Wellbeing agents of change: Sean Silvey and Jane Bourke (Melbourne event)
Insights.
We’re pleased to share part two of our Agents of change for organisational wellbeing event in Melbourne, which recaps some of the highlights from our conversation with Sean Silvey (IAG) and Jane Bourke (Woolworths Group), as they talk about evidence-based wellbeing strategies, organisational readiness, and making a meaningful difference for their people.
Panellists
Guest: Sean Silvey Executive Manager, Safety and Wellbeing, IAG
Sean’s expertise in safety and wellbeing has grown throughout his career, both locally and internationally, having worked with a range of organisations across various industries such as education, aviation, insurance, finance and healthcare.
Sean is passionate about ensuring safety and wellbeing plays a critical role in improving people’s personal and work lives.
He is committed to demonstrating the clear influence this can have on the delivery of positive employee and customer experiences, improved business performance, and the wellbeing of the communities.
Guest: Jane Bourke Group Director, Safety, Health and Wellbeing, Woolworths Group
Jane is a globally-accomplished professional with extensive leadership experience in developing and executing a strategy to drive sustainable business performance.
Jane’s experience has taken her to senior roles within global companies (Amazon, BP) and Australia’s Top 20 companies (Origin Energy,Telstra) - working best in transformation and change roles in complex environments which require a strong risk-based approach with business acumen.
She has significant experience with HSE transformation; mergers and acquisitions; retail; construction programs; oil and gas; transport, logistics and warehousing.
Host: David Watson Head of Enterprise, Sonder
David is a culture-focussed business leader who heads the enterprise business at Sonder.
He is passionate about helping others and sharing ideas and innovations, especially as it relates to workplace wellbeing and holistic safety.
Prior to Sonder, David was a founding team member at LinkedIn Australia and also worked at world-class organisations such as KPMG, IBM, and Salesforce.
Building on from part of our interview with Jane Bourke, here’s a bite-sized recap of some key insights from our Agents of change discussion with Jane and Sean:
- Jane talked about the importance of transparency and vulnerability with your executives and your board members. She said you don’t need to immediately know all the answers. It’s okay to say “great question, I need to take that away”, and to say that you’re working through the question within the team, the organisation, and sometimes with other organisations.
- Jane reflected on her years working in the United States, commenting that a lot of employees make their choice about where they’re going to work based on what health care they’re going to receive from their employer.
- Sean talked about the power of listening. He said it’s about caring enough about your people to listen to their perspectives.
- Sean commended his executive members who embraced organisational wellbeing and asked great questions. He said this made “a world of difference” because it empowered his executives to influence others as well.
- Jane and Sean talked about how their respective CEOs ‘walk the talk’ by regularly getting out and about personally - to stay close to their people and their customers.
Inspirational quotes
The following thought-provoking quotes from Jane and Sean build on the event’s key insights:
“All the evidence is showing us that people are choosing their companies based on certain factors, and one of those factors is wellbeing.”
– Jane Bourke, Group Director, Safety, Health and Wellbeing, Woolworths Group
– Jane Bourke, Group Director, Safety, Health and Wellbeing, Woolworths Group“If you can embed wellbeing into what they do, that’s then when it… that’s the future, I think. Rather than, it’s HR, or safety, or the wellbeing team, or this team, or someone else’s, it’s actually, no, it’s everywhere.”
– Sean Silvey, Executive Manager, Safety and Wellbeing, IAG
– Sean Silvey, Executive Manager, Safety and Wellbeing, IAG“I always talk about right time, right place. So you might have a crack at something today and it lands flat. Don’t get disappointed. I’ve had many times where I’d pitch ideas and they’d land really flat, and I’d be like, geez. And then six months later, I’d pitch it again and everyone would go, “You’re amazing”. And I’m like, I’m just saying what I told you six months ago. It was just readiness.”
– Jane Bourke, Group Director, Safety, Health and Wellbeing, Woolworths Group
“For me, the future of wellbeing is, it’ll be less the word ‘wellbeing’. It’s actually just smart, businesses will embrace it, and it’s just part of who they are as an organisation.”
– Sean Silvey, Executive Manager, Safety and Wellbeing, IAG
“Where is your organisation at, and where is there readiness for change, and find the way. If they’re really interested in something, how do you link it to that?”
– Jane Bourke, Group Director, Safety, Health and Wellbeing, Woolworths Group
“How do we influence how people feel? And the principle is not hard; if people like working here and they feel valued, heard, [and] the diversity of their background and experience, if that means something and contributes, I'm going to turn up tomorrow. Yeah, we're going to have a good relationship as colleagues, and then ultimately, the customer benefits.”
– Sean Silvey, Executive Manager, Safety and Wellbeing, IAG
“When I was at Amazon, they were really cool at doing control testing. We’re going to roll it out over here, see what happens with this group. And you’ve got to be careful about this – we’re not going to do it over here. And just see the difference. And that was a really cool way of being able to show any new program, does it actually make a true impact.”
– Jane Bourke, Group Director, Safety, Health and Wellbeing, Woolworths Group
“So, I think the wellbeing agenda is just going to move to, we employ people and look after them, and if we look after them, they’re going to look after each other, they’re going to look after our customers, and our customers are going to come back.”
– Sean Silvey, Executive Manager, Safety and Wellbeing, IAG
“One of the metrics that Woolies has is Voice of Team, which I think a lot of organisations are going this way, and if you’re not, really encourage you to. Don’t talk [to your people] once a year – do it always on… So we do it once every three months. At Amazon, you did it every day. Amazing.”
– Jane Bourke, Group Director, Safety, Health and Wellbeing, Woolworths Group
“If they’re nice people and treat me nicely, I want to work there. And when I do turn up, I want to be good at what I’m doing and contribute to the team.”
– Sean Silvey, Executive Manager, Safety and Wellbeing, IAG
“There is no magical fence that keeps everything in your home life out that side of the fence and everything in your work life in this side of the fence.”
– Jane Bourke, Group Director, Safety, Health and Wellbeing, Woolworths Group
Interested in part one?
To read the transcript from part one of this event, we invite you to visit: Wellbeing agent of change: Jane Bourke (Melbourne event).
To stay in the know for future posts, we invite you to follow us on LinkedIn.
Download the report
If you’re an organisational leader, we invite you to deep-dive into the full report here.
To register (or submit topic ideas) for future events, we invite you to contact events@sonder.io/uk.
For more information about how Sonder can help you rethink your employee and/or student wellbeing strategies, we invite you to contact us here.
Want to learn more?
For more information about how Sonder can help you rethink your employee and/or student support, we invite you to contact us here.
About Sonder
Sonder is a technology company that helps organisations improve the wellbeing of their people so they perform at their best. Our mobile app provides immediate, 24/7 support from a team of safety, medical, and mental health professionals - plus onsite help for time-sensitive scenarios. Sonder clinicians hold certifications across the United Kingdom, Australia and New Zealand. This puts us alongside leading hospitals and healthcare institutions around the world.
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