers, many of whom spent some of their most formative years at Dixons Group.

Dixons Group puts a lot of emphasis on performance management to identify and develop high flyers, but also to help employees more generally to be more effective in their roles. So personal reviews emphasise goals and performance, and there is a wide range of bespoke training on offer from a dedicated internal training resource and specialist external consultants.

In fact, the group offers more than 500 training and development options to employees, including language training. These options use carefully structured modules, training workshops and a dedicated e-learning intranet service. In 2003, more than 12,000 hours of leadership training were delivered, and the group operates four levels of management development training run in conjunction with Henley Management College.

In addition, there’s increasing emphasis on coaching and mentoring alongside the more conventional methods of developing people. Dixons Group says it aims to add value to the people it employs, and it is prepared to take a creative attitude to this.

Similarly, the group is determined to use the best ideas from any part of the organisation. Dixons is no longer a UK-forced operation, it is becoming a truly European group with operation in 13 countries. The growing internationalisation is being matched by more inter-country postings.

Dixons Group plc
Maylands Avenue
Hemel Hempstead
HP2 7TG