(Editor’s Note: On June 29, Stellar announced that John Hollingsworth has been appointed global CEO of the company, and will be succeeded in his current role by Melissa Hamilton. The press release can be read here.)
ceoforum.com.au: Why was diversity an important issue for your company to address?
John Hollingsworth: The interesting thing is that we did not originally set out to tackle diversity as such. What we did do when we started the company in 1998 was to put a culture in place that balanced the needs of our shareholders, our clients and our employees. All our work practices and processes reflect that culture, so, as a result, we have a work environment that offers flexibility and equal opportunity to all our employees.
We really saw equal opportunity and flexibility as being closely related. If we wanted to appoint the best person for the job, for instance, we needed to make sure that the working environment supported that person. As a result, we have a number of female executives who have returned from maternity leave, and who are now working part-time. We also have a number of mothers who are working reduced hours so they can meet their family commitments at the beginning or end of each day.
ceoforum.com.au: Getting the acceptance of extensive part-time work, for instance, is sometimes difficult. What were the challenges you faced in getting this to work?
JH: We were fortunate that we established those principles of flexibility and having a family-friendly workplace from the starting of the company in 1998. As a result, we didn’t have the problem of overcoming entrenched practices or attitudes that some companies may have, as we had operated in a family-friendly way from the start.
I think the really fundamental challenge is the more general one of balancing the needs of shareholders, clients and employees. We take a collaborative approach to this, and it needs some give and take on all sides. We do need to be mindful that we don’t tip the balance to one group or the other, and that needs constant monitoring. You can’t meet everyone’s needs all the time, of course, but we do believe we get it right most of the time.
ceoforum.com.au: What about the attitude of individual managers to having a lot of part-time employees? Some companies find, for instance, that some of the managers are not comfortable with this, at least initially.
JH: I think there are two basic factors that shape the attitude of managers. Firstly, there is the individual’s own prior experience with, and attitudes to, managing employees in this fashion. Obviously if it is something new to them, there will be a period of personal adjustment.
However, it’s not just about an individual manager’s attitudes and behaviours. There is sometimes a broader challenge in that things like industrial awards, workplace agreements and so on are often not formulated to take innovative work practices into account. As a result, you may need to go through a process of re-negotiating and re-structuring these agreements if you want to create a truly flexible work place.
ceoforum.com.au: Did you set formal targets for women’s representation within different levels of the organisation?
JH: No we did not. Our view was that setting targets would potentially send the wrong message, and thus drive the wrong sorts of behaviours. If there is too much emphasis on targets, it becomes all about compliance, and we didn’t want that to happen.
What we did do was develop the appropriate work practices and processes within the organisation to support women in their career development, and thus make equal opportunity a reality. We felt if we managed those processes effectively, we would see the results take care of themselves.
Even though we do not set targets, we do measure women’s representation in the organisation. Our current snapshot is that women are 62% of our employees, 3 out of 5 of the direct reports to the CEO are women, and 5 out of 10 of our most senior executives are women. As well as this, we have nine major regional operating centres in Australia, and all of these are headed by women.
What was more important than targets was ensuring managers across the organisation understand the benefits of a flexible work place. Once that is understood, there is strong buy-in from everyone and it just becomes part of the culture of the organisation.
ceoforum.com.au: Do you think women have been the primary beneficiaries of a flexible workplace, mainly for the reason that they were the group most disadvantaged by a lack of flexibility?
JH: I think that is true. If you look at historical attitudes to work, and how men and women fitted into that, it was clearly more difficult for women.
Having a more flexible workplace also means dealing with different expectations about what constitutes work. When I began work, for instance, there was very much an expectation that you would be present i.e. you would start at 8.30 am and finish at 5 pm. Sometimes managers were more concerned with managing your hours rather than managing your work outputs, as managing hours was easier!
In a more flexible workplace there is greater emphasis on work outputs, rather than inputs like attendance. In our management processes, we have put a lot of work into identifying the required outputs for each job role within the organisation, and thus making sure we manage to outcomes, not things like hours worked.
ceoforum.com.au: How do you deal with flexibility for more senior managers? There is often a strong if unstated expectation, for instance, that the more senior a person gets, the more hours they will work.
JH: The way this operates in our company is not that they are expected to work more hours, but they are expected to be on-call more, for peak load or emergencies. Fortunately technology helps a bit here – you feel much more comfortable, for instance, someone being out of the office in this situation when you know they have access to phones, email, computer systems and so on. If people were truly impossible to reach in emergencies once they left the office, flexibility would be much more challenging to manage.
ceoforum.com.au: What have been the benefits for the company from this approach?
JH: I have no doubt that, if you create a family-friendly workplace, you get a more committed and passionate employee as a result. Sometimes the business has to come first, and sometimes family has to come first, and it is in that negotiation and understanding that you develop richer working relationships.
Retention of talent is another plus – the simple fact is that, if you don’t have some flexibility, you will lose people you would otherwise want to retain.
Just how fundamental flexibility is to our organisation’s culture and practice can be seen in the succession plan for my CEO role. My successor as CEO will be Melissa Hamilton, an employee who has taken maternity leave twice, worked reduced hours for a while on her return, and will now soon be CEO. It’s a great story, and shows the value of the sort of flexibility and work culture we have created.
