You are given a text that consists of multiple sentences. Your task is to perform abstractive summarization on this text. Use your understanding of the content to express the main ideas and crucial details in a shorter, coherent, and natural sounding text. 
Text: References to margins and adjusted operating margins reflect the performance for the Americas and International segments.
We will refer to Net Service Revenue or NSR, which is defined as revenue excluding pass-through revenue.
Our discussion of year-over-year NSR growth for the fourth quarter and full year is adjusted to exclude the benefit of the extra week to the prior year fourth quarter.
As a reminder, we sold the Management Services business in January of 2020 and we closed on the sale of the Power and Civil construction businesses in October 2020 and January 2021 respectively.
The financial results of these businesses are classified as discontinued operations in our financial statements.
Lara Poloni, our President will discuss key operational priorities and Gaurav Kapoor, our Chief Financial Officer will review our financial performance and outlook in greater detail.
We will conclude with a question-and-answer session.
I want to begin by acknowledging our teams across the globe whose contributions made fiscal 2021 a tremendous success.
Our people remain our greatest assets, and it's because of their commitment to our success that we are so well positioned for the future.
I'm proud of our team's accomplishments, and I'm energized by the opportunity we see in 2022 and beyond.
Turning to our results.
We exceeded our expectations on every key metric, highlighted by accelerating organic NSR growth, record operating margins, double-digit earnings growth and strong cash flow.
It really was a very successful year.
Our NSR for the fourth quarter increased by 6.5%, which marked a third consecutive quarter of accelerating organic growth and included the strong contributions from both the Americas and International businesses.
We delivered a 14.8% segment adjusted operating margin in the fourth quarter and 13.8% for the full year.
Both results exceeded our expectations and extends our lead over the industry.
To put this performance in context, our margin in the fourth quarter is more than 600 basis points higher than in fiscal 2018.
This performance directly reflects the high value we provide to clients and the actions we have taken to create the best industry delivery platform.
Looking back to February, at our Investor Day, we set margin targets at the time that we were very ambitious.
Today, we are ahead of schedule on our plans, and we have even greater conviction in our 17% longer-term goal, which we now view as achievable rather than aspirational.
Importantly, our strong margins afford us the opportunity to accelerate investments in our teams to drive organic growth and into our Digital AECOM capabilities, which I will discuss in greater detail in a moment.
Turning to earnings, we delivered at the high end of our guidance ranges for both adjusted EBITDA and EPS.
Full-year adjusted EBITDA was $830 million and adjusted earnings per share was $2.82, which marked an 11% and 31% increase respectively.
Free cash flow was $583 million and was driven by our strong earnings and continued high cash flow conversion.
Our cash flow result is a testament to the focus on efficiently converting our earnings to cash as well as the high quality lowest mix of our business.
We have repurchased more than $1 billion of stock since last September, or 13% of the Company.
And we have $940 million remaining under our current authorization.
We remain committed to repurchasing stock with available cash and cash flow, which we believe is the best and highest returning use of our capital after our investments in growth.
Turning to our wins and backlog.
Our win rate remains high, and we continue to gain market share.
We delivered $3.7 billion of wins in the fourth quarter, including a 1.2 book-to-burn ratio in the design business.
Our contracted backlog, which is a key indicator of revenue growth increased by 18% and included 4% growth in design business.
Our pipeline of opportunities is up to double-digits in the Americas design business.
And based on our clients' strengthening funding backdrop, including benefits from the $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill in the US, we expect our backlog to continue to grow.
Overall, our performance demonstrates that we are outgrowing the industry organically and capturing market share.
There are two areas in particular that highlight our success and showcase the value we deliver to clients.
First, we set as a key objective to substantially grow our Program Management business and we are delivering.
This is especially apparent in the Middle East where we had several recent successes on high priority and larger programs where a combination of technical leadership, global thinking and program management expertise were instrumental in our success.
This includes winning significantly expanded program management and design roles in transformational projects in Saudi Arabia, such as for AlUla City and a large transportation project in Qatar, where more than 100 employees have joined AECOM from the incumbent to support this work.
Second, we are demonstrating our leadership on ESG.
Our investment at the Natural Capital Laboratory in UK is a great example.
We established this project in 2019 to study the environmental change and biodiversity impact with precision by leveraging drones, artificial intelligence, GIS Data and thermal imaging.
The ability to more exactly measure the impacts of decarbonization is a critical element of the global agenda to drive decarbonization and carbon sequestration.
Our investment in our work at the NCL underscores how AECOM and our professionals are leading in the development of standards and methods to measure decarbonization which will be especially important for creating reliable markets for sustainability investments.
Let's turn to the next slide.
I mentioned earlier that our strong performance in fiscal 2021 has created the opportunity to accelerate investments and expand our advantages.
We break these investments into three categories: People, Clients and Digital.
Beginning with our people.
We are a knowledge-based business and our diverse professionals serve as our greatest advantage.
Therefore, it is critical that we have the right culture and programs in place to attract and retain the best talent in the industry.
To do this, we've implemented a flexible work model designed to facilitate optimal work life balance.
In addition, we've enhanced the benefit programs and increased our investment in technical and professional development.
Most importantly, our people are winning and delivering the most challenging and iconic projects.
All of this culminates in a culture of high engagement, high satisfaction and low attrition.
Turning to how we deliver for clients.
We are leading with our higher margin program management and advisory capabilities and investing across our key account programs to ensure our clients are benefiting from our best expertise globally.
We're also developing technology to automate and pre-populate certain elements of our designs, which capitalizes on our vast expertise, accelerates the design process and extends the capacity of our workforce.
Finally, today we unveiled Digital AECOM which brings together all of our innovative digital capabilities.
After more than a year of focused investment and the launch of many digital solutions, we are now formally rolling out our digital products.
A great example of this is PlanEngage, a digital platform that reinvents the public engagement process for an infrastructure project by creating greater certainty on cost, time and stakeholder management.
Successful community engagement is a critical step in a project, but this process is really digitized.
PlanEngage simplifies this process by integrating all the key elements of a project into a digital tool, which allows our clients to capture information to make more informed decisions and advance projects more quickly.
This solution is years ahead of the competition by our estimation.
And we see PlanEngage becoming the industry standard.
With the passage of the Infrastructure Act in the US, this tool will be even more valuable.
Across these focus areas, one theme is constant.
Our investment will expand our advantage as demand grows and labor constraints challenges some in our industry.
Please turn to the next slide.
Looking to fiscal 2022 and beyond, the spotlight on infrastructure has never been brighter.
In the US, the $1.2 trillion Infrastructure and Jobs Act marks a generational investment in America's infrastructure.
This bill provides much needed long-term funding certainty across our strongest end markets such as transit modernization, electrification, environmental remediation and climate resilience.
Importantly, we are positioned to benefit from nearly every line item in this bill.
We anticipate this funding will increase our addressable market in our most profitable business by double-digits over the coming years.
And we expect the most meaningful benefits in fiscal 2023 and beyond.
In addition to the strengthened federal funding environment, all of our state and local clients are on an equally strong footing.
Today, state DOT [Phonetic] budgets are significantly above prior projections and the fiscal outlooks are stronger.
Our public sector pipeline in US is up double-digits and with the strong funding backdrop now in place, we anticipate the pace of decisions will accelerate as well.
Our international markets are equally strong.
Conditions in our largest markets have improved, and we're delivering strong growth across all major international markets in the fourth quarter.
In addition, we had strong backlog growth in each of our larger geographies.
I'm especially pleased to see that our strategy with a focus on Program Management contributing to the success in places like the Middle East and in key transportation wins in the UK, where regaining market share has been a key priority.
As the number one ranked transportation facilities and environmental engineering firm as well as the number two ranked water design firm, we are uniquely positioned to benefit.
Turning to our financial guidance.
We've initiated adjusted EBITDA and adjusted earnings per share guidance of between $880 million and $920 million and between $3.20 and $3.40.
This reflects 8% and 17% growth at the respective midpoints.
Underpinning this growth is an expectation for another year of accelerating organic NSR growth and at least 30 basis point increase in our margins to another record high of 14.1%.
Our guidance incorporates all the planned growth investments we are making in our people, business development, client delivery and digital capabilities.
I also want to comment on the 2024 financial projections we shared at our Investor Day in February.
Based on our strong performance to date and the returns we expect on our investments, we are raising our long-term adjusted earnings per share guidance to at least $4.75 in fiscal 2024.
This represents a more than doubling of our fiscal 2020 earnings and a nearly 20% CAGR from 2021 to 2024.
I am pleased with how well our teams have responded to our new strategy and their many accomplishments in fiscal 2021.
In particular, I'd like to highlight our success on some of our larger key pursuits, our global approach, technical leadership, program management capabilities, advisory expertise and multiyear investments are bearing fruit.
A great example of this is in the Middle East where we prioritize as a long-term growth opportunity.
We have gained market share with wins from megacities, including NEOM and AlUla in Saudi Arabia.
Key to these successes was the integration of global capabilities, including expertise from every region and market sector.
Our culture of collaboration has truly distinguished us from competitors, particularly as our clients work to address multi-decade investment programs that require more holistic thinking.
Another great example is in the US where we were recently selected for a large program for a client who selected us based on our leadership capabilities in many verticals including in PFAS, even as PFAS expertise wasn't the main criteria in the pursuit.
We are continuing to prioritize our time and capital on the best opportunities, which has been instrumental in our high win rate over the past year and in our confidence in continued market share gains.
Looking ahead, our clients continue to prioritize investments in ESG, and we are well positioned to capitalize on this trend.
At the COP26 Summit earlier this month, this commitment was front and center as the most prominent public and private sector voices spoke with unity on the challenge and the opportunity.
In demonstrating how we are leading in ESG alongside our clients, we published our Global ESG Report last week, which includes disclosures aligned with the SASB and TCFD frameworks.
This report is an important step in our ESG journey and underscores our commitment to regularly communicating our progress on our sustainable legacy strategies.
Finally, Troy spoke about our focus on ensuring we attract and retain the industry's best and brightest.
And I'm pleased to report we are operating from a strong position.
To that point, we conducted a global employee survey in September that revealed very strong levels of engagement, including the vast majority recommending AECOM as a great place to work.
High employee engagement is also leading to the highest client satisfaction scores in our Company's history in fiscal 2021.
With our momentum, we are in an enviable position from which to deliver another strong year in fiscal 2022.
Please turn to the next slide.
Our fourth quarter and full year results serve as clear evidence of the strength of our business and the benefit of our focused strategy.
We delivered: Accelerating NSR growth; the highest margins in our Company's history; another year of double-digit adjusted EBITDA growth; more than 30% adjusted earnings per share growth and; a seventh consecutive year of free cash flow at or above our guidance range.
Our strong financial performance is creating increased opportunities to invest in organic growth while also bolstering our confidence in delivering on our long-term organic growth and financial goals.
Importantly, all of this was achieved while making critical investments in people, teams and digital capabilities that will sustain our advantages in fiscal 2022 and beyond.
Please turn to the next slide.
In the Americas, NSR increased by 7% in the fourth quarter, including growth in both design and construction management businesses.
Contracted backlog increased by 21% to set a new record.
This included growth in the design business and a large construction management project that moved into contracted backlog and firmed up our outlook for the year.
I should note that our awarded backlog was reduced by $1.3 billion as a result of this client only advancing the first phase of this project at this time.
However, the economic impact of the shift is not material to our earnings outlook.
And, our confidence in the growth outlook for the construction management business is higher than it ever has been in many years.
The fourth quarter adjusted operating margin was 19.8%, a 290 basis point increase from the prior year to a new all-time high and reflects strong execution.
Please turn to the next slide.
Turning to the International segment.
NSR increased by 6% in the fourth quarter, including growth across all of our largest regions, and backlog increased by 10%.
This is a result of our organic growth investments, market share gains, steadily improving market conditions.
Our adjusted operating margin in the third quarter was 7.4%, an 80 basis point improvement from the prior year.
We continue to make progress on our margin improvement initiatives and remain confident in our goal of achieving double-digit International margins.
Please turn to the next slide.
Turning to cash flow, liquidity and capital allocation.
Fourth quarter free cash flow of $299 million contributed to full year free cash flow of $583 million.
Our performance reflects the benefit of our improved cash phasing throughout the year, which allowed us to accelerate our stock repurchases.
We have now repurchased nearly 20.5 million shares since September 2020, or approximately 13% of our starting share count at an average price of approximately $51.
As we look ahead, we will continue to make critical investments to build on our industry-leading organic growth.
As a result, we expect our capital expenditures in fiscal 2022 to include investment primarily relating to the advancement of our digital strategy as well as ongoing investments to reconfigure our real estate footprint and support our flexible work programs.
These investments will impact the conversion of our earnings to free cash flow in fiscal 2022.
However, the underlying cash generation within the business is firmly intact.
To that point, we expect free cash flow of between $450 million and $650 million in fiscal 2022.
Importantly, our investments in growth and innovation will continue to separate us from our peers, and we are progressing toward our 17% longer-term margin target.
Please turn to the next slide.
For fiscal 2022, we are guiding to adjusted EBITDA of between $880 million and $920 million or 8% growth at the midpoint and adjusted earnings per share of $3.20 and $3.40 or a 17% growth at the midpoint.
This guidance contemplates the improved market conditions we're experiencing today, our substantial backlog and pipeline and the benefits of our investment in our people, client and digital capabilities.
To be clear, this guidance does not reflect any expected benefit from the recently passed legislation in the US, which, as Troy mentioned, is expected to benefit us more materially in fiscal 2023 and beyond.
We expect our MSR growth to accelerate to approximately 6% in fiscal 2022.
This is all organic growth.
In addition, we project a further 30 basis points of margin expansion to 14.1% as we continue to expand our lead on the industry while investing in people, clients and innovation.
I also want to emphasize that our adjusted earnings per share guidance only incorporates the benefit of our share repurchases completed to date, though we expect to continue to buy back stock in fiscal 2022 as part of our capital allocation program.
Also incorporated into our guidance is a 26% effective tax rate.
We expect to maintain this rate going forward, reflecting changes in our operating mix and structure.
Finally, I should note that we expect our EBITDA track with our phasing in fiscal 2021.
Our tax rate may be lower in the first quarter, and as a result, our earnings per share phasing may be more first half weighted than our seasonal pattern.
With our outperformance in fiscal 2021, our expectation for strong growth again in fiscal 2022 and the successful launch of our digital platform, we are also increasing our long-term financial targets for fiscal 2024.
This includes our expectation to now achieve adjusted earnings per share of at least $4.75 in fiscal 2024, which is 10% above our prior projection and is nearly 20% compounded annual growth rate from 2021 to 2024.

user
q4 revenue fell 6 percent to $3.4 billion.
expects 2022 adjusted earnings per share of between $3.20 and $3.40 and adjusted ebitda of between $880 million and $920 million.

assistant