“I was really shocked when I got the phone call,” Fulton Hogan Project Manager, Alysse Reedy, says of the time she learned she was a finalist in two categories for the Women in Industry Awards.
“I’m familiar with the organisation and Awards and all of the women that had received finalist nominations had done such incredible work in the industry.
“So, I’m absolutely honoured to be even considered for that,” she says.
Alysse is nominated in the Excellence in Construction and Safety Advocacy categories.
In each case, Alysse’s specific eye to how safety information can be successfully communicated to people at worksites and presented in ways that make it easy to use are what really set her apart.
In the last 12 months, Alysse has been leading work on three separate safety programs: a process for working around mobile plant, plant safety requirements, and a national safety manual.
“We’ve developed a decision tree that helps people understand how they should be setting up mobile plant areas, we’ve got unified signage and delineation in colours,” Alysse says.
Alysse’s approach needed to be nationally aligned and applicable to a broad array of worksites differing in size, scope, and purpose.
“There was about three months of research, collaboration, and workshops.
“There was three months of pulling together drafts and revisions, and then we started with on-site trials, and those trials went on for about six months.
“The great thing that I really loved seeing from the trials was the innovations that different people across the company developed.
“I’m just one person, I come up with an idea, but seeing how people take that and apply that to things like clever signage, it was really great to see,” Alysse says.
The second safety project Alysse led was all about transforming a complicated set of data into something that could be utilised on a work site.
“When I first started, the plant safety requirements were an Excel spreadsheet that had every type of plant listed down with safety elements across the top.
“It was published on our website in A3 and you had to zoom in to even see any of it.
“So, it wasn’t exactly user friendly,” she says.
Now it’s a website “If you’re a subcontractor, you can go in and you can put what type of plant you have and it will bring you up a checklist of the requirements for your item of plant,” Alysse says.
And to improve onsite accessibility even more, Alysse’s work is continuing with Fulton Hogan’s IT to bring it to an easy-to-use phone app.
“The third safety project that I’ve been working on, in the last 12 months, is the Fulton Hogan Living Safely Manual for Australia.
“It’s that first point of call for people in the field, those ones at the coal face that are making decisions, because that’s where safety really happens.
“The manual was about surfacing information to help their everyday decision-making,” Alysse says.
A few years ago, Alysse took part in the CCF NSW Women in Civil Mentoring Program and credits it with preparing her for some of the leadership challenges she has faced.
She was paired with CCF NSW Board Member, and Director of Quickway Construction, Peter Wilkinson.
“He helped with everything from everyday problems to how to negotiate and influence and I took a lot of those skills into the success of the mobile plant projects and the manual.
“It was a lot of those fundamental leadership skills that I learned from Peter in the mentoring program.
“So, it was an amazing experience, to be honest, and I was very fortunate through CCF NSW to have to been paired with someone like Peter,” Alysse says.
Asked what she’d tell someone considering joining the mentoring program, Alysse says, “Go for it!”
“I don’t think, when I applied or was accepted into it, did I understand what I would get from it,” “I have great support internally through Fulton Hogan, but it was amazing to have that support extend broader into the industry, which I think CCF NSW is great at doing,” Alysse says.