Make It Work was a group put together by AgriFood Skills Australia three years ago to look at ways of attracting and retaining good staff in the North West area.

The group has representatives from various sectors of the community such as retail, agriculture, education and Local Government.

Make It Work development manager Russell Stewart said the Employer of Choice survey system was developed to help employers understand what their staff were or were not happy with in the workplace.

He explained that the staff use a remote control to anonymously select their responses to a series of on-screen questions about the workplace.

As soon as the answers to the question have been selected, the responses are graphed.

This opens up the opportunity for discussion between employers and employees, Mr Stewart said.

Gwydir Constructions director Ron Gunther has owned his business in Moree and Narrabri for many years. The business has nine employees, three of which are apprentices.

Over the years Mr Gunther has found it difficult to get good tradesmen and to keep them in the business.

He says attending the work choices forum and completing the survey helps businesses develop their employer-employee relationships.

“It was enlightening to get the feedback from our staff and it opened up an opportunity for discussions with our staff which gave them more of an understanding of our business and more of a dedication to our business,” he said.

“It has created a more unified business relationship.”

Busy Bee Auto Electrics proprietor Greg Morris said he undertook the survey to find out ways to keep his valuable staff.

“We have to train our people from scratch in this area... this may take six to seven years... so our employees are very valuable to us.

“The survey is the most effective means of being able to improve the relationship between employees and managers to succeed in the ongoing ability to provide these services to our customers and retain staff in this business.”

Mr Gunther said with the solar farm soon to bring in a lot of potential business to Moree, businesses need to be ready to take opportunities to grow.

“If other businesses are open to change in their business, and I believe we’ve all got to be able to change in this economic situation, (they need) to understand the needs and growth of their staff even down to their family and relationship situation. This gives you a better understanding and you are able to work easier with your staff,”

Mr Gunther said having staff taking an ownership of the business meant they were more likely to stay with the business.

“After this survey I saw a distinct change in the attitude of all my staff members... to take on the business as part of themselves - it is their business as much as mine,

“We want to stay and continue to grow in Moree. We love Moree and the North West. Our business will grow in this area by utilising tools like making work choices and employer of choice,” Mr Gunther said.

Mr Stewart said the Sydney University Workplace Research Centre spent 12 months going over the survey and doing some small tweaking.

Sydney University senior research analyst Dr Michael Rafferty said the initiative would help employers formulate policies to help them retain staff.

“The most significant challenge for businesses now and into the future will be in securing, developing and retaining their workforce,” Dr Rafferty said.

“We know lots of employers say they want to be an employer of choice but they don’t have any mechanisms to know if they are succeeding. What this survey does potentially is have both a dialogue with staff about that but also providing base information so people can start developing policies to improve their employment propositions,” he said.

“So we know that in the context of skills and labour shortages in rural and regional Australia this is a really important initiative.”