Non-financial targets and sustainability 

For more than 60 years Peab has contributed to sustainable social development and worked to improve everyday life for people in the local community. We do this by building everything from homes, schools and hospitals to bridges, roads and other infrastructure. Working sustainably is a strategic matter for Peab that always takes place locally, connected to everyday life based on our core values, business concept, mission, strategic targets and Code of Conduct.

Since 2021 we monitor our business based on nine external targets – both financial and non-financial – that also identify our prioritized sustainable aspects (Best workplace and Leader in social responsibility). We monitor our targets quarterly, semiannually or annually. In connection with the year-end report we present the outcome of all nine targets.

Most satisfied customers

It is imperative for a long-term, sustainable relationship that Peab deliver on its obligations to customers. A satisfied customer is a customer that comes back and is vital to marketing our company. This is why our annual customer survey is an important measure of how well we are meeting our customers’ expectations while also indicating where there is room for improvement. This year’s Customer Satisfaction Index (CSI) added up to 80 (81), which is a continued good result and higher than our target of 75. Customers’ perception of Peab’s employees, offer and ethics are three areas that have developed substantially in this year’s index and regarding our business areas, Construction is notable for how its CSI has improved compared to last year.

Best workplace

Serious accidents

A safe work environment is the foundation of our business. Everyone at our workplaces should be able to be there under safe and secure conditions, despite the fact that there are risks involved in the work we do. In order to prevent incidents and accidents at our workplaces we develop quality-ensured work methods and train our employees. Our focus is on planning and risk assessment in projects, taking safety measures and learning from reported risk observations, incidents and accidents.

Our target of a contracting trend in serious accidents* comprises everyone at our workplaces. After contracting in 2021 the trend turned in March 2022 and the number of serious accidents rose. During the fourth quarter there were six and for the entire year of 2022 there were 49 (28) serious accidents. Of these, 30 referred to our own employees and 19 referred to subcontractors. The accidents occurred primarily in construction contract operations in Sweden and were mostly accidents from falling or connected to handling machines. Sadly a colleague borrowed from another construction company died from a fall at one of our projects in Sweden.

It’s regrettable that the trend in accidents is developing in the wrong direction, and that one accident was even fatal. This proves how important it is to continuously work on our safety culture. In order to turn the tide we have intensified our preventive work concerning the work environment and we work with in-depth investigations and take measures to prevent similar accidents from happening again. We also continue to provide our information series to all our employees where we share good examples, advice concerning the work environment and safety as well as information on the latest in the industry.

We also monitor the number of workplace accidents with more than four days absence, excluding the day of injury (LTI4), and workplace accidents according to the same definition per one million hours worked (LTIF4) for our own employees. In the fourth quarter this year there were 40 (28 third quarter 2022) and the LTIF4 frequency rate for a rolling twelve month period was 5.8 (6.2 after the third quarter 2022), which is a positive trend.

Every remedied risk is one less potential accident, which is why we are highly focused on reporting and remedying risk observations*. During the year the organization reported around 60,000 risk observations. Peab has implemented a new system for reporting and managing risk observations, incidents and accidents in Swedish operations. The system has a number of advantages such as an even greater focus on seeing that planned measures are carried out. Operations in our other countries will implement the system during 2023.

* For a definition see section Alternative performance measures and definitions.

Attractive employers (eNPS)

We should be the obvious choice for anyone who wants to work in the industry. Everyone should be part of safe and including workplaces with good work conditions and opportunities to develop at Peab. Twice a year we hold our personnel survey The Handshake so that we can continuously develop and improve as co-workers and teams. The questions in The Handshake mainly concern productivity, the team’s sustainability and if employees are willing to recommend Peab as an employer to friends and acquaintances (eNPS). The latter is also one of our nine external targets that we report twice a year.

The response frequency in the autumn survey was 86 percent (84) in the Group, accompanied by many suggestions for improvement. This shows the great interest our employees have in contributing to developing their own teams and all operations.

Within the strategic target Best workplace the eNPS (recommend Peab) score should be above the benchmark for the industry (industry and manufacturing). The eNPS score for the Group rose in the autumn survey by one point to 29 compared to 28 in the spring survey. This is clearly above the Nordic benchmark which is currently 22 compared to 20 in the previous survey. In principle all areas are developing well and our employees continue to be satisfied at work, despite the tougher market situation. Worth noting is that the eNPS score is on the rise among skilled workers in almost all of the organization, and the most positive changes can be seen in Norway. Parameters like change and well-being have developed better than previously. Right now we are working on following the areas safety culture and equal treatment more closely in the Handshake.

Leader in social responsibility

Climate target for carbon dioxide intensity

In recent years Peab’s climate and environmental work has increased in scope and our targets and metrics more stringent. As the Nordic Community Builder we have a big responsibility for reducing the considerable climate impact of the construction and civil engineering industry at the rate required by the Paris Agreement.

Peab impacts the environment and the climate through our own operations and the impact created by partners such as suppliers and customers. Our operations primarily cause emissions of greenhouse gases by using various materials in production like concrete, steel and asphalt. Two other major sources of carbon emissions in production are energy consumption and transportation. Therefore our prioritized, emission reduction activities can be found within the framework of these areas. As community builders we also have a comprehensive perspective on our climate work and strive to contribute to a sustainable society on the whole by building, for example, solar power plants, wind farms and railroads or by building in such a way that people can live more sustainably. We have a life cycle perspective in our operations and take responsibility for both making and meeting demands in the value chain in relation to our customers and suppliers. We also have an advantage in that we can supply our construction contract operations and the projects we develop ourselves with input goods and raw material through business area Industry, which augments our ability to actively steer towards lower carbon emissions.

In 2045 Peab will be climate neutral. Our targets by 2030 are to reduce carbon dioxide intensity by at least 60 percent in our own operations (Scope 1 and 2)  and for input goods and purchased services (Scope 3) by at least 50 percent compared to base year 2015. The outcome after 2022 reveals that developments are going in the right direction although to different degrees. Carbon dioxide intensity in our own production has gone down by 43 percent compared to base year 2015 and by two percent for input goods and purchased services. This means that we are well on the road to converting the production we ourselves have control over but the greater challenge is when we are dependent on other parties for a reduction in our carbon footprint. It is therefore vital that we continue to make explicit and stringent demands as well as point out choices that are better for the climate in order to reduce emissions. We work actively to increase the completeness in our measurements of carbon dioxide intensity, which is particularly demanding in Scope 3 reporting.

Equal opportunity
Only about five percent of those that graduate with, for Peab, degrees in relevant, practical education are women. This means that the construction and civil engineering industry has a major role to play in taking advantage of all the competence society has to offer. As one of the largest Nordic community builders we have a responsibility to nudge the entire industry forward. Our target initially is therefore to strive for the percentage of women recruited to Peab for our core skills to always be higher than the percentage of women who have graduated with, for us, relevant degrees on the education markets. We are focused on core skills in production (skilled workers) as well as in production management and production support (white-collar workers). At the end of 2022 the percentage of women in new recruitments was 7.9 percent in production and processing compared to our target of more than 5.0 percent and 45.3 percent in production management and production support whereas our target was more than 30 percent. In 2023 we are going to implement a new internship program for women. Our target for 2023 regarding equal opportunity in production and processing will continue to be surpassing 5.0 percent and our target for production management and production support surpassing 30.0 percent.