A meat processor in regional Victoria is changing its rosters to get more people, mainly school mums and young women, in the workforce and onto the factory floor.
More than 140 delegates including politicians, academics, and business leaders spent two days talking about ways to solve Australia's labour and skills shortage in Canberra last week.
But Don Smallgoods in central Victoria is already doing it.
The company received $3.6 million in state government funding to hire 200 extra workers at its Castlemaine factory, and two farms at Bears Lagoon and Girgarre.
Family-friendly, flexible shifts have been key to recuitment success.
Mum back to work
Kath Cleator, who has seven children, said she had to quit her job in Bendigo in June because her shift start times were too early to allow her to access before-school care.
"The kids' before school care doesn't open till 6.30am, there were a couple of before 6.30am shifts that they needed me to be there," she said.
"And I couldn't give the guarantee whether I could or couldn't."
She has found work at Don KR in Castlemaine, which offers flexible shift times that fit in with her parenting.
"It actually makes it easier for me to be able to come to work and actually be part of a workforce," she said.
"For me, being a mum, I like to be there before the school bell goes [in the afternoon] and I still love to drop the kids to school of a morning."
She said getting children ready for school on time was challenging but she now was able to get it done and then start work by about 8.30am.
Don Smallgoods managing director Will Ursell said the company's recruitment success was entirely due to the family flexible shifts on offer.
"We've had to get a bit creative with how we can attract people into the workforce and find workers that we just can't find currently," he said.
He said the new "school parents" shift and an evening shift had attracted more parents, women, young workers, and culturally and linguistically diverse people to the team.
"There's a 9am to 3pm shift, and there's a 5pm to midnight shift, both of those shifts have proved to be very popular," Mr Ursell said.
The company is training workers in food processing, agriculture and leadership and management as a part of the scheme.
Summer Jones was 19 when she joined Don KR after spotting an advertisement for the 9am to 3pm shift on social media.
Not having a driver's licence had made other jobs impossible for Ms Jones in a regional area where trains and buses didn't run all day and all night.
But this shift allowed her to catch public transport to work.
"I wanted to go to a place where I had more job security and more stability," she said.
"Working 9am-3pm every day is different from jumping around to different schedules, it's a whole lot easier, especially if I need to get there.
"And it was nice to be able to up my skill set."
Ms Jones has since got her driver's licence and is now on a full-time day shift.
She is known around the factory as one of the company's best and most dependable load-out operators.
Workplace Gender and Equality Agency director Mary Wooldridge said flexible, family-friendly shifts were important in creating real change when it came to gender equality in the workforce.
"It's absolutely critical that we are talking about gender equality as a fundamental part of workplace reform," she said.
"And that's what the Jobs and Skills Summit did — put gender equality front and centre."
Ms Wooldridge said workplace reforms that highlighted flexibility created momentum to improve gender equality.
"But we also need to think about broader reform in terms of support of childcare, low paid workers getting a better deal," Ms Wooldridge said.
Nine new employees started at Don KR this week after the callout for applicants last month.
