Symposium attendees included chief safety officers, general managers and directors of health, safety, environment and risk from major organisations. Senior representatives from key regulatory and advisory bodies, including WorkSafe Victoria, the Office of the Federal Safety Commissioner and industry associations, also participated.
With 120 event registrations from 60 organisations, the inaugural event demonstrated the desire from health and safety professionals to improve practice through evidence-based research, and the potential impact of collaborative research partnerships to strengthen frontline outcomes.
The Symposium was opened by Professor Ron Wakefield, Associate Deputy Vice Chancellor, International and Dean at RMIT's School of Property, Construction and Project Management.
Highlights from the day included a presentation by Dr Matthew Hallowell, Brad MacLean and Mike Quashne outlining the journey of our sister organisation, the Construction Safety Research Alliance, in North America. The SHINe project team shared progress from SHINe’s first project, Decluttering safety management systems. Industry lead, Scott McMillan presented approaches for visualising and simplifying complex systems, while RMIT researchers, Associate Professor Rita Peihua Zhang and Dr Huey Wen Lim, described the scientific framework underpinning the work. The day also included an Industry Landscapes session featuring presentations from David Denney (Office of the Federal Safety Commissioner), Jon Harper-Slade (Construction Health and Safety New Zealand) and John Beattie (Transgrid), each offering perspectives on emerging challenges and opportunities across Australia and New Zealand. Dean Riha of Fulton Hogan also shared his experiences of the successful adoption of an industry-based Culture Standard and a five-day work week at the Brunt Road Level Crossing project, which was supported by RMIT’s SHINe research team members, Distinguished Professor Helen Lingard, Professor Michelle Turner and Dr Payam Pirzadeh.
The Symposium was a great success with an overall satisfaction rating of 8.8 out of 10 and participants comments including: “Each presentation had interesting learnings and takeaways - normally would only get something from part of the day for equivalent event” and “All of the sessions were excellent, all speakers were really engaging and doing high quality work. Very impressed! I learnt heaps.”
With many attendees indicating they would like to attend future SHINe events we are excited to commence planning for our next Symposium.
