Our people

Our people

HEALTH AND WELLBEING

We openly encourage our people to seek work-life balance and have made several health and wellbeing programs available to this end. Weight Watchers, Quit (smoking cessation) and 10,000 Steps, for instance, have gained in popularity across the organisation.

As in previous years, we offered 'flu vaccinations to employees in support and Distribution Centres. Meanwhile executive health checks continue. We have developed a health check program tailored to store managers in Supermarkets and BIG W, and to our regional and area managers in Liquor and Dick Smith. The Supermarket store manager health checks have begun and we have scheduled dates for BIG W, Liquor and Dick Smith to start theirs.

Logistics has made significant inroads in health and wellness by creating a wellness room at our Brisbane Regional Distribution Centre and a health and wellness corner at our Perth Regional Distribution Centre. Onsite physiotherapy for employees has already been introduced for 75% of the Distribution Centre network.

A range of other health and wellbeing initiatives has been designed to support and assist employees as their circumstances change. BIG W is introducing wellness content on its intranet for staff to access wellness programs and related information. Lunch and Learn sessions have been running at our Norwest Support Office for the past 12 months. Topics here include stress management, men's health and heart health.

Employee assistance program

A resource available to all employees is the Woolworths Employee Assistance Program. This enables all staff and members of their immediate families to access confidential counselling free of charge. During the year under review, 1,550 employees used the service, a 7.7% increase on last year. Managers are increasingly promoting the service, with management-initiated counselling accounting for 45% of referrals in the past 12 months.