 Hello and welcome to our studio audience today as well as to those who are watching online. My name's Jennifer Hewitt and I'm here to facilitate the discussion with our three panellists on the topic of why big business needs to lead on work, health and safety. Before we start I'd like to acknowledge that we are meeting on the traditional lands of the Gadigal people and to pay our respects to elders both past and present. The other issue I'd like to talk about initially is that the 28th of April is World Day for Safety and Health at Work and Workers Memorial Day. That's a day when we honour those who've died at work and think about how our actions can prevent future work related incidents, deaths and illnesses. We're going to talk about this today and in particular we're going to explore the role that big business has in taking the lead on workplace safety, health and health. So I think we should start with some of the research which I think is extraordinarily telling. Safe Work Australia has estimated that the total cost for work related injury is nearly $62 billion. That equates to a cost of over $116,000 per workplace injury or illness. What we also know is that when a worker experiences an injury that takes them out of the workplace for a week or more, either productivity decreases or overtime has to be paid to others. Workers who experience an additional workload become fatigued and are more at risk obviously of injury themselves. Business compensation premiums go up and there are medical costs and rehabilitation costs as well. There's also obviously the possibility of legal fees, fines and penalties for the organisation if the work and health and safety laws have been breached and of course the reputational damage that can result. There are also other flow on costs kind of more indirect. We know about them, the staff turnover, the retraining, the loss of corporate knowledge and of course the loss of reputation. And that does affect profit margins and the bottom line. Safe Work Australia's research also shows us that taking work health and safety seriously offers many benefits to big business. Most obviously that's avoiding the direct costs of the injuries. But it's also that investors look also for information about how businesses look after the safety of their workers. They look for companies who manage risk well because they're more likely to have a more productive and more engaged workforce and of course they're less likely to suffer the costs of any safety failure. So what we're going to do today is have this discussion with our three panellists and get their insights in how they think big business can take the lead, should take the lead, is taking the lead into these types of issues. So on my immediate left we have Diane Smith-Gander. She is Safe Work Australia's chair and she's also chair of the Asbestos and Eradication Council. She holds non-executive director roles for AGL Energy and West Farmers and is a board member of Keystart Loans, Henry Davis York and the Committee for the Economic Development of Australia. Then there's Dean Pritchard. Dean is a non-executive director for Broad Spectrum. He's occupied roles as chair and non-executive director across a range of industries. He also has an extensive career in the building construction industry as an engineer and CEO and he holds a particular interest in the area of corporate social responsibility. And finally Marcus Hook is the executive general manager for production and logistics at News Corp. He's had more than 20 years of experience in operational leadership and has a lot of knowledge driving work health and safety for improving operational outcomes. These work locally and internationally with a range of businesses including Colgate, Pomolov and News Corp Australia. So I am Jennifer Hewitt. I work for the Australian Financial Review and I've long had an interest in the intersection of big business and policy and I'm particularly fascinated by the evolving nature of the pressures on big business in particular including things like work safety and health and how they are key integral to the broader culture of the organisation. So Diane I'd like to start by asking you now when you're sitting on top of a very big organisation either as a you know as a board or even senior management and and you can be operating in a range of industries sometimes across different countries many different types of sites. How do you drive the standard safety culture and the understanding of those issues right through the organisation? Yeah thanks Jen. Like I think anyone who thinks that's an easy task is completely underestimating the size of the challenge. It's not something that's easy at all and I think anyone that thinks that you can sit at the top of the organisation and give out a set of edicts and then it will naturally just flow through as also really kidding themselves. So the first thing is how do you build a culture in your organisation that allows everyone through the organisation to be a safety leader because without that vigilance through the organisation you're not going to get the outcomes you're seeking. We live in a very complex world and we can't over complicate it so used a very important word when you said standard because I think having standardisation through your systems safety designed in and then standard outcomes that you're seeking is a very important part of this and so when you're dealing with a distributed organisation as you said perhaps across national boundaries as well you need to make sure that you don't get queued and start to bend the rules. Oh it's a bit different in India or Western Australia's got some particular challenges therefore we need to do things differently. When you start to put shades of grey in it's very hard for people to interpret what it is you're looking for. So I think the use of all of your staff as safety leaders and then the importance of standardisation are the two most important things in that setting. Now Dean of course we always hear though about the need for business to be more flexible. Diane's saying exactly the opposite when it comes to safety do you agree with that? I don't think we're saying it's the opposite I think the real issue is to take the best parts of your organisation the performing parts to set the standards and then try to get the rest of the organisation to perform in that way and that's where it's pretty tough pretty hard to do and cultures are pretty important part of it but as well that strategy I mean two things have to work together we need both strategy and culture and getting the strategy right and the understanding of this is what we are doing these are the initiatives we are taking this is how safety links into that I think it's pretty important but flexibility is to me the opportunity for change and that's important because there will be as Diane said different parts of the organisation performing to different levels in the safety area. And Marcus on that point of course you I mean you work at News Corp so you're covering a range of sites and and you'd think that many of the issues that would affect say the production of newspapers is very different than those that would affect news journalists for example kind of providing that content so how do you accommodate those types of differences and yet maintain a safety culture? It's a framework you put in place so everything becomes a risk-based conversation so the risk you're exposed to at a print site might be moving equipment whereas the risk you face with a journalist might be a war zone or a a bike you that might want to to attack you if you're taking a photo of him outside the court so it's being aware of the environment you're confronting and having a plan in place to to deal with it. To the point about flexibility I think the standards I agree with you've got to have some strict standards on some things but that doesn't disable flexibility flexibility comes in some of the operational improvements you can make in an environment whereas if you want to control and have a safe environment then you need to have stands in place that people abide by. And that's hard enough I would imagine in a big organization to kind of drive that right through every element of your and creating those those safety leaders but you're also not just dealing with your own organization you're dealing with the whole the use of contractors subcontractors really many small businesses many of whom I would imagine would argue that what's appropriate in a big business is not really appropriate for them so how do big businesses encourage that same attention to safety and the same types of procedures and processes. This is an area that I think has been quite a lot of change you know over the period that I've been a non-executive director so the last sort of 10 to 15 years because we've had a lot more conversation in the corporate social responsibility space about things like ethical sourcing and your supply chain and we know that in Australia we have a very deeply layered contracting environment we work together at broad spectrum and you would be the head contractor but then you know you would be subcontracting down and we're of a very large nation and we like to see activity in the regions and when you get out to region Australia much smaller companies but they're sort of connected back to the large entities so again you can't say because it's a subcontractor it's not my problem clearly legally you're not allowed to do that but ethically you wouldn't do that either and so it requires a real understanding of what your supply chain looks like what is the ecosystem in which your company is operating because you know you're going to get a range of outcomes you're going to be measuring those outcomes you want to be able to get a line of sight through the contractors as well so that's the first thing is ensuring that you do understand what's going on and you're actually measuring it. It can take us back to our focus I guess and that is big business leading I think this is a really practical example and the really good thing about the way in which big business is dealing with its subcontractor marketplace and you said encourage some of the smaller players to build their practices and improve their practices it's an absolute requirement if you're going to do business with the leading companies that subcontractors and suppliers fit in with the appropriate standards of you know pre-qualification induction and auditing and even though they may well find that pretty frustrating and annoying and seems very bureaucratic to some in the end they come to realize that they make more money that way and for both parties that's an important thing but it's a very important role and I see a lot of companies really seeing this as an essential part of a partnership more so than just a contractual relationship and long-term being relevant short-term. Well Dean was saying that to some people it might seem bureaucratic but also I would imagine to some small groups it not only seems bureaucratic it also seems something that they cannot afford in terms of expertise time and resources because they don't have all those layers to draw on so how do how does big business say to them I'm sorry that this is really important and how does sometimes the boards have to make a judgment of what's appropriate or not. I think as Dean was saying it's the rules of engagement and probably a good example is we've got a fleet of vehicles that do a million kilometres a week delivering our papers around the country and whether that's toll or Australia post vehicles or a mum and dad driving a van we've got a kick the tyre program where we'll check make sure that the lights work the tyres aren't bald and there's a common standard across everyone and if anyone wants to deliver our papers they've got to meet that standards they know that they're you know when they come to work for us they're playing by our rules so it's it's an expectation now it's just accepted. So Diane you were talking about regional Australia do you think that means that by necessity some of those businesses just can't do they actually learn to adjust or are the ones that don't learn to adjust inevitably get cut themselves off? Well certainly there are many examples of you know smaller contractors that companies aren't able to continue to work with because they've failed to meet the safety standards but I think there are plenty of resources available for smaller companies you know as Dean said big business will encourage you know and be helpful and reach out and I think just the rub-off effect of some of the resources that are available within large businesses the government does a huge amount you know through safe work and the regulators and the various jurisdictions there's an absolute wealth of resources available you know on many levels for people to be able to understand what they might be able to do to improve their safety system what sorts of things they need to measure you know how to build those systems into their business so I don't think it's inevitable that you have to have a business of certain size to be able to work with big business but you certainly have to have safety standards that are at a certain level. I think the other role big business plays is to play the coach so as a small business you don't quite know what your obligations are but as a large entity you're well versed you've got more resources to look into it so you know we can set the expectation that you know we want to see this policy we want to see this standard we want to see this practice so the the small business doesn't necessarily necessarily have to have that in their team they can then utilize you know big business and their resources to to help define what they need to have in place. And a good tendering process and a good contracting process from a large business to a small business will cover all those sorts of things so I think sometimes you know we get a bit too excited about the legalese of our contracts and you know what is the intent of what we're actually trying to do but you can certainly see some very good ones that address the number of these matters. So Dean do you think that business big business has become more skill that actually providing that education that resource for small businesses over the years? By necessity yes because that's where the where the benefits come so and part of the this the purchasing skill is really to determine who are the people that we're best able to invest in because they come the big businesses are investing a lot for in this area for their own for their own benefit but it's it's you need to be sure that you're putting your effort in the right place if you can. And how can you be sure that you're putting your effort in the right place I mean how do you measure that type of thing? Well if you I guess if you start you've got a lot of data you've got a lot of statistical data incidents costs of incidents you know the various frequency rates and so on and if you think about it from a if you start from the board's perspective they will be thinking what's happening what are the trends what's what's going on this might be a long answer if that's all right so and so data is an important part of it but the more important part of it is getting getting out there and really trying to understand what is happening in the business and I'm particularly focused on in being part of boards where boards are very close to the action in the best way that they can that's always difficult but who spend time out in the businesses out at the facilities meeting with people verifying that what is being said about the culture that it's they each board member has the responsibility of being satisfied that it is really happening and what people are telling them is happening in the field and you have to get out there and you have to become skilled as board members to be able to ask the right questions to know what an HBI is high potential incident to know what that means to challenge managers as to whether they really understand that and what they think about their businesses it's it's a very and it's a long answer because it's a big process I think so all of those things have to come together Marcus use the risk word before you know and at core if you don't understand the risks in the business and you don't have a good risk appetite statement you're not going to know whether you're focusing in the right area you know and then to the associated question of spending money it's a very interesting line that you walk in trying to not run a cost benefit on safety because if you think about that you know to its end incarnation a cost benefit on safety is a sort of nonsense you've got a safety standard you've got to deliver that you you can't attach you can attach costs to incidents as Dean has rightly said but the notion of a cost benefit for safety outcomes just is I think anathema you know to most thinking boards so how do you then ensure that you are investing enough in your safety function and that the way the whole system in your organization runs because everything you do is an investment in safety so I'm probably interested in what these guys think about that particular question because it does come up a lot okay it's funny because I'm listening to that that opening blurb around the the cost of injuries to me that's not the conversation because but when my view is you look at safety is is hard to lead but it's the most important thing to lead and everything else flows after that so if you're trying to build a culture or an environment in a workplace you start with safety then you focus on your people then your efficiencies and your costs flow through if you can't lead safety then you actually can't lead a business you can't lead for efficient production you can't leave for quality production so when we get safety wrong everything else goes wrong that you got a distracted workforce who'll more likely have quality issues more likely have breakdowns down times inefficient outcomes which are really hard to measure in those strict costs so getting safety right up the front actually leads to some really good outcomes that flow through so the dollar analysis I agree I mean I don't do safety because I'm worried about the cost of workers comp or the cost of a potential fine against me I do safety because it leads to every other aspect of the business which delivers results so no my financial outcomes could be better if the place is safer yeah you take a business like broad spectrum with a lot of big range of operations various sites doing different things and not all of them performing at the same level there's a very strong correlation between strong safety performance and and profitable business and it's you know the planning is better the organization is better the culture is better people are committed they turn up every day they love being at work it and they go home at night safe it's it all goes together I guess Marcus it also depends how broadly you define safety I mean I suppose in some ways it's easy to think of safety when you talk about you know no you know no particular injuries at work and to measure it like that but you seem to be talking about safety in a much broader way is I mean if you've got the you've got the physical well-being you've got the the mental well-being and you've got the general well-being and I think there's a journey want to take all that all that people on now whether it's they're coming to work in a fit and mentally prepared way it leads down to healthy eating and and exercise so it's it if someone arrives work in a healthy condition then you're going to get a better outcome as well so part of what I see we need to is educate people on general preparedness for work and it is the and it's a it's a much bigger topic now I think it's it's getting better understanding the whole mental health issue and you know what what are the lookouts for that because very easy to see someone's broken a leg or it's very easy to see someone's you know yeah cut a hand but the triggers for mental health is something that I think we're still learning as a as a society and how we deal with that because there's a lot more stigmas associated with that so I think there's there's a lot for us to get right in that field still well Diane you said that you know you can't treat safety is a cost-benefit equation I suppose I understand that but if you start talking about fitness for work prepared mental health preparedness you get into a very much more fuzzy areas I think of measurement and you also like to you might get start to get this idea of how long is a piece of string I mean yeah it's a very good very good point but I don't think it's one that we can step away from you know this is difficult and it's the current sort of new frontier in in some ways but I think in Australia we do a pretty good job of measuring these types of things and we have some good line of sight the work that's been done around bullying some of the things that's been done on domestic violence they play into this as well and and we've done some really good research and built some very good resources for organizations you know for example there's a the people at work project which has a really good benchmark survey which you can download it's all free you find it on the Safe Work website and on regulator websites that allow you to sort of run a test through your organization to see what the stresses are in individual work roles and so forth and so I think we just need to recognize that we've still got a number of steps to go but that we do have resources available in the area and it is still a difficult conversation to have with people you know because this is very personal stuff you know talking to someone last night who leads a business that's in food service so they have a lot of people who are very passionate about food and for some of those people that translates into some weight problems I mean how do you have that conversation with people across a business without it stepping into the personal and becoming inappropriate and and I think this senior management and board have to provide the settings for leaders throughout the organization to understand how to have those sorts of courageous conversations if you will with people that are going to step into these psychosocial areas well so can I just add one way to help is to create a framework where that's what everybody talks about and you know the companies that invest I'm thinking of mine sites when a change of shift at five in the morning whenever the first 15 minutes is spent with the physio and with some exercise so it becomes common place to talk about fitness for work and health and so that improves the framework for being able to have those difficult conversations I think so that everybody thinks about it and my mates are thinking about it and talking about it and how fit am I and boy you haven't you are struggling today do you think that runs ever runs the risk though of people seeing that as too intrusive on their own personal space on their own privacy issues and how do you deal with that I think it's what you as an organization choose to give you people permission to talk about you know we talk about this a lot in the gender diversity space you know people have families they have children they have aging parents all of these caring responsibilities if you don't talk about that openly in the workplace it makes people feel there's some sort of hidden agenda I better not talk about the fact that I'm thinking about having children maybe you know they won't think I'm career-minded or whatever so if we don't open the door on being able to talk about these things in a sensible way people are going to think it's not the fodder of the organization so I think there is something about giving permission about what you will talk about I think it links back to exactly what we're here to talk about today is that is the conversation that needs to occur how you how you live outside work impacts how you work and if you're not coming to work in a fit and healthy condition particularly if you've got a job which requires physical activity then you're putting yourself at greater risk and for us to not confront that conversation means where you know we're neglecting our duty so I think the role we've got a place to start this conversation with people to say look I don't believe you've you know what the way presenting is not necessarily you know it's suitable for the job you're seeking to do today and it is the next frontier of the conversations we need to have and how effectively Marcus do you think big businesses have been tackling that that new frontier so far mixed I might agree with Dean I was down in Tassie recently at Simplot at their their their veggie factory down there and they started every team meeting with a 15 minute bend and stretch they talk about what they're going to do for the day and before they walk out everyone stretches and it wasn't a it wasn't a tick-and-flick exercise everyone was generally engaged in that program yeah there are good stories in the mining sites doing it we've launched in news a few of our areas doing industrial athlete and so we've got you know 40 plus year old printers who you'd think would mock this sort of thing I'm doing a bit of a bend and stretch for they will they start work so it's it evolves but it starts with that risk based conversation where if you've got the aging workforce how do you how do you balance that but but Dean do you do you think that at some level boards have also got to say well yes this is a journey we're all kind of constantly improving this is evolving but there is a limit to the amount of company resources that should be devoted to this area there's always a limit but I'm in my experience that's that's not really being the issue in terms of the resources because I mean line managers are the key to this and they're probably some safety professionals here but and they will truly understand the the the view that line management has to perform in this area and that's that's an appropriate way for us to be you know putting our effort so we the line managers are there we just want them to do this work better so it's not necessarily a question of the board thinking we're not spending enough in this area that's not not ever been an issue in my experience okay it's just how how well people are doing it the the big thing I mean the issue for boards is it's not what they think what they do and it's in it's exactly the same thing when you get into safety it's not what people say about safety and what we believe and what our principles and things are it's how we do it and you know that that doesn't cost any more money to do that and how do you avoid that there's there can be a certain element of ticker box compliance how do you make sure that is not what is happening well you know I think with Dean said it's what you do and if there had to be a sort of test in the boardroom to see whether people might pass or fail on the way they think about safety for me it would be how well they are able to express that risk appetite statement you know they really have to put the time in to truly understand what's going on in the business the external influences that are on the business and therefore what are the true risks that need to be mitigated and how is the business operating to do that and if a board is able to express that very clearly you know that they're going to steer the organization towards the right activities to to mitigate the risks and there won't be a cost conversation in there because this is the way we want to operate our business and so at the end of the day for me that's the job of the director when it comes to this matter is to be you know have taken the activities inform yourself well enough to be able to express a proper opinion on the risk appetite statement I was struck by Dean talking in a sense about walk around management by by going out and finding out exactly chatting to people talking about what's going on and yet this isn't an era where we've got far more automation evolved and sophisticated technology so it's that mix how do you get that mix right Marcus you've got to touch your organization so Dean's exactly right you can't you can't run you can't check the business on a Google hang out or a video conference you've got to get out there talk to people ask the question what's working for them what's not ask them again you know those front-line leaders the key to success and failure if those front-line leaders if you if your front-line is an organization know what they've got to do to deliver success then you're gonna be successful so you've got to test them and the roles they're doing and test the people to report to them and make sure they're getting support they need so we've got a program which is safety leadership walks and most of our executives do to a year safety leadership walks and you just walk out you talk to someone on the floor ask them what's working what's not when we first kicked it up I think people were a bit sort of stum you know I'm gonna get in trouble if I give you my real point of view on this but there you get some quite frank conversations and you deal with those issues and people realize that okay safety is a serious consideration for business so it's very simple to get the message and very simple to test the business on what's working what's not and the insights can be super meaningful I did a safety walk when I was on the NBN co-board and I went to a construction site in suburban Perth and it was a really hot day and so I was going out to interact with the supervisor and a couple of construction guys and I thought I would be probably hearing about the heat and you know issues like that when I wrote they were sitting under a tree and I thought well that's great I'm glad they're under the tree are you sure but I'd be even happier if they're doing some work so we had a bit of a chat you know and I sort of wanted to know why we're under the tree and it turned out that when the design drawings had turned up and they'd scoped the work and got ready to go they turned out to be wrong the first premise they went to it wasn't right and so they had to go and sit under the tree to wait and I asked the supervisor what he thought was the biggest hazard they actually faced is part of this conversation and he said to me well this bad design is the biggest hazard I face because I get my crew here we go through that our safe work methods we're all ready to go and then all of a sudden we have to stop and sit under a tree and then I've got to get them back up again ready to think about doing the job safely and if I have to do that two or three times a day said I know that by the time I get to the third time I have got zero chance we might as well go home because something is actually going to go wrong and the inside in that conversation for me because okay right let's go back through the contract to chain what was actually causing that so these are the sorts of insights you get when you go and ask very simple questions out of the field it works both ways though of course because you're out there as a board member and you're displaying the culture of the organization from the top and this is a really you know a really important part for board education training broad spectrum we got we have we have leader led safety conversations is the terminology for the same sort of conversations with people about safety so we sent each board member out with our chief safety person who was obviously very good at that as a way of coaching and developing the skills because not everybody has the board members because not everybody has the same the same level of skill and experience they come that's the whole idea of a board to have a different perspective so that was very useful and and helps when you've got a board that's going to be out there four or five times a year on sites meeting with people and they will be in your terribly on show in that circumstance you you walk up the stairs without holding onto the handrail and the people you've been trying to talk safety to saying well hang on what's going on here you know and some board members just think it's you know not serious you really that's really critical that we get those those common standards and you know really determined I think that boards really take on this responsibility and both checking and validating but demonstrating the culture of the place but with their own skills or the worst thing is someone makes a suggestion in response to how did you make the place safer or whatever and some bright spark says wow what did that cost you know that's the one you're told you never go to that question because it's not relevant in that setting yeah so you do have to be really careful about what comes out of your mouth and to Dean's point Marcus about you know demonstrating whether even walking down a staircase holding onto the rail or to what extent is this a show of solidarity almost a symbolic gesture and how how much is it you know really integral to to the company's performance do you think it's going to come back to well it's all the risk base so you put in safeguards around risks you've identified and if you've identified something's a risk be it holding the hand as we walk up and down then then that's the standard you live by so if you identify to stand you're going to have then then everyone buys up to it you can't have standards that apply to some and not to others because at what point do you say this this rules for me and it's not for you so if we're if a company is going to be serious about something then everyone signs up to it and it's it always needs to be the right thing and we've got to be careful around when we put the rules in place or we make the design right it's got to be the easy thing to do because if we make it the hard thing to do then human nature is to circumvent and find the easiest path so the challenge I think for business is to design safety is the easy outcome and design safety is the right outcome and that's it then comes a natural outcome I think there is a risk we can overburden it if we if we make it too cumbersome but holding the hand rails is something simple to do and it's something really easy to lead by yeah well that's right I mean making something simple to do sounds great but I think we've all come across circumstances where in organizations it's become not exactly bureaucratic monster but certainly you know a lot of what seem to be reasonably redundant overlays and and and repetitions how do you avoid that type of issue and how significant an issue is it or do you think that's just one of those the in that sense the cost of doing safety business properly I haven't seen an organization that doesn't hasn't got the benefit from constantly reviewing the way it does things and just finding a better way of doing it easier way a simpler way generally it's best designed from the people closest to the action and but that kind of ongoing that needs to be part of the the the DNA of the organization that they are constantly changing they're looking for improvements and that means all of the process are up for grabs once they're agreed then it that's the way that we should do it but but from time to time there has to be that systematic review and I think we're on the cusp of you know a lot of technology and automation improvements in this area I was at one of a GL's plants just recently and there's a system there now when you do a safety walk you see a hazard you see something that looks like it needs a bit of maintenance you know there's the photo and it's straight through the app so you're not finding the issue of multiple observations of the same issue in a plant as people move around it and so forth but I think people are finding it a bit harder to make the investments at the back end of the process where there's still a lot of paper and you know a lot of reports that are you know a bit dense and hard to get on to so I'm looking forward to some automation and that's the SO. I think a good example to explain what I mean is a safe work method statements was mentioned before and when you look at one of our areas in the business we had a pile this high that we expect people to understand to be able to do their job safely and we'd written in the same bit of information into about 100 documents and then people would have an injury and we'd say well it was written down in their document you know how to get injured. So we revised and we took about one one and a half thousand safe work statements from around the country and dialed it down to ten so there's now ten common standards that we expect everyone around the country to know rather than one and a half thousand so we built a system that that was technically safe but impractical so we took that feedback and to Dean's point how do you simplify it and make it a practical beast and ten is quite an easy one for people to know so it's we made a system that in reality you couldn't expect anyone to follow because it was just it was too overburdened as we had to come around and improve it and that's the challenge we've got to work to is how do we look at what we've got and make it the easy thing to do and the right thing to do. And Jenny it goes back you mentioned flexibility back back earlier in in this situation what we're doing is is also and it's pretty consistent across across a lot of businesses I think becoming less prescriptive and and really and so the procedures instead of describing exactly how everything is to be done sets the standards the standards can be clearly understood and then there's a greater degree of flexibility for the different places where there are different climates, risks, cultures of being able to deliver that but there are certain immutable standards that we do have. But these principles based safety. Yeah and and and that and that does help to make things much clearer but also helps us decide what's a given and where can I have flexibility and that's where with the creativity and innovation and change and improvement can come in that flexibility bit so long as you get this the standards absolutely clear. And obviously technology is making a big difference in this area is it always a force for for good in that in that sense of making people understand it more things more easily or being able to check things more easily. Obviously we've seen some examples with with the use of vehicles as you were talking about where do you how do you see that evolving? Vehicles is a great example and and I think one of the biggest risks of a lot of workplaces is moving vehicles around people and we were talking about this before which was you know I might work in a newspaper environment someone else might work in a mining environment but they're still moving equipment and people and so what practices can you put in place and there's good technology advances in that area where you know the vehicles will stop itself if it goes in the wrong area of it has a as a it hits something at a certain speed will stop itself so technology means that unable to improve it's an unable to provide the information to make better decisions. It provides information through to you so you know you can be more educated on what's occurring out in the out in the field so it's only going to help us going forward. Another example would be the use of drones yeah the amazing use of drones to reduce the working at height inspection of simple example of gutters on high level gutters on buildings being able to inspect without having to get people up there. There are lots of ways in which people are finding really clever things to do that take away the hazards that we've been used to therefore change the process. So big businesses is always you know evolving its processes learning a lot and that but also big business is often acquiring other businesses now we've talked about or it's sometimes being acquired we've talked about how you drive this down into a into contractors and subcontractors but what about if you if you've got a you know a merger or a takeover how do you then and you've got two different cultures how do you best to get the best of both rather than the lowest common denominator. I think whenever there's those big changes in an organization you know you go into a new geography or they say you acquire you or you are acquired you know even you know if you're like in a downsizing frame those big changes and disruptions really do change the safety dynamic so it's a time when more vigilance is needed and when you think about the project plans that get put in place for these things there's not necessarily always a sort of safety moment at the start of it to say well what might the outcomes be I think in organizations you know that are the big hazards mining companies you know airlines these sorts of things probably a much greater propensity to think that through but I don't think we take enough heed to change even holidays you know we ran quite a big campaign through safe work and the regulators at holiday time to sort of people are in a different mode and so you know their you know headspace might be quite different so I think this is the thing is recognizing that safety always needs to be given that number one ranking that Marcus was talking about. I think also it's asking the questions so in any situation where two companies are coming together it's dangerous to presume anything so I think you need to understand what the culture is or what the cultures are of the two organizations if there's nothing wrong with it right now then there's a good period of understanding about how you can get the best out of both and how you can end up with the best outcome. If there's something fundamentally flawed with the organization and they are entering people the rate of knots and the systems are failing then there's you know quite a triage needs to go and you need to get in there and almost have that immediate change so I don't think there's one answer to it but just asking questions understanding you know what the history is what the culture is and what needs to change and if it's starting off at a high base then you merge slowly you change slowly if it's a low base then you get in actively and drive change quickly. If you go back to the start when the acquisition of the merger is being contemplated boards put a huge amount of effort into really understanding the cultures of the two organizations because that's the hard part. It may well be a strategic fit but if the culture isn't right then the challenges are much greater might still be achievable might still be the right thing for the company to do but and when we talk about culture safety culture is the easiest and best way to get a feel for what's really going on in the place so that due diligence is a pretty critical part. And I have seen screening for acquisition targets by companies that are serial acquirers it has the safety culture and the safety outcomes as a question in the screen you know and of evaluation at the beginning whether that company can actually fit into the environment so it certainly can be quite a prominent decision and if it and do you think if it's regarded as not a good fit does that often rule it out or do people just say we're going to actually have to impose our different standards I think it can be used as a definitely a rule out but certainly if there's an ability to improve then it's a positive synergy for the acquiring company to be able to put their systems and processes through but it certainly can be used as a reject in the screen and if you were looking at a couple of companies and you know one had a very bad set of safety outcomes and the other had a good safety outcome and other reasons they were pretty much similar you know where you'd be jumping. And what the board would expect to see if it were to proceed with challenges is how are those challenges going to be dealt with you know a really clear plan for tackling what might be you know a difficulty. And you'll see a lot of this when you do the litigation review you know so you look back into the company's history and see what their workers compensation history has been and whether they've got any you know large matters that have got a safety flavour to them so it definitely comes into the screen. Marcus would be saying though you have to get out and get into it and find the place you find out what it's like on the ground which is that right? Yeah so we've we've recently acquired a business so we've gone from having seven print sites and now having 10 and we've got we're getting an independent order conducted to do exactly that go around these the behaviours we've established we want in our business so let's go and test the behaviours in that business to see if they meet our standards these assistant processes we expect so let's test to see whether you know the sites required stand up with that because it's safety can also be something that's very easy to get a nice bit of paper and put it across the table and say aren't we good but until you go and ask the questions and test you know what's actually happening that paper might actually flow down to the organisation and to everyone that's that's how they're working. So the specific we've done is just conduct an independent order to see where they are and what we need to do. And in terms of such an order again it's much easier to measure specific things like you know the rate of of injury or even possibly you know time off work for illness reasons. But we're now talking about a much changing world where there's a lot of periods at work where you're actually never off when you know that that that line between work and being at home and private life is increasingly blurred. So how do you accommodate for that and we talked a little bit about you know the new frontier but is it this is increasingly an issue how and how do you measure that type of issue? That's a very hard question. I think if I could answer that now then you know there's probably a prize in there for me as well. Oh I'm sure we can find one. It's a constant challenge because we're expected to be responsive 24-7. We put a lot more on our leaders. We put a lot more on our front-line operators. So a lot of what I'm trying to design in our organization at the moment is moving a lot more towards self-managed teams and having fewer leaders to lead those teams. So by design when you do that you put a greater expectation on those fewer leaders to be you know account for longer periods of time. So it's it's it's a real challenge. And the conversation you have is to make sure when you go on holiday you know you do switch off or when you're away for weekends you do switch off. And that's leading by example. So I'm actually going to hold that tomorrow. Phone's off. Out of office is on. I hope that lasts for two weeks while I'm away. I've never managed it so far. No I'll tell you in two weeks time whether it worked or not. But it's trying to lead that by example. But it's getting harder and harder because the business does expect you to respond constantly. I'm not really sure we've got that right yet. What do you think Diane? Well we know that workplace flexibility is really important in being able to engage employees. But when you think about you know the style of workplace flexibility that I might want, maybe I'm quite different to what you want, quite different you know to what the guys want. So how do you manage in that environment as well? I think it brings in a whole lot of new challenges and certainly a lot more handoffs. And we know that you know in process engineering world the handoff is the thing that we want to get rid of. You know we want to have fewer handoffs because whenever there's a handoff. Can you explain what a handoff is? So a handoff is if I've got a piece of the process I finish my piece and to get the rest of the task done I need to hand it to Dean. So I hand it off to Dean. And the way that that occurs you know you can have slippage. My communication of what's going on maybe less than you know perfect and and so there's always some danger that comes into that either from getting a bad safety outcome but just a bad process outcome. And when you think about workplace flexibility and also the fractionation of work you know so as we have more automation the amount of work that needs to be done by a person may shrink. So some of our jobs may no longer be full-time jobs. So I think this is a new arena that we're coming into that we haven't yet thought through all of the risks and hazards and what the implications are going to be for safety outcomes. Now there's lots of industries of course that have been handling handling this sort of stuff all the time. You know when people say to me oh it's difficult to job share I say well how do you think you know emergency surgeons and ICU surgeons handle this sort of stuff. You know they can't work until the patient gets better without a break. So at some point they have to hand off. So I think there's lessons in other industries we can use but we're in early days infant days on this topic. The other change that's occurring obviously in the workplace is the fact that people are tending to work longer and you know the idea that you'd retire at 55 seems to have completely vanished for certainly a huge number of the workplace. So how does that affect safety? I mean obviously I suppose you can say it's clearly more of a factor you know where there's physical effort required. What about you know just even if you're doing screen work how do companies deal with that? You're asking me. I am asking you. Neither of us are retiring at 55. We're well in the past. No well I mean clearly I think the my instant response is to think about the responsibility of the individual and if you expect to work longer then I think you have to be prepared to perform and this question of fitness for work is something that is clearly in your court as well as for the organisation. The organisation will create a culture in which you are encouraged, supported, helped financially even with health programs and so on but it's up to the I'd look really hard at the individual if you want to work I think you've got to be absolutely sure you present yourself in the right place and are able to make the contribution that's expected of you. And Marcus do you see that as part of what you're talking about having a more engaged workforce that also takes responsibility for themselves as well as being encouraged to do that by the company? It is. I mean there's a large education piece there where as you know the workforce contracts and people are working harder. There are more strains than individuals or can be more strains than individuals so they need to be aware of of how they present for work and that is stepping back to what we spoke about about half an hour ago that's a conversation that leaders need to have and I think as Diane touched on it's quite hard to start a conversation so I'm saying your weight might be a challenge for your job or it's posing health risks for you which might have consequences outside of work but that's kind of a conversation to have with someone you respect as well because to me a lot of this is around how you care for your people and if you truly care for your people then you are going to be having conversations about what's best for them or what or pointing out information that might be best for them whether they choose to to act on that information is the next challenge. Now I'm conscious of the fact that we're trying to allow some time for questions from the audience so if there's anybody who's got a question please raise your hand and I'll be happy to take it the lady at the back there there's a microphone and please just say where you're from. Yes, Liz Greenwood from the New South Wales Business Chamber. The question I have relates to the new frontier of well-being physical, mental and general well-being. You mentioned programs where for example the physio in the morning and people are encouraged to talk about themselves and their wellness but I guess the question then is what then happens with that information? Do you ever come across a situation where employees sit down and they relax and they talk about their issues and then perhaps afterwards think oh gosh maybe I shouldn't have said that and I suppose what do you do as employers to help make that discussion happen so that there are no ramifications or perceived ramifications for having that full and frank discussion? Diane? Yeah it's a it's a very good question and I think this is but something that's been in workplaces forever you know we can all think of settings where sometimes the office holiday party you know where behaviour will occur that you know people will feel a bit embarrassed about afterwards and it's it's got a very strong analogue with that type of behaviour so how do you have a good holiday party you know is probably going to tell you how you have a good courageous conversation. We've talked a lot about frameworks and you know equipping individual team leaders and managers with the skills that they need to be able to have those conversations without causing damaging the organisation because you know poorly planned and executed you know interventions of that nature into wellness and so forth can be just as damaging and risky at work as you know a sort of unsafe practice in another area so I don't think there's an easy answer but I do think there's quite a lot of resources available to illuminate that particularly for smaller businesses that might not have the resources to have the conversation in the way the big business starts but I think it's an evolving space we're probably a six out of ten in this country at the moment we need to do better. There's a good example of one of the parallel industries to mine safety week a couple of years ago they did a survey of their staff and they had a free medical checkup and one of the bits of feedback came that about 60 percent of the workforce was overweight to obese and they had some cardiovascular issues so they approached the site they approached the union the representative site and together the management union went out to the floor and they started the biggest loser board where anyone who wanted to could go up there and put their weight on the board and then you know put their goals and as a site they then encourage each other to lose weight and generally across the site they lost some substantial weight so they used something was a bit fun to address a serious issue and got a good result so I think depending what the issue confronting is you just got to be prepared to confront it. Katie. Thank you panel for a very interesting conversation. Katie Leahy from Star Entertainment Group. I'd just like you to tell us a little bit more about the role of the unions in health work safety. Dean. Thank you. Very interesting question you ask a person who grew up in construction building and engineering as a civil engineer and contractor for a long time and has been involved as a non-executive director with quite a few companies in highly unionised areas as well. I just wish it was much better it's pretty tough unfortunately safety is a bargaining tool rather than a focus for him for real improvement and I think we in this country we have a huge opportunity to bring about a place where unions take a different role with respect to building safety cultures than they do at present and I might say that I'm pleased that I'm not directly involved in it anymore. Diane. Well you know I think that Dean is right in saying that the role that unions and employers together you know the way they're parceled out that set of responsibility is probably not in an optimum place but clearly unions have to have a role vis a vis safety they're the representatives of the workers so it would be crazy to think they're not going to be intimately interested in this topic but I think we have through a bit of lack of intestinal fortitude on both sides sort of ended up with safety becoming involved in bargaining and it shouldn't be it should be completely separated over to one side and I certainly believe that unions could take a role in safety training as long as those organisations are very much slinked and you know have the right sort of expertise there's no reason why that shouldn't occur so you know many people would know I'm a bit of a windmill tilter you know I haven't found a windmill I don't want to hop on my horse with my sword and have a bit of a joust at so I do think we could try to step towards a much different sort of arrangement and I think it's open it's partnering and it's about trying to drive towards the outcomes but suggesting there's no role is clearly not an option and I don't think that's what Katie was suggesting either I think she was just asking what's the right role yeah and I think we might have time for one last question down here hi I'm Steph de Souza from Thompson Reuters a safer Australia study last year indicated that women suffered more bullying in the workplace than other demographics so that was unwanted sexual behaviour unfair treatment due to their gender or even physical threats what can big businesses do to lead and protect the health and safety of those workers but anybody who's bullied in the workplace yeah look I think you said the important thing right at the end of your question there everyone needs to have a safe workplace that's free from bullying and any sort of violence and so you know business doesn't discriminate in that way why more women than men I think this is really an artifact of the fact that we don't have gender equity in our workplaces so 46% of the Australian workforce is female but only 10% of leadership positions in large companies so it does create a different dynamic I think that's what's at play fix the root cause of gender equity and participation fast forward 25 or 30 years sorry it's going to take that long this one be a topic but it's also zero tolerance so I think I agree with that it's zero tolerance against all incorrect behaviour so I think as soon as the leadership team allows the wrong behaviours to creep into organisation then then the doors open up to all the wrong behaviours so as soon as you you are very blunt that you know these are our standards and we're not going to let them slip and whether that's bullying and harassment against anyone in the organisation then then there's you remove the problem so I think we've been much firmer on your standards is is the key thing now we're just going to squeeze in one last question Nina Pakhrej worker and safety consultant as a worker and safety consultant for a working for a large organisation my biggest barrier to improving safety is the lack of ready access to dollars I always have to go with cap and hand to middle management for safety improvements keeping that in mind how would you react to a proposal to link CEO or director bonuses to an improvement in agreed safety safety KPIs and not just to increase in profits Dean well they already are with most CEOs in my experience an essential part of their KPIs for short term bonuses is safety performance and often it's a mixture of lag indicator and lead indicator to try and get you know balance the focus but that's a very big part of of the bonus assessment for I would say all big business across the board the conversation that I'm often part of is should safety be a modifier to the overall incentive scheme however that operates or is it one of the parts of that scheme and I think companies have a big conversation with themselves about that particular factor and that's an important one because the idea of paying for safety doesn't sit well and in all the sort of conversation we've been having so far and so I think people are very interested in this idea of modifying outcomes and then how do you determine you know how that should actually work because how you get the outcomes is as important as the outcomes you get well we're coming to the end of our discussion I'd just like to finish it off by asking each of the panellists what's the biggest change they expect to see in five years time if we're talking about safety and culture I think we touched on a bit before which is is the whole mental health issue and how we support people from that aspect whether it's a it's always been there we haven't understood it or whether it's it's you know some in society pressures we're now getting around that constantly accessible 24-7 I think that's to me that's the frontier that we need to understand more and really provide good networks to support mental health so I'd hope in five years time you know organizations have a much better handle on how they're going to look after people from a mental angle how they're going to process in place to support them and how they are going to let people switch off because I think the point you raised before about people you know being there 24-7 and you know you haven't had the break when you go and leave that's the bit we've got to get right so we do support people mentally Dean I'd like to see all the stakeholders a bit better aligned with what we're trying to do in safety I mean the the opportunity with the unions we've raised in a via a question but with our shareholders and the the various activists the other stakeholders in in our business clearly we engage a lot with our employees but to see all of the stakeholders much better aligned and being able to value this kind of contra the things we've been talking about today they make a real contribution to everybody's lives if done well so if we could all get get aligned there and hopefully that's that that would be an aspiration for the next five years for me. I'm hoping for data analytics to play a big role so that the wealth of information that we've got about safety outcomes and about hazards is more you know penetrable so that we can use it to really guide decision-making and we can use it to guide design in systems so that safety outcomes get better. Okay well I think it's been an absolutely fascinating discussion and I'd appreciate you all joining me in the studio audience at least in showing your appreciation thank you very much