OVERVIEW: Asciano operates in a heavily male dominated industry and our gender diversity challenge was clearly evident. Over the past few years, we have increased our focus on both thought leadership and gender diversity through a number of awareness raising initiatives. Developing a workforce which reflects the diversity of the community we work in is important in establishing a positive and productive culture at Asciano - in addition to being a commercial imperative for our business and our customers.

In October 2014, Asciano’s Patrick business launched a new leadership program to promote diversity and inclusion in the Australian stevedoring and logistics industry, specifically addressing the fact that 4% women take up frontline roles within Patrick. The WILpower Cadetship program is a two year structured program intended to provide women with the opportunity to develop the skills required to enter operational leadership roles and positively address the gender imbalance which currently exists in our workplace. APPROACH: Inclusive Workplace Support (Internal)The WILpower Cadetship program was marketed internally in an effort to educate the terminals business as well as the Patrick and Asciano business overall. Communication points on the program, unconscious bias, and inclusive workplace behaviours were discussed, distributed and were widely available, encouraging employees to embrace the program and refer the opportunity to their external female network.

Recruitment ProgramThe recruitment program included position description and competency confirmation, values, behaviours required, and a discussion around specific challenges that women new to the industry would face.

The attraction strategy unashamedly targeted only women by rewriting advertisements including inclusive imagery and content across job boards, Facebook, and local community hubs. The program included local invitation only information nights hosted by a local Patrick Terminals leader where women from aviation, construction, nursing, human resources, and mining could learn about the logistics industry and the Cadetship alongside their peers.

CASE STUDYWILPOWER WOMEN IN LOGISTICS CADETSHIP PROGRAM, PATRICKMelbourne, Sydney, Perth, Brisbane

STRUCTURE: An accelerated development pathway for female cadets interested in pursuing an operational management career, the Asciano WILpower cadetship program involves a number of elements:• Completion of relevant tertiary education – completion

of a tertiary qualification via online self paced education, based on the cadet’s previous study and qualifications

• Job rotations – completion of three or four 7 month job rotations, exposing the cadets to different operational roles in the business

• Class room based leadership training – Classroom based modular program to equip cadets with the tools to do their job and help build their internal networks, topics including communication and influencing skills, coaching and performance discussions and career development

• Leading @ the Frontline Certificate IV in Leadership & Management – Attendance at Asciano’s Frontline Leaders program resulting in a Certificate IV in Leadership & Management

• Mentoring program – Allocation of an internal Asciano mentor to draw on the experience and knowledge of more experienced colleagues

OUTCOMES:Eleven women were successfully appointed as WILpower Cadets from a wide variety of backgrounds as part of Asciano’s commitment to promoting diversity and inclusion in the Australian stevedoring and logistics industry.

The highly commended program provides women with mentoring and on-going support, with the opportunity to develop the skills required to be successful leaders in the logistics industry.

Introduction of the program has also increased awareness internally of inclusive leadership through development and

training with our existing workforce, as well as increased investment in our careers team to be able to better source and support the attraction of females for our existing roles as well as helping to change our recruitment processes to increase our ability to attract a diverse pool of candidates.

“Our qualifications were only one of many determining factors. Looking around, I believe we are also selected on our resilience and we need to fit the company

culture”

April 2016