Toyota comes to Packaging Solutions
After an intensive and highly-rewarding mentorship opportunity, Scope’s Packaging Solutions team in New South Wales is thriving after studying the Japanese art of kaizen with manufacturing giant, Toyota.
Kaizen is the basis for the ‘Toyota way of thinking’, and it broadly translates to ‘continuous improvement’; something Stephen Price, General Manager Packaging Solutions and his team is passionate about.
“Toyota specialises in educating companies in continuous improvement through the Toyota Production System Support Centre (TSSC),” Stephen said.
“We consulted TSSC because we wanted to improve production and organisation at our packaging solutions sites,” he said.
“But, the ultimate goal was to find a way for supervisors to have more time to spend with our supported employees, training them and reaching goals together.”
Over six months, a team of TSSC engineers visited Scope’s packaging solutions sites and advised on ways they could become more efficient and sustainable. It was followed by a session for six Scope staff at the TSSC ‘Dojo’, at Toyota’s head office. The ‘Dojo’ was an intensive training and simulation experience intended to instil the mentality of kaizen.
“Six months, four site visits, many coffees, bundles of post-it notes and reams of butcher’s paper later, the project team have come away with amazing learnings on how to make our enterprises more efficient and productive,” Stephen said.
“Going forward we will have a dedicated ‘Toyota Champion’ to work with site managers and staff to continue the Toyota way of thinking, and embed the structures and procedures learnt during the last six months,” Stephen said.
Employee statistics
6796 Employees
21.3% (1449) full time
43.8% (2978) part time
34.9% (2369) casual
Diversity at Scope
Male 39.5%
Female 60.5%
Identify using a different term (0.04%)
Years of Service
< 10 years = 5227
Years
Employee Age
 Under 20 |
0.3% |
|---|---|
|
|
4.2% |
|
|
10.6% |
|
|
13.1% |
|
|
14.4% |
|
|
13.3% |
|
|
11.1% |
 50-55yrs |
11.4% |
 55-60yrs |
8.8% |
 60-65yrs |
7.5% |
 65yrs+ |
5.3% |
20-25yrs
25-30yrs
30-35yrs
35-40yrs
40-45yrs
45-50yrsGender Equality compliance
In line with the Workplace Gender Equality Act 2012, which aims to promote and improve gender equality in workplaces, Scope’s efforts for the 2022-23 WGEA Gender Equality compliance reporting period is summarised as follows:
Victoria
We reported an average total remuneration Gender Pay Gap (GPG) of 2.4%, significantly below the national average of 21.7% and slightly above the industry-standard GPG of -2.5%.
New South Wales
Scope reported an average total remuneration GPG of -21.6%, which exceeds the national average and industry standard.
Drivers of our gender pay gap
In Victoria, for 2023, the gap of 2.9% shifted from -0.5% favouring women, to 2.4% favouring men. Our gender pay gap is influenced by a lower representation of women in senior leadership roles, and a higher representation of women in lower-paid positions.
In New South Wales, our gender pay gap is a product of having twice the number of men in supported disability employment in the lowest pay quartile, and a majority of women in the pay top three quartiles.
Disability Inclusive Workforce Strategy
In July 2023, we established a working group of diverse Scope employees, with and without disability to develop Scope’s Disability Inclusive Workforce Strategy group.
The purpose of the Strategy is to address the under-representation of people with disability in the workforce, particularly in our senior and decision-making roles, and implement changes to promote inclusion and diversity at Scope. It includes nine recommendations, with a total of 71 initiatives. Scope’s focus remains on improving data collection, which will enable us to define meaningful targets moving forward.
The Strategy was endorsed by the Scope Executive Leadership Team and Board in December 2023. Since then, we have started working on our top five initiatives:
- Representation: Form a representative body at Scope for employees with disability.
- Workplace Adjustments: Develop a Workplace Adjustment Policy and Protocol for Scope.
- Disclosure: Create a Disclosure Policy and Protocol for Scope.
- Leadership: Prioritise Senior Leadership Team and Senior roles at Scope for people with disability.
- Prioritised and Partner Roles: Roles for people with disability in key and strategic positions within Scope.
We want to lead the way and become an employer of choice for people with disability, and we’re committed to addressing barriers to meaningful employment for people with disability.
Learning and Development
Scope has always acknowledged the key role that learning and development plays in ensuring our teams across the organisation can deliver on our commitments to our clients and their families.
Scope invested more than $3.5 million in learning and development initiatives for the financial year, up from $2.3 million the previous year. This included a range of onboarding programs, client and site-specific learning interventions, culture improvement programs, and our Leadership Essentials program.
Investment in onboarding programs for our new, frontline staff resulted in a satisfaction rate of more than 90% among that cohort.
Leadership Essentials continues to deliver the key capabilities we and our clients expect of our frontline leaders, and is now supported by our Transforming Series designed to strengthen our Executive and Senior Leadership Teams and improve collaboration among key stakeholder groups.
The Leadership Essentials program included the roll-out two full-day workshops to all frontline leader groups, and the launch of a third and final full-day workshop. This program is aligned to the Ability First Australia capability framework and ensures Scope is continuing to develop sector-leading management teams to support our frontline staff.
The upcoming financial year will see the Learning and Development team continue to review the onboarding pathway for support workers, in an effort to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of the program. This will include working with our sector partners to establish alignment with national qualifications, to recognise the existing experience and skills many new starters bring to Scope.
Health, Safety and Wellbeing
Our unwavering commitment to safety and wellbeing is the cornerstone of everything we do.
We strive to create an environment where every client can thrive with dignity, knowing they are in a safe and secure setting. Equally, the safety and wellbeing of our staff comes from being supported by strong leadership, best practices and wellbeing resources.
Our ongoing investment in strengthening our safety culture and practices, underpinned by Scope’s Health, Safety and Wellbeing Performance plan, focuses on a clear and consistent approach to health, safety and wellbeing across all areas of the organisation. In 2024, we made excellent progress in the following areas:
- We improved our performance in relation to time lost for injured employees, including:
- Exceeding by 6.9% the target rate for pre-claim Lost Time Injury Frequency. This means fewer employees were injured compared to the previous year; and
- Bettering by 21.7% the target rate for standard claim Lost Time Injury Frequency. This indicates that fewer employees need workers compensation support, and that early intervention and support for injured workers has been effective.
- Exceeding by 6.9% the target rate for pre-claim Lost Time Injury Frequency. This means fewer employees were injured compared to the previous year; and
- Some 73% of injured workers requiring medical treatment returned to work within 12 weeks.
Ultimately, it’s about creating a workplace where our clients and staff can belong and thrive by ensuring we keep improving the culture, psychological safety and wellbeing of our people.
