Mining for a gold standard in leadership
We marked 2024 as our year of commissioning market research at Everyday Massive.
We’ve been lucky enough to work with some incredible secondary research sources over the years, and seen comprehensive internal research undertaken by our collaborators. For a broader view of safety sentiment in Australian high-risk industries, we decided to gather some primary research.
As we were pressing send on our February 2024 edition of Everyday Insights, we got our hands on the topline results.
After a decade working with high-risk industry collaborators we had our predictions for what safety sentiment research might show.
Turns out, we weren’t far off!
Safety sentiment is very positive in Australia — a testament to all the work done by OHS leaders (that’s you!) and law makers over the years to make safe work conditions imperative. In an industry like mining, which employees identified as involving high or extremely high risk, the safety sentiment is distinctly positive.
The two areas our research confirmed needed a little lift in industries with high or extremely high risk (like mining) were the leadership pillar (leadership creates a workplace culture where safety is valued and prioritised) and the engagement pillar (employees are actively engaged in safety improvement initiatives). Again, not a massive surprise to see this come through in research.
This was the reason we started designing and developing leadership programs with our collaborators. All our experience told us that to lift engagement, you needed really strong leadership buy-in and support for safety. And leaders are certainly not always born.
This was a challenge Kestrel Coal Resources (KCR) brought to us in 2022. A change in ownership triggered a reset on what effective leadership could look like in the mining industry.
The new KCR team needed to define what good leadership looked like by articulating the qualities and behaviours of a KCR leader, and building an engaging, KCR-owned leadership program that set new behaviours and standards.
We started by engaging with KCR leaders across a range of different levels and roles to determine their needs. From here, we collaborated to create a comprehensive face-to-face leadership program — which we called Unleashed. Aligned with Kestrel’s corporate vision of Unleashing Opportunity, the program focused on three core pillars: Safety, People, and Business.
In the Safety modules, leaders were equipped with the necessary skills and mindsets to be role models for safety, build trust with their teams, and create a culture of safety engagement. The People modules provided leaders with the skills and confidence to motivate, influence, and guide their teams to high performance. Finally, the ‘Business’ modules enabled leaders to better understand their role, accountabilities, and expectations, allowing them to plan more rigorously, better adapt to change, and make sound business decisions.
EM x Kestrel Unleashed video with project highlights
For KCR, face-to-face sessions were delivered to executives, senior leaders, frontline leaders, and other influential individuals. The program was supplemented with two hours of online modules that were integrated into participants’ work schedules, which was really important for one of the world’s largest coking coal mines to keep up with production requirements. Practical workplace assignments helped participants apply learnings, and peer-to-peer virtual coaching and experience sharing deepened the learning experience.
And Unleashed achieved real results in terms of leadership capability for KCR.
Pre-and post-program diagnostics of participants showed an average uplift of 19% across a range of competencies. Highlights included:
⟶ 33% uplift in leaders’ ability to develop and execute innovative improvement ideas with teams.
⟶ 24% uplift in feeling they could effectively coach others.
⟶ 22% uplift in being able to put plans in place to improve team engagement and performance.
⟶ 16% uplift in their ability to lead change.
Unleashed was also named the Best Leadership Program at the 2023 Australian HR Institute (AHRI) Awards.
So how do you get to the gold when trying to lift leadership capability in a high-risk industry? Well, we’ve got three suggestions.
Engage to understand
The first step is always to engage with your audience. Understand their daily routines, challenges, and learning preferences. This insight was crucial in our work with KCR, where we unearthed the common leadership capability areas that the team needed support with. We also learned through engagement that the most effective way for KCR leaders to learn wasn't exclusively via online learning — this audience needed face-to-face learning, with some online supplementation.
Customisation is key
One size does not fit all in communication and learning. By customising your channels and learning modes for different segments of your audience, you increase the relevance and impact of your learning.
Iterate and innovate
Use feedback loops to refine your engagement strategies. Innovation should be a constant in your approach, always looking for new and better ways to connect with your audience. Our experience with KCR showed that testing a program like Unleashed with a pilot group can net some amazing insights to help iterate and evolve the program approach before it’s rolled out to more cohorts.
If you’re keen to learn a little more about our market research, we’ll be sharing more at the upcoming OHS Leaders Summit on 6—7 March in Brisbane. If you’re interested in a leadership program, book a discovery call and tell us about the challenge in your organisation.
