Safety, Health & Wellbeing News Update

Health & Safety Industry Update: Growth and Movement

infrastructure, transportation workers are required to deliver this material. The better the infrastructure is in an area, the higher the population the area can accommodate and so the cycle goes on.

Demand / Competition for talent rises as salary and contract rates increase

This is why there have been increases in both salaries and contract rates. Increased activity across these sectors has meant a spike in demand for WHS professionals. However, without a corresponding increase in the talent pool, competition to secure the right staff is high.

Organisations have typically tried to recruit from within their industry sector as this reduces the time taken for new recruits to come up to speed with the jobs requirements. The tightening on the employment market in the construction sector has driven employees to search eider across other sectors to find staff which in turn has put pressure on the entire NSW HSE candidate market.

Part of the problem stems from the lack of investment in training resources for professionals in the industry. Since 2008, there has been a pervading company focus on reduced costs and business agility, meaning a reduction in headcount, reduction in any auxiliary spending and employee training.



This budget-cutting mentality has resulted in little-to-no investment in professional development, which has left the industry with a lack of skilled professionals to fill this sudden influx of roles. There is no doubt that salaries are going to continue to rise over the coming 3 – 5 years and investing in your staff must be an essential component for any organisation’s operational strategy.

Logistics: We are seeing organisations delve further into their practices around Chain of Responsibility as harmonised legislation and increased fines are implemented in 2018. Logistics is a sector that will never be outsourced and typically is follows the same trajectory of each state’s economy. Projections for this sector are looking significantly high across the eastern states for the next 3 – 5 years.

Manufacturing & Corporate Services: There is significant focus on employee resilience and well-being across these two sectors being driven by corporate social responsibility focus and awareness that happy employees are productive employees. The figures around this corporate spend are eye watering and are driving innovation through the safety function.

We are seeing a trend across these sectors that is widening the scope of WHS senior professionals remits which is pulling in Workers Compensation and Wellbeing into their portfolios. Welbeing roles are now permanent roles in organisations and are having a significant impact to the direction of WHS strategies.

Upcoming Zenergy events

Zenergy will be hosting a CEO’s Safety forum in Sydney this month. On October 25th leaders from across Australia will come together to discuss how they are influencing safety in their organisations and what questions they are asking to drive this strategy.

We hope to not only highlight key thought leaders in our space but also to consciously promote and raise skills across a wider platform. There has been a trend emerging over the past few years of collaboration across safety practices. This is being driven globally across some of the largest projects and industries and whilst there is resistance from some organisations, we genuinely believe that safety should not be viewed as a competitive advantage but as a shared responsibility.



Confirmed panel members include:

Register your interest now by emailing your details to the Zenergy team today!



events@172.16.0.160