ESG Personality of the Month: Gina Marchetti

In this interview series, we celebrate ESG achievements from across the GFG family. This time, we caught up with Gina Marchetti, Project Manager PMO, Infrabuild in Adelaide, Australia.

The ‘S’ in ESG – Social – is all about delivering good quality and sustainable working lives for our people; supporting our communities and managing trustworthy supply chains.

Hi Gina, how did you come to be involved in the social side of things?

Gina: When I joined the company as a 19-year-old graduate in the 80s, there weren’t many women in the steel industry. But I’ve been really privileged to have had strong male mentorship throughout my developing years, which enabled me to grow to be the person that I am professionally today.

I wanted to make that experience available for others, which led me to get involved in setting up the Women’s Network in Australia in 2019.

A gap in female participation is not just a ‘female problem’ and it can’t be solved by women alone.

What is the Women’s Network and why is it important to us all?

Gina: It was born out of the recognition that we didn’t have enough female participation at InfraBuild and we had work to do on the gender pay gap. At the time, we had amazing women in customer service roles but not in management roles and there were issues with talent retention.

We wanted to create a space for our people to speak openly about the barriers to us achieving equality: somewhere for our women from across our 52 sites in Australia to share and learn from their common experiences and challenges.

It’s relevant to us all because a gap in female participation is not just a ‘female problem’ and it can’t be solved by women alone. That’s why the Women’s Network is open to everyone across InfraBuild – not only women.

One of the values of WRIB (We Are InfraBuild) is about being better together. Being collaborative as an organisation works far better than being directive and controlling.

Creating an inclusive workplace takes a long time – just like building a safety and wellbeing culture – but we need to start somewhere.

What impact has it had on the working lives of our people and our communities?

Gina: The impact has been threefold. For our people, we’ve had some very high-profile guest speakers talk to our Network on topics like resilience, mental health and how to build a great LinkedIn profile. We’ve helped our women access training to build their skills through our partnership with NAWO (National Association of Women in Operations).

For our communities, the Network holds annual Christmas charity drives per state and region, which has really resonated with our employees, customers and the communities we engage with.

From a recruitment perspective, our work with the Women’s Network supports our commitment to creating a better workplace for our people. I find that younger generations are much more interested in what their employer stands for and its stance on sustainability, diversity, and inclusion.

What’s next for the Women’s Network?

Gina: There are plans to change the name of the Network so it’s more to do with societal responsibility and to be more in line with Diversity and Inclusion. We would like to expand the topics covered to include disability, race, religion for example. It important given this momentum that we continue to build and educate together rather than alienate by focusing on specific groups only.

It’s about how we help all our people feel purposeful about the company they belong to and how we integrate inclusivity into our recruitment and our culture. That takes a long time – just like building a safety and wellbeing culture – but we need to start somewhere.

Thanks Gina!

Did you know that GFG Alliance has a global Women’s Network? Click here to join.

To join the Women’s Network in Australia, click here.

To meet the other ESG superstars we’ve spoken to in this interview series, read more here.