Atlantic Canada's Top Employers (2026) Magazine - Magazine - Page 16
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ATLANTIC CANADA’S TOP EMPLOYERS (2026)
Employee input drives culture change at CAA Atlantic
W
hen Mike
Burgess started
working as
vice-president
of people and
culture at Dartmouth, N.S.-based
CAA Atlantic Limited four years
ago, his goal was to transform the
region-wide provider of roadside
assistance, insurance and travel
services into an organization that
put employee satisfaction and
retention first.
They acknowledge that
what we’re doing is very
important to the business,
and we’re taken care of
very well.
— Dominick Forrestall
Emergency Roadside
Technician
CAA Atlantic regularly measures employee engagement through formal culture assessments and pulse checks.
“We’ve made a deliberate
transition from a more formal and
structured organization to really
shift the focus to prioritizing our
employees,” he says. “We clearly
laid out our mission, vision and
values, reinforced them in our
hiring process, performance
reviews and recognition programs,
and made sure that new hires
were quickly made aware of our
philosophy and approach.”
Driven by employee feedback,
the changes included everything
from permitting casual dress to
increasing vacation time and
compensation and providing
educational scholarships for
children of employees. Not
surprisingly, they’ve been popular.
“No one left for 18 months after
we adjusted the compensation,”
Burgess says. “It was great.”
Dominick Forrestall, an
emergency roadside technician,
can vouch for that. “When I first
joined CAA and realized that a
lot of folks had been doing these
ground-level jobs for 15 years or
more, I thought, ‘Okay, this must
be an excellent place to work,’”
he says. “They acknowledge that
what we’re doing is very important
to the business, and we’re taken
care of very well.”
One thing Forrestall particularly
appreciated was the fact that
his previous work experience as
a locksmith contributed to his
benefits at CAA.
“I made keys and programmed
computers in cars which was
considered relevant experience, so
I was allocated more vacation time
because of that,” he says. “It makes
the transition easier. If you’re well
established in another trade and
want to come to CAA, you don’t
feel like you’re starting from zero
again.”
CAA Atlantic — which operates
locations in New Brunswick, P.E.I.,
Nova Scotia and Newfoundland
and Labrador — also redesigned
its benefits program to base
employee contributions on
income. “Those who make the
least pay the least,” Burgess
says. “And we followed up with
structured learning development
programs to upgrade people’s
skills.”
Those programs include
extensive leadership training
offerings as well as career
development options for front-line
and mid-level employees.
“We got feedback from our team
members that they needed clarity
around how to move forward with
their careers, so we built our
Career Path program, which
defines the competencies and
experience needed for each role
and the courses they can take,”
Burgess says. “So now anyone can
see their path and work with their
leader to build a two-year plan.”
The organization measures
employee engagement annually,
