2026 Australian Workplace Health and Safety Awards
The health and safety profession’s night of nights delivered in style. The winners of the 2026 Australian Workplace Health and Safety Awards (AWHSA) were announced at the annual gala in Sydney on Thursday 12 November, capping a record year for the awards: 200 entries — the most ever — narrowed to 52 finalists across nine categories by a judging panel of 30. Zenergy was a proud sponsor of this year’s awards, and it was a privilege to see the depth of talent and ingenuity across the profession we’ve served for 20 years.
“Every Australian has the right to go to work and come home safely. These awards recognise the people and teams working hard to make that happen and improve conditions for workers across the country,” said Julia Whitford, CEO of the Australian Institute of Health & Safety. “The judges were impressed by the high standard of entries. Each showcased how individuals and organisations are going above and beyond ‘business as usual’ to demonstrate innovation and drive improvements in work health and safety outcomes.”
The 2026 winners
- WHS Leader of the Year (under 1,000 employees): Andrew Pachioli, ADCO Constructions
- WHS Leader of the Year (over 1,000 employees): Louise Belcher, bp Australia
- WHS Rising Star: Dylan Cubitt, Skilltech, a Downer company
- HSR of the Year: Paul Cooper, Gold Coast Hospital and Health Service
- WHS Team of the Year: Acts of Violence and Aggression (AOVA) Squad, Woolworths Group
- Best Recovery & Return to Work: Zinfra Injury Management Team, Jemena/Zinfra Group
- Best Health & Wellbeing Strategy: BCE Health and Wellbeing Strategy, Brisbane Catholic Education
- Best WHS Training and Development: Managing Aggressive and Disrespectful Customer Training, Vodafone
- Best WHS Technology and Innovation: Molonglo River Bridge Lifting Program, BMD Group
What the winning work has in common
Read the winners list as a snapshot of where Australian WHS is heading and three themes stand out. The first is the frontline customer interface. Woolworths’ AOVA Squad took Team of the Year after reducing severe incidents in high-risk stores by 59 per cent and helping pioneer Workplace Protection Orders to keep repeat offenders out — and Vodafone’s winning training program tackles the same hazard from the capability side, equipping retail teams to manage aggressive and disrespectful customers. Violence and aggression towards customer-facing workers has moved from an HR talking point to a managed, measured safety risk, and the best programs are now delivering hard numbers.
The second theme is the whole-of-person view of safety. Brisbane Catholic Education’s winning health and wellbeing strategy and the Zinfra Injury Management Team’s recovery and return-to-work win both reflect a profession that increasingly treats wellbeing, recovery and prevention as one discipline rather than three departments.
The third is engineering ambition. BMD Group’s Molonglo River Bridge Lifting Program took the technology and innovation category — a reminder that some of the best safety thinking in the country is happening in the planning of complex, high-consequence lifts, not just in policy documents.
And running through all of it: individual leadership. From Andrew Pachioli and Louise Belcher’s recognition at opposite ends of the organisational scale, to Paul Cooper showing what an engaged HSR can achieve in a hospital system, to Dylan Cubitt’s Rising Star award for his work supporting field workers — the awards are, in the end, about people who decided the standard in their patch would be higher.
Why Zenergy partners with the awards
Zenergy sponsors the AWHSA because recognition matters to a profession that mostly succeeds invisibly. When nothing goes wrong, it’s because somebody did a great deal of unglamorous work right — and a national stage that celebrates that work lifts the whole discipline: gives emerging practitioners something to aim at, and reminds everyone that safety excellence is a career, not a compliance function.
There’s a hiring lesson in the list, too. Award-winning safety outcomes are built by deliberately assembled teams — the right leader, the right technical depth, the right cultural fit — and after 20 years recruiting across every level of HSE leadership, we’ve watched that pattern repeat in every sector represented on this year’s winners list.
Congratulations to all 52 finalists and nine winners — and thank you to the AIHS for another outstanding celebration of the profession.
If you’re building the team that wins one of these in 2027, talk to a Zenergy consultant on 1300 333 400, or browse current roles at www.zenergygroup.com.au/job-results.
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