Our people for the future

The once-in-a-generation River Murray flood made 2022-23 a challenging year for our people. While operating along the River Murray is part of our daily work, the flood changed the operating landscape by introducing new hazards and dangers, such as working in and around flood waters. Our Health and Safety team worked alongside operational teams to support the health, safety and wellbeing of our people working on our flood response and those directly affected by the flood.

While the flood required some adjustments to our Health and Safety Improvement Plan, key projects were completed including the second psychological hazards climate survey and the roll out of Health and Safety leadership training. This bespoke training develops our leaders’ safety mindset, while giving them tools to continue their development on the job.

The leadership program was further complemented by a 2-day Incident Cause Analysis Method investigation course delivered in March 2023 which supports our commitment to quality incident management.

This focus on quality incident management helps create a safe workplace for our people as evidenced by our performance against key safety measures. Our end of year result of 5.0 for the total recordable injury frequency rate was favourable to the target of 5.5. The high potential incident frequency rate result was 6.3 against a target of 6.7.

Technology improvements continued to be pursued to mitigate health and safety risk exposures. These included trialling drone water sampling and, in collaboration with UniSA, wearables to identify fatigue indicators.

In 2022-23, a new Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Strategic Plan 2030 was endorsed, together with an accompanying governance structure. The plan sets our 2030 goal to be an innovative organisation where diversity and inclusion is part of everything we do.

As at 30 June 2023, women comprised 48.89 per cent of our leadership, favourable to our target of 40 per cent and continuing the recent upward trend. The percentage of women overall in our business is 32.39 per cent.

Through the Capital Delivery Strategic KPI Program, a report on women working in science, technology, engineering and maths (STEM) fields was prepared together with our major framework partners. The report highlighted the barriers women in STEM face, focusing on women who graduated with a STEM degree in the past 5 years and who are working in a STEM field. To understand early barriers, the focus included senior high school students in years 10, 11 and 12, university students and early career professionals. The report will be used to identify opportunities and implement activities to address the barriers and encourage greater participation of women in STEM careers.

Our sponsorship of the University of Adelaide’s Women in STEM careers program continued, giving students the opportunity to connect with industry professionals and learn about career options available when they have completed their studies.

Our employee networks groups, Together for Women, Pride Together, Kauwi Miyurna and Able Together, continued to promote and share their experiences to celebrate the diversity of our workforce.

In 2022-23, Aboriginal employment was at 2.09 per cent and cultural awareness training has been reviewed with a plan in place to ensure it is specific to our needs, building a more inclusive culture.

A partnership with the Clontarf Foundation which provided traineeship opportunities, was extended until December 2025 with one trainee joining the team in Whyalla.