Enrich our Value Chain

We know that when we successfully collaborate across our value chain our outcomes are stronger and relationships more prosperous. This sustainability strategy focus area concentrates on the elements that make our business more robust; our suppliers, our employees and how we engage with the broader community.

Sustainable supply chain management - safety, human rights and the environment

Throughout the year we continued to collaborate with our suppliers to achieve health, safety, and quality outcomes through our ‘Sights on Safety’ initiative. Sights on Safety focuses on identifying and implementing measures to reduce the number of serious incidents at our developments and assets. The program is aimed at driving safety behaviours and advancing better practice on our developments, construction sites, operational assets and where possible, across the broader construction industry.

With regard to the human rights aspect of our supply chain framework we have been working with our contractor partners regarding participation in health, safety and wellbeing initiatives on our sites. This has been demonstrated with our continued work with Mates in Construction to improve mental health awareness at our worksites. We have also extended this to our head office by raising awareness about mental health issues facing construction workers in conjunction with our national mental health promotion campaigns such as RUOK Day.

We acknowledge that within the broader construction industry supply chain there may be risks associated with labour practices. For this reason, we consider that industry collaboration is the most appropriate means to increase transparency and have committed to working with members of our peer group to create an industry-wide supplier survey across our broader supply chain.

Over the course of FY18, we have worked with our suppliers to establish a sustainability schedule for inclusion in project requirements. We continue to work across our business and with our suppliers to implement these requirements across the development of our assets.

The schedule aims to:

• improve environmental impact through environmental management systems, environmental and waste management plans, reuse of spoil on site and the use of recycled materials and materials that have lower embodied energy
• prioritise health, safety and wellbeing programs and initiatives such as Mates in Construction
• promote Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employment opportunities with our contractors
• seek to understand how we can partner with our contractors to improve female participation in the construction industry
• raise sustainability awareness through initiatives such as the Supply Chain  Sustainability School and implementation of the Green Star suite of rating tools
• drive community engagement by working with contractors to hold events to involve residents in the delivery process of their new community
• enhance understanding of emerging risks such as modern slavery through working with the Supply Chain Sustainability School. 

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For more information see our Supply Chain Management Deep Dive.

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High employee engagement supported by commitment to diversity and inclusion

We continue to outperform the Australian high performing norm for employee engagement with a score of 83 per cent, as measured by Willis Towers Watson. Our results reiterated the importance our people place on diversity and inclusion, which continues to be a key driver for engagement and retention. The diversity and inclusion Index from our 2018 Our Voice survey has increased to 87 per cent (86 per cent in FY17), and continues to be seven points above Australian National Norm.

We have a firm commitment to improve the diversity of our workforce and continue to build a culture of inclusion in our workplace. It outlines our aim to leverage the maximum potential of our people, irrespective of differences, such as gender, ethnicity, age, physical abilities, gender identity, gender expression, sexual orientation, family status, beliefs, and perspectives.

Targets and metrics that guide our approach to diversity and inclusion include:

• targets for women in: management, senior management and job families with lower female representation.
• parental leave return rates targeting greater than 80 per cent return, as well as growing the proportion of males taking primary carers leave
• target range for gender pay equity ratio
• gender diversity of our succession pipeline and talent population
• diversity and inclusion related indices from our annual Our Voice employee engagement survey
• flexible working practices through One Simple Thing.

Our Gender Equity, Flexibility and Disability, Parents and Carers, Wellbeing and Cultural Inclusion, and LGBTI+1 employee advocacy groups (EAGs) are a key component of our approach to diversity and inclusion. Key achievements in these areas include:

• Gender equity: Women in management increased to 45.1 per cent and senior women in management was consistent at 39.7. Our gender pay equity ratio remains within our target range at 98.3 per cent.
• Flexibility and disability: 80 per cent of employees have a flexible work arrangement in place via our ‘One Simple Thing’ initiative. Six students interned at Stockland as part of the Stepping Into program for university students with a disability. Two went on to permanent positions.
• Parents and carers: Our rate of return from parental leave continues to be well above our target of 80 per cent. Following the enhancement of our parental leave policy in FY17, there has been a near 50 per cent increase in men taking parental leave.
• Wellbeing and cultural inclusion: continued to advance our Reconciliation Action Plan commitments and piloted a resilience course for our leaders focused on stress management.
• LGBTI+: The LGBTI+ EAG was formed in FY18 and quickly established itself as a vital component of our diversity and inclusion agenda.

Case study: Benchmarking our LGBTI+ inclusion strategy

In FY18 we participated in the Australian Workplace Equality Index survey for the first time.

Read the case study

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For more information please see our Employee Engagement Deep Dive.

Read our Reconciliation Action Plan on the Stockland in the community webpage

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