Developing our People and Know-How

Aim

Develop and invest in leaders who will genuinely challenge the status quo

Approach

• Developing a high performing culture of skilled professionals
• Investing in innovation and knowledge sharing
• Developing skills to meet current and future needs
• An increased focus on staff development in relation to commercial acumen

Key Performance Indicators

Status	Level Of Achievement
Full-time equivalents (average)	1009.08
% Women in leadership positions, Level 6 and above	19.2%
% Completion Individual Performance Agreements	94%
% Staff who believe Innovation has improved	48%

Looking Ahead

• Workforce and succession planning continue as we identify new skills and competencies for business challenges ahead. We are also ensuring good management approaches and knowledge transfer from our ageing workforce profile
• Creating a diverse succession pool focusing on future leaders, high potential and critical skills gaps including having an emphasis on identifying positions for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians
• Actively committing to success in the six priority areas from our EEO and Diversity Plan
• Promoting benefits of the Innovation and Research program which encourages teams to identify priority research areas to overcome work barriers, along with continuing the Removing Roadblocks campaign to reduce our own internal red tape
• Deploying the final modules of our new integrated Human Resources Management System

Introduction

Investing in our people and their know-how is key to creating an organisation where people embrace and accept those who inspire and bring innovative ideas, skills and perspectives. We seek to ensure that the right people are attracted and retained to address our future business operations.

Promoting Diversity and Equal Opportunity

We strive to create a rich, diverse workforce and promote equality ensuring our workplace is free from harassment and discrimination, with all employees having access to training, progression and promotion. Following is an update on achievements in this area.

Equal Employment Opportunity Management Plan 2017–2020

Our Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) Management Plan is developed in accordance with Part IX of the Equal Opportunity Act 1984 (WA) and aligns with the Office of Equal Employment Opportunity’s outcome standards framework. A new EEO Management Plan was launched in 2017. Our Diversity Working Group will continue to implement the actions of the EEO Management Plan which is focusing on six specific areas:

• Women
• Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander groups
• Youth
• LGBTIQ inclusion
• People with disabilities
• People from culturally diverse backgrounds.

Our statistics for key areas are below.

	2015 (%)	2016 (%)	2017 (%)
Female Employess	30.0	30.5	31.1
Employees of culturally diverse background	18.8	17.2	19.6
Employees with a disability	1.1	2.9	2.1
Indigenous Australian employees	0.7	0.8	0.9

Women in Leadership

Main Roads recognises and values the role of women in the workforce and gender diversity at all levels of the organisation as a business imperative. The focus for the past year and the coming year is attracting, retaining and developing women in non-traditional roles and leadership positions. We recognise that women in positions instrumental to Main Roads’ future will lead to increasing numbers of women in leadership roles.

	2015 (%)	2016 (%)	2017 (%)
Women in the workforce	30	30.5	31.1
Women in Level 5 positions (permanent employees)	28	29	29
Women in Level 6 positions and above (permanent)	18	18.5	18.5
Women in acting opportunities	35	35.3	39.9

Our ongoing activities include:

• Professional development opportunities for our women through leadership development programs
• Feedback from our Diversity Working Group on work practices and on initiatives requiring review to ensure inclusion
• Promotion of flexible working arrangements in job advertisements and encouraging women and people with diverse backgrounds to apply for roles.

Reconciliation Action Plan and Indigenous Employment

This year our Reconciliation Action Plan has been redeveloped. We have a continuing commitment to reconciliation in Australia. The Plan has been approved by Corporate Executive and widely promoted across the organisation. Acknowledgement of Country and Welcome to Country are now required for all major events and a guide to assist employees and guests speaking at our events is available. As part of our commitment to a diverse workforce representing the communities in which we work, a Senior Leadership Aboriginal Employment Initiatives Taskforce has been formed. This group is to lead and champion Aboriginal employment initiatives across Main Roads. Our Reconciliation Action Plan is available on our website.

NAIDOC Week

We recognise the importance of engaging our staff to celebrate the history, culture and achievements of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples during NAIDOC Week. This year our celebration included a Welcome to Country and a musical performance. This was followed by a bush tucker inspired afternoon tea sourced from Kuditj Café, an Aboriginal owned and locally based café. Similar events are celebrated around the state in our regional offices.

Recruitment and Workforce Planning

Recruitment activity over the past 12 months focused on Asset Management, Project Development, Project Delivery, Maintenance Management, Network Operations and specialised technical and engineering disciplines.

Building resources in these core functions is critical to support a demanding maintenance and construction program of works, delivery of the Traffic Congestion Management Program as well as building capability within the organisation as an ‘informed purchaser'.

In addition, our workforce planning cycle was reinvigorated in 2017 and is focused on identifying and addressing key capability risks and gaps in these core areas. The workforce planning process involves a comprehensive environmental scan of the organisation and considers current capability, succession planning, recruitment forecasting and other capability development and resourcing strategies.

	2015	2016	2017
Positions advertised	117	100	156
Applications received	2,340	1,808	4,116
Average applications per advertised positions	21.5	18.1	26.0

Developing our Employees

Employee Engagement on the Rise

During the year we conducted two employee perception surveys, one called Shaping our Future and run by Aon Hewitt and the other conducted by the Public Sector Commission (PSC). Overall results were slightly improved on previous similar surveys. The PSC survey showed our employee engagement three points higher than the Western Australian government agency average and slightly ahead of our 2014 results. In the Shaping Our Future survey our score was slightly higher than the Australian and New Zealand public sector engagement average.

For the PSC survey, positive statements about our workplace culture that elicited high rates of consensus were: strong personal attachment to my organisation (Main Roads 82 per cent, broader Public Sector sample 68 per cent); workplace culture welcomes people from all diversity groups (Main Roads 91 per cent, broader Public Sector sample 86 per cent); and my work group is encouraged to come up with new and better ways of doing things (Main Roads 80 per cent, broader Public Sector sample 77 per cent).

Both the AON Hewitt and PSC surveys found areas for improving and creating stronger engagement. These include, broadly: more effective leadership, improving change management, and communicating information on changes to our organisation. During a state-wide presentation to all staff in June, the Managing Director agreed to identify two or three high priority topics for the executive team to focus on. Business areas were encouraged to explore engagement and understand each other’s areas of strengths and weakness while creating customised or fit-for-purpose approaches to survey results.

Individual Performance Agreements

Individual Performance Agreements (IPAs) foster regular conversations about performance, behaviour and development. They help employees understand how work fits into the bigger picture. The IPAs assists in clarifying roles and expectations for both managers and employees and identifies training opportunities and supports a high performance-based culture. This year we had a 95 per cent completion rate with 85 per cent of all IPAs being closed out by the end of the year. Next year will see the introduction of improved processes around IPAs, focusing on career conversations.

Graduate Program

Our three-year structured graduate program has continued successfully developing skills, including work readiness, technical and commercial and leadership skills. Over the next year our focus will be on strategically engaging with higher education providers and professional associations on how to attract women into non-traditional studies including construction and engineering. We have set specific targets in regard to our female graduate intake for 2018 and beyond, to ensure our technical and leadership capability for the future is a diverse workforce.

Innovation and Research Program

TThe Innovation and Research Program provides opportunities for collaboration and encourages staff to learn, solve problems and explore new and innovative opportunities. Our Brightideas software package helps us to foster a high level of engagement throughout the year as people either participate in specific corporate challenges or submit their own ideas on innovative approaches. We also held our second annual Innovation Survey indicating significant improvements against our baseline survey. When asked “I will be supported if I try a new idea”, 62 per cent of respondents said yes compared to 45 per cent last year. Forty-eight per cent of staff believed innovation had improved over the past 12 months compared to 35 per cent previously, and 80 per cent said their team had implemented some form of innovation in the past 12 months.

Improving Productivity by Removing Roadblocks

In March 2016, through the ‘Removing Roadblocks’ initiative, Main Roads put in place a forum for employees to make suggestions on improving our business. The objective is for employees to identify inefficient or illogical work practices that may inhibit productivity and innovation. Using Main Roads’ ideas management system, employees collaborate online, through voting and commenting, to identify and develop solutions for working more effectively.

Challenges have been coordinated at directorate, region or branch level and customised to participants to encourage engagement. We have run 20 challenges with: nearly 900 employees logging on to view the challenges, more than 300 ideas submitted, almost 370 comments made, and in excess of 1,000 votes cast. Ideas fell into the general themes of ‘Innovative Solutions’, ‘Financial Efficiencies’ or ‘Business Improvements’, with each idea relating to one of the four strategic areas of focus from Keeping WA Moving.

The Nudge Foundation

Nudge (formerly The Roads Foundation) is a for-purpose charity focusing on getting young people into jobs and training opportunities in industries throughout the state. Nudge is an employer support agency that specialises in making the process of training, employment and community engagement as simple as possible. Main Roads along with the Western Australian Local Government Association are strong supporters of the foundation. It specialises in and can assist employers with the following areas:

• Aboriginal Employment—short and long term projects, recruiting locally
• Local workforce engagement and participation
• Employee retention and support
• Government Building Training Policy—trainees & apprentices
• Pre-contract community consultation
• Gender diversity focused employment
• Workforce planning and employment.

This initiative delivers economic and social benefits for the community. It emphasises placing young people in employment, traineeships and apprenticeships in the resources, construction, infrastructure and agricultural sectors through a unique community engagement model. The foundation has been operating, predominately in the road and civil industries, for the past 10 years.

Due to increasing interest from other sectors and the effectiveness of our community engagement and support models, the Board recently decided to include a broader range of services, careers and opportunities. While the revised strategic focus expands responsibilities, this independent, not-for-profit organisation will continue to play a large role in the civil and road sectors. It will work closely with us ensuring projects and major maintenance contracts have high levels of training development, Aboriginal engagement and employment for continuing growth of the Western Australia workforce and for local community development.

Strategic Research

We undertake significant activity to develop and enhance our collective knowledge of economic, environmental and social topics. We do this through close collaboration and partnerships with industry and research institutions undertaking leading-edge road and transport research. These organisations include:

• Austroads
• ARRB Group Ltd
• WA Road Research and Innovation Program
• Planning and Transport Research Centre
• Sustainable Built Environment National Research Centre.

We regularly conduct a ‘Futures’ reviews to identify new trends, technologies and business models from around the world that might impact the transport sector. This review is updated periodically to ensure currency and that we understand the global and local context in which we operate.