HERA recently commissioned an external market research company to figure out what NZ society thinks of our metals industry. The outcome was nothing short of interesting. Why? Because when asked if the steel industry was prepared for future technologies and innovation – only 47% felt we were. And of that, 79% responded that future-proofing the…
Sustainability has many facets. But it looks like climate change is the hands-down winner for the holiday sustainability hot topic (pardon the pun). So, how do we respond as an industry to this growing global concern? And what is HERA doing to assist? The catastrophic Australian fires and recent smoke impacts on New Zealand have…
Over the holidays a recent discovery got me to thinking about what data leads designers to imagine the future. As per the status quo of any extended holiday (once the eating, spending time with whanau (family), lounging about and doing things one tenth the speed we usually do), we generally turn our attention to tidying…
Employees are the cornerstone of any successful organisation. Not surprisingly, it’s why businesses are constantly looking to fill positions with top employee talent – because they want to improve their products and services. However, in a competitive job market, businesses must up their game to avoid losing top talent to the competition. This is where…
Several months ago, I was talking to HERA’s CEO Dr Troy Coyle regarding some of the positive advantages of early engagement on construction projects. I reflected on the way our industry currently conducts business and the general way it manages change. It is because of this, or rather because of the lack of it, I…
Recently, I met up with a senior leader whom I admire because of the way he practises mindfulness in his leading. The focus of our conversation was being authentic and mindful in our leadership. We agreed that a good definition of mindfulness is about being awake to and aware of what is happening to ourselves…
Have you ever asked yourself this? It is a term that is often bandied about in leadership discussions. But what does it actually mean and why is it important for HERA to talk about it? Recently, being a charismatic leader has come up in many conversations for me (and not by my initiation). It’s prompted…
We’re making great strides in achieving diversity in the boardroom, but we’re still not there. One would think it’s a no brainer. But every time an announcement is made around diversity in the boardroom, I always get asked for comment about why this is important which makes me wonder: Is this really not self-evident or…
We all know that HR has fundamentally been about helping enable culture and driving performance. But in order to do this effectively in today’s world, we need to recognise the key role HR plays in enabling innovation. There is an innate tension within high-performing leadership teams, a product of the diverse and (partially) non-overlapping goals…
Surprisingly, this appears to be the case according to research recently released. An interdisciplinary team involving researchers with backgrounds in engineering, intercultural communication, and applied linguistics from universities in the United Kingdom, Belgium, Australia, and Japan conducted the research. They analysed written materials with intercultural communication as the subject, as used in engineering education. They…
If there’s one word that embodies the spirit of team leadership, it’s empathy. Empathy is probably the most sought-after workplace skill these days – be it for the customer, employee, teammate or even boss! But how commonplace is it? Empathy is often little valued, yet critical for bettering workplace culture and performance – but is…
The third industrial revolution changed the way the previous generations worked – and very soon, the fourth industrial revolution will do the same again for us. Inevitably, we’ll always have the ability to access powerful resources previously unavailable or uneconomic. HERA members now need to be able to innovate and change to counter or utilise…