Australia marks International Women’s Day with week-long celebration

Teams event with nearly 1000 participants wraps up the week

International Women’s Day (IWD) 2024 culminated for GFG Alliance Australia with a Teams event on March 8 that attracted nearly 1000 participants.

Following a week of regional celebrations throughout Australian GFG sites, Infrabuild board member and one of Australia’s leading women in business, Andrea Slattery spoke for an hour to Infrabuild and LIBERTY Primary Metals Australia (LPMA) employees in line with the IWD theme of inspire inclusion.

Broadcasting from the Adelaide GFG office, Andrea was introduced by LPMA Chief Executive Officer Sandip Biswas with support, on the line, from Infrabuild CEO and Executive Director Francisco Irazusta.

Outlining her background and journey in business that started on a farm in regional South Australia, Andrea emphasised that IWD was not just about March 8, it was about celebrating and creating the opportunities for women every day. She explained how women can advance themselves and address an imbalance in leadership roles within the company.

There are going to be lots of opportunities and development programs that promote inclusion and gender equality in our business
Andrea Slattery

“What we are doing in GFG Australia is about continuously progressing and accelerating the opportunity for genuine equality through economic empowerment, professional and personal development,” Andrea said.

“We must help women in our organisation to let them know they can achieve that next level and do so with authenticity.

“Be yourself. It is so important that we have that diversity, for each of you to be authentic and for our leaders to lead with integrity and authenticity as we work towards achieving our future vision in leading clean, green steel.”

Sandip quoted a statistic that reveals only 22% of Australia’s Chief Executive Officers are women as he outlined GFG Alliance’s strategy on inclusion and gender equality. GFG Alliance Australia currently has a 13% overall representation of women in the workforce which, for the steel industry, is an admirable percentage while 24% of our LPMA leadership team are women and 19% at Infrabuild.

“At GFG Alliance we are working hard so that we don’t become one of those statistics with only 22% of CEO’s being women,” Sandip said.

“When you work for GFG there are equal opportunities here because we know the value of diversity in our teams.”

Francisco pointed to GFG’s recent track record that sees many women in senior roles in the business while identifying gender equality and diversity as a real opportunities for our organisation.

“There is a significant opportunity and potential to be proactive, be the leaders in the promotion of women and diversity,” Francisco said.

“It is a challenge for everyone but an advantage for us to have that positive inclusion mindset.

“It will be crazy if we don’t because we will be missing out on more than half of the talent in this world … I’m convinced that in the future we will have a 50/50 split of women and men in leadership roles, maybe even 60/40 women and men.”

The session was wrapped up with questions from the floor including one that asked what the future opportunities for inclusion and gender equality in the business look like.

When you work for GFG there are equal opportunities here because we know the value of diversity in our teams.
Sandip Biswas

“There are going to be lots of opportunities and development programs that promote inclusion and gender equality in our business,” Andrea said.

“It will be part of life going forward and it is just up to everyone to get on board and really be engaged in the process.”

These programs will be visible in May when the Xplore and and associated Discover women in leadership pilot programs kick off as a lead-in to a business-wide roll out.

Main picture: Andrea Slattery address the Teams meeting on International Women’s Day. Above right: Andrea, centre, with staff at the Adelaide office Elisa Black (Head of Communications LPMA), Kellie Collins (Head of Health, Safety and Risk LPMA), Susan Bromley (HR Manager LIBERTY Primary Steel), Amy Burnell (Continuous Improvement Lead LIBERTY Primary Steel), Linda Goodley (Category Manager), Georgia Jones (Head of Legal LPMA)