The Journey to Zero Harm: Strong leadership is the key to keeping employees safe

Managing the safety of labour hire employees working on host client's sites is a significant challenge and responsibility for all labour hire companies.

At the Safety in Action 2008 Conference today, Mr Greg Hargrave, MD and CEO of SKILLED Group, will explain how the company drastically reduced work-related injuries amongst its on-hire employees and successfully instilled safety as SKILLED Group's number one value.

In 2007, SKILLED Group employed 25,000 employees who were on-hired to 5,500 clients across a range of industrial sectors in Australia and New Zealand.

For the same period, the company's lost-time injury frequency rate (LTIFR) - the number of lost-time injuries per million hours worked and a key measure of a company's safety performance - was 1.3. Ten years earlier, the annual measure was 69.9.

SKILLED Group slashed its LTIFR by introducing a strong safety culture. The company has made safety its first value, and an integral part of every business goal, system and work process.

Mr Hargrave will explain how SKILLED Group has instilled the belief in its people, from all levels of the organisation, that working safely is a vital part of business processes.

SKILLED Group's safety culture has resulted in an exceptional safety record, accreditation, self-insurance and various awards, and the company's goal of 'zero harm' for all employees remains steadfast.

Mr Hargrave is available for interview. Please call Annabel Urquhart, Group Manager Corporate Affairs on (03) 8646 6417 / 0458 394 213.

SKILLED Group Facts

• SKILLED Group operates a number of brands that supply skilled, semiskilled, tradespeople and professional employees to a range of industrial sectors across Australia and New Zealand
• The SKILLED brand is accredited to international safety standard AS/NZS 4801
• SKILLED Group operates an award-winning safety management system
• SKILLED Group generated revenue of $1.4 billion for the 2007 financial year.