We are committed to fostering an inclusive and diverse workplace where every employee feels valued and respected. Our Inclusion and Diversity program is designed to create a sense of belonging for all employees, enhance our capability to innovate, and reflect the diverse communities we serve.

Why Inclusion and Diversity Matters

• Innovation: A diverse workforce brings a variety of perspectives that lead to better decision-making and problem-solving.
• Productivity and Performance: Inclusive work environments result in happier, more productive employees and increased retention levels.
• Community Engagement: A diverse workforce helps us better understand and meet the needs of our customers and communities, driving the transition to a clean energy future 

To support these aims, we facilitate internal Reference Groups for our five key focus areas to enable employees to champion inclusion and diversity efforts across the business. We also partner with organisations who can support our employees and enable us to attract new and diverse talent such as the Diversity Council of Australia and our inclusion and diversity initiatives have been acknowledged as a finalist in the 2025 AGRIAs.

Our Key Focus Areas

Gender

Our goal is to create equal opportunities for women to thrive, succeed, and lead within our organisation, ensuring their voices are heard and their contributions valued at every level. 

We are proud of our achievements that include supporting working parents through gender-neutral paid parental leave and superannuation payments, increased support and equipment for our women in the field and developing and mentoring our future female leaders. 

Our work in this area has been recognised with multiple awards in both 2025 Dual awards champion workplace equity and flexibility and 2024 Essential Energy awarded for driving equity in the workplace.

Our established partnerships with WORK180, Champions of Change Coalition, Menopause Friendly Australia, Family Friendly Workplaces and Empowered Women in Trades support and recognise these achievements.

First Nations

Our objective is to provide genuine opportunities for and increase the number of First Nations employees, and to support Indigenous communities through participation, contribution, and advocacy.

Through our First Nations Strategy and our Reconciliation Action Plan we have implemented a sustainable program of activities to support our First Nations employees such as mentoring, cultural awareness programs, cultural protocols, leadership development and career pathways programs to support young First Nations people to join our organisation and thrive.

We actively work with Clontarf Foundation, Stars Foundation, On-Country Pathways and Supply Nation to support First Nations people and their communities.

DisAbility

We strive to engage, encourage and support people with a disability, those caring for or working with people with a disability and/or who identify as neurodivergent, by creating a platform for employees to share their experiences and provide input for improving and raising awareness of disability inclusion in the workplace and broader community. 

The development of our Accessibility and Inclusion Plan aims to address access and inclusion barriers for our employees, customers and community, and we are proud of the resources we have delivered to ensure all employees with a disability or who are neurodivergent feel supported and can thrive.

We are committed to supporting adjustments throughout the recruitment and selection process, as well as during employment. We actively support and encourage people with a disability to apply for roles (including alternate formats of application forms or alternate ways for accessibility). To discuss adjustment requirements, please contact [email protected] or call us on 1800255777.

Our partnerships with the Australian Disability Network, Hidden Disabilities Sunflower and Carer-Inclusive Workplace are testament to our support of people with a disability.

WCAG2.2 Statement
We are constantly testing and improving the digital accessibility of our website to align with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG). While we acknowledge the site currently has some minor accessibility issues, we are working with our developers to bring it in line with WCAG 2.2.

LGBTQIA+

We promote awareness, education, and advocacy on LGBTQIA+ issues within the organisation and the community to ensure every employee feels safe and valued. 

We are proud to have achieved Bronze Tier status in the Australian Workplace Equity Index (AWEI) which recognises our commitment to LGBTQ+ workplace inclusion.

Our active ally network with Pride in Diversity and The Pinnacle Foundation enables us to support both our employees and the Australian LQBTQI+ community e.g. Scholarship a pinnacle step towards diversity and inclusion.

Multicultural

We enable our people the opportunity to champion a culturally diverse and inclusive workforce and increase intercultural awareness through education and communication.

We support and celebrate multicultural events in our footprint, provide cultural leave to employees and are proud members of the newly established National Employer Network for Refugee Empowerment.