Our Culture
Our vision encompasses people who believe in working hard to achieve success for the company and our communities. Open communication. Integrity. Recognition for a job well-done. Always learning, always growing. A feeling of value.
These are just a few ways employees describe the culture at American Century Investments. You'll notice a unique spirit in the air the minute you walk in the door. People genuinely care about each other, and we work together to make our company successful by helping our investors, clients and one another.
Our founder, Jim Stowers Jr., established an environment in which everyone is encouraged to try new things and is supported in their professional and personal goals. Mr. Stowers asks that we "treat people as you would like to be treated." His words are embraced by our leaders and permeate our employee base. This intangible spirit is key to making American Century Investments one of the nation's top employers, and it's one of our biggest sources of pride.
Premier Investment Managers
American Century Investments is a leading investment manager with more than 40 years of experience helping investors achieve their financial goals. Serving financial intermediaries, institutions and nearly two million individual investors, American Century offers a broad array of investment products across a variety of disciplines.
For four decades, American Century ® has been a leader in performance, service and innovation. From pioneering the use of computer technology in investing to allowing investors to conduct transactions and receive financial advice over the Internet, we have remained committed to building long-term relationships.
In a very real sense, investors put their future in our hands. With so much at stake, we continue to guide our work by one central belief, shared by every person at American Century: We succeed only if our investors succeed.
Community Commitment
American Century Investments has a heritage of success that is shared through our Corporate Community Investments programs. Our activities are based on our strong belief in helping others. We do this by giving back to the communities that have helped American Century grow. Each year we give an average of 2% of our net profits to charities in the communities where we work.
We address the philanthropic needs of our employees with a corporate volunteer program - Mutual Friends - which offers fun community service opportunities to employees and their families and friends. Employees gave more than 10,450 hours of service through the program in 2005. On our last corporate opinion survey, 95% of our people rated our community service efforts favorably.
We support employees' volunteer interests through our "Dollars for Doers" program, in which a monetary donation is sent to the agency an employee supports with at least 25 hours of service each year.
James Stowers Jr., our founder, built a world-class cancer research center near our headquarters office. This $300 million investment of his own money is a testament to his generosity and commitment to people. He was named one of the 10 most generous men in the country for 2001. Although the research center is not affiliated with the company, our employees feel a connection with Mr. Stowers' activity.
Celebrating Success
American Century has a long history of celebrating our success as a company, as well as individual employee's success.
From anniversaries to asset level achievements, reaching company milestones results in a celebration for employees. For example, when we celebrated reaching milestone assets under management, we threw huge parties with live music, lavish food and drink and custom-created, gold-dust sprinkled American Century cookies. At another milestone assets under management, we treated employees to outdoor celebrations with champagne toasts from executives and flyovers by airplanes trailing congratulatory messages. At the 40th anniversary, employees received a commemorative publication, a customized chocolate candy bar, a business card holder and an invitation to a 1950s-style ice cream social.
For eight years, we have celebrated being named to Fortune magazine's 100 Best list. Our celebrations have included executives flipping pancakes for an all-employees breakfast, balloons bouquets on every floor and special executive memos.
When celebrating a milestone employment anniversary, employees receive a commemorative gift of their choosing. On an annual basis, the entire company gathers to celebrate the past year and recognize the best of the best at the company. Peers nominate co-workers who emulate our Guiding Principles for the top awards in our company, which are presented at the ceremony. Our top two recipients receive travel vouchers and Giftrust accounts.
