Lisa Korol, regional HR manager for MEA at Axis Communications, suggests ways to cultivate a vibrant workplace culture.
Lisa Korol, regional HR manager for MEA at Axis Communications, oversees HR for both the Middle East and Africa regions. Axis is a security technology company that specialises in video surveillance, access control, intercom, and audio systems.
Born and raised in Moscow, Lisa graduated in psychology from Moscow State University before beginning her journey in HR. She shares how the company has successfully fostered a positive, thriving workplace culture, emphasising the tangible benefits such an environment brings to both employees and the business.
- What role does leadership play in fostering a culture of engagement and satisfaction?
Leadership plays a vital role in fostering engagement and satisfaction at Axis, starting with transparency and open communication. Each year, the EMEA sales team meets for a kickoff event where leaders share business strategies and objectives.
Regular communication includes weekly updates, monthly newsletters, and quarterly calls to keep employees informed. Leaders ensure quick, clear communication during major changes and remain accessible through calls, emails, or meetings, always open to feedback and questions.
- What are the key factors that contributed to this achievement?
Being recognised as a Great Place to Work reflects how we prioritise people and foster a welcoming, collaborative environment. From day one, we focus on making new team members feel like part of the family. In fact, 93% of our employees said they felt warmly welcomed when they joined us.
We have a pretty thorough onboarding process – typically three to five weeks – where new hires meet all the key people and get a good understanding of how everything works together. Employees also attend Axis Intro Days in Sweden for a deeper understanding of our global operations.
Leadership programmes, mentorship, and global exchange opportunities promote teamwork, growth and a sense of community. This focus on people and development is central to the culture where employees thrive and grow.
- Can you walk us through the process of identifying areas for improvement based on employee feedback? How do you prioritise these areas?
When reviewing employee feedback, we use a simple yet effective approach, prioritising improvements with an important/urgent matrix. This helps us focus on what’s crucial for both the business and our people, addressing immediate needs first.
For less urgent but important areas, we develop a one- to three-year plan to ensure long-term progress. We also look for ‘low-hanging fruit’ – quick, easy fixes with noticeable impact – to show employees we're listening and acting, building trust and maintaining momentum.
- Can you share any examples of initiatives or programmes that were introduced as a result of engagement surveys or feedback?
One great example of an initiative that came directly from employee feedback is our EMEA “Axchange” programme. Through engagement surveys, we learned that many employees were really interested in opportunities to work in other regions and departments within Axis.
“Axchange” is a personalised development programme that allows employees to work on specific projects or tasks in another country or region. Based on the feedback we received, this year we made the programme more transparent and accessible. Now, more employees are aware of it and can take advantage of the opportunity. Several employees have already had the chance to work on exciting projects in different regions, gaining valuable insights and expanding their professional experience.
- What challenges have you encountered in measuring employee engagement, and how have you addressed them?
Thankfully, we haven’t encountered many challenges. The one thing that does come to mind is that, early on, there was some scepticism from a few employees about whether the feedback they provided would actually lead to action. However, over time, we’ve been able to prove otherwise.
By consistently acting on the feedback, making improvements, and being transparent about the changes we’re implementing, we’ve built trust.
