Lockdown

This will be our last Status e News for a couple of months. Last Saturday, the Australian Government released its request for tender for Employment Services 2009 -2012, and all of our management team not directly involved in the delivery of services will be in lockdown 24/7 for the next 6 weeks as we prepare our submission. It was prophetic in a way that this should be released on Grand Final day because our future as an Organisation depends largely on our ability to write a premiership script, detailing our successes from the past and providing winning arguments as to why we have the best plans to deliver the Governments key employment and training objectives in the future.

We face some pretty stiff competition this time around from both local providers and overseas companies but believe our 20 year history of working with employers and our understanding of the local labour market should work in our favour. Our recent Business Economic Survey has provided an invaluable source of information, independent of the Australian Bureau of Statistics labour market data, and we are extremely grateful to all those CEO’s and business owners who took the time to complete our survey.

Today, the 5^th Annual Top 100 Company index, which is a much-anticipated fixture on the SA business calendar, will be revealed at a luncheon for more than 1,000 guests at the Hilton Hotel. Status Employment Services has been a major sponsor of this event since inception and this year joined with in-business to conduct a state-wide business economic survey to coincide with the release of the Top 100. The survey results, published in in-business magazine today, represent the views of the Top 100 companies only but were amazingly similar to the views expressed by those surveyed through Status e News. It appears that regardless of the size of the company the issues for employers in relation to labour supply and skills shortages are the same. If you would like a copy of the Top 100 Company Index edition of in-business magazine, delivered to you free of charge, please contact Dora Zalunardo at our Marion office on 8377 0101 or email dora@status.net.au.

Like all of the businesses listed in the Top 100 Company Index, we are very proud of our business success but equally proud of our commitment to corporate social responsibility and leadership in advocating for the most disadvantaged members of our community. Your support has been invaluable to our success in the past and we look forward to strengthening our working relationship with you all in the future. We view Status e News as a pivotal part of our communication strategy with the business community, and have enjoyed bringing you industrial relations updates, economic news and those, somewhat indulgent, editorials this year.

So until next time we meet, probably around December, we wish you good health and business prosperity.

In our featured article this week we look at a recent report from the Australian Bureau of Statistics, which concludes that Older Workers Are Healthier, and introduce two new “Employee Hot Prospects”, which can be accessed from the “hot chilli” link at right.

Older workers had lower rates of heart disease, diabetes, obesity and arthritis than their non working peers, according to a recent analysis of the 2004–05 National Health Survey by the Australian Bureau of Statistics [ABS].

The report found that mature age workers [between 45-74 years] were slightly healthier than their non-working counterparts, with 8 in 10 workers having a chronic health condition such as cardiovascular disease, diabetes or obesity, compared with 9 in 10 of the non-working population.

Cardiovascular disease and arthritis each affected around a quarter of all mature age workers compared with half of non-workers. However, similar proportions of workers and non-workers aged 45–74 years were overweight or obese [58% and 55% respectively].

On the other hand, 7% of mature age people reported that they had a medical condition, [arthritis, osteoporosis, asthma, cancer, cardiovascular diseases, diabetes or mental problems], attributable to their work.

Work related conditions include a high proportion of disc disorders, [42%], back problems [41%] and hearing loss [32%]. Other findings include:

• Mature age workers in capital cities [77%] were less likely to have a chronic condition than those outside of the capitals [83%].
• Mature age workers living in disadvantaged areas have higher rates of nearly all chronic diseases [81%] compared with the most affluent areas [78%].
• Tradespeople aged 45–74 years were more likely to have a chronic health condition [84%] than professionals [75%].
• Even with a major health condition, 56% of mature age workers still assessed their health as very good or excellent, compared with 31% of those who were not working.

This is good news for those who have had their retirement plans dashed by Armageddon on Wall Street – you’ll remain healthier the longer you stay in the workforce - and is great news for our employers. As we revealed in our Economic Business Survey Results in the last issue of Status e News, 78% of respondents, [business owners and employers], were having difficulty in meeting key financial and operational targets because of skills shortages. So it can be seen that for every dark cloud there is a silver lining, and as the meltdown of financial markets gathers pace across the world, rejoice in your ability to keep working and being wanted – even at your age.

So keep working and stay healthy – you can’t afford not to!