A message from your E&I leaders, May '23

As we edge closer to the middle of the year, the six-month look ahead is shaping up to be a busy one.  

In my last update, I spoke about a large volume of tendering activity happening behind the scenes. We continue to make good progress on numerous opportunities as we head into some final discussions regarding these tenders.  

As a leadership team, we are currently focusing on ensuring we are set up properly for the upcoming major peak in activity, including ensuring we have a clear plan for the financial year ahead and are providing the right level of support to our people.  

Each year, our people are invited to submit their most innovative and safe solutions in our EC Innovation Awards, which help celebrate our innovative culture. Last year, you may recall the award was taken out by the ergonomic poly weld stands innovation, which went on to take out a national safety award.  

It would be great to see a team or individual from our business win the award this year. The winner will receive a $10,000 prize and, of course, bragging rights for the year ahead. We want to hear your ideas, big or small. I believe sometimes the most practical solutions can make the biggest difference. Speak to your supervisor to learn more or log your idea in MProve.  

Hanno has been traveling a bit over the last few weeks, so I’ll throw over to him for an update on his travels and to provide an on the ground operational overview.  

Until next time, stay safe.  

Damien Johnson  

Operational update from Operations Manager, Iain Hannant

Welcome to the May edition of On the Wire. Hopefully you didn’t forget about your Mum’s special day a couple of weeks ago? 

Recently, when I was over east, I was lucky enough to get a tour of the Alpha HPA facility where Clint Doherty (Dozer) is heading up the recently commenced stage 2 works. It’s a great facility with an interesting process that results in 99.99 per cent alumina used in the latest battery technology. It’s a great opportunity for our team to showcase our capability in this space, hopefully leading to additional work.  

On the way back, I stopped into Adelaide for a few days to continue our search for the ‘ever-elusive’ electrician. I spent a few days at a career’s expo, meeting with individuals, recruitment agencies and other contractors to see how we can extract more labour out of the South Australian market for our upcoming projects. I came away with some avenues of opportunity, however the market is as tight as ever (as it is everywhere at the moment). 

On the project front, the team at Iron Bridge in the Pilbara only has a week to go after successfully completing their scope. Well done to everyone on a supreme effort – a special mention to Luke Jaenke and Nic Hearne for steering the team on a safe, successful and the reputationally defining project – our first project for FMG. This has put us in a good position for upcoming projects. 

Down to Greenbushes in the south west of Western Australia, where the E&I team is at peak on the MSA project and continue to be solution focused on a daily basis. Dave Chapple and the team have another couple of months to grind out to get the project over the line, which I have no doubt they will, and safely. 

As Damien mentioned, there are plenty of opportunities that are very close to award. The timing of some of these seems to be bouncing around a bit at the moment, but hopefully we can lock down some certainty soon and keep our teams rolling onto these projects. Watch this space. 

Stay safe 

Iain Hannant