The story of 2023 was APS-wide bargaining and the goal of bringing more commonality across APS enterprise agreements. There will be many changes that make it easier for APS HR professionals longer term, with the introduction of common dates for pay increases and more consistent entitlements.
So with the release of the statement of common conditions at the end of the year, the start of 2024 will see APS agencies finalising and presenting their new enterprise agreements to staff to vote on.
So far, 9 agencies have voted up their new agreements. If you are not one of those agencies, your voting period shouldn’t be too far away, as agencies will need to go into their access period on or before 14 March 2024 and get a majority ‘yes’ vote for staff to receive the benefits of the government’s pay offer.
As HR professionals, you might be wondering how you can best support your people in understanding the agreement and how many of these enhancements will be implemented.
Keep your advice consistent and correct
People will see you as a reliable and accurate source of information. If your agreement isn’t voted in yet, it is important to ensure all the information provided to staff is accurate and that senior leaders do not provide mixed messages. If this happens, your agency could be in breach of good faith bargaining and cause delays in implementing your agreement.
It is alright if you don’t know the answer to specific questions. Make sure you know where to find accurate information from your bargaining team to share with people, and if you don’t know the answer, forward any questions to the bargaining team.
At this stage in the process, it is unlikely that all the policies, guidance material and processes have been updated to implement the changes yet, and the bargaining team will be best placed to respond.
Preparing for the changes
Your role as a HR professional will be critical with implementing the changes. While HR roles can vary in what you do, it is likely that there will be a change that will impact your work. So here are some tips on helping get ahead of the changes.
Take the lead
- Stay up to date with the latest information from your bargaining team and be aware of what you can and cannot say.
- Be on the lookout for incorrect or misleading information surfacing within the organisation, so you can point people to trusted information.
- Understand the voting process, so that you can help any staff who are experiencing the voting for the first time understand.
Anticipate changes
- It is critical to have a holistic approach and understand and anticipate changes to your systems. Think about the long-term impacts they may have on the organisation and what your people will need to know.
- Implementation of policies and systems takes time, some big changes may be easy to implement, and smaller ones can be quite a far reaching and complex process. Factor these into your forward planning.
- Identify any issues or concerns early on and engage with your bargaining team, get involved, and speak up if you need to.
What’s next?
It’s an exciting time to be in the HR profession and your expertise can make a huge impact to people navigating their way through implementing the changes of the enterprise agreement.
In future editions of this newsletter, we hope to share some more insights from senior leaders as the implement their new agreements.
If you want to know more about the voting process, go to the Fair Work Commission’s website: Voting process | Fair Work Commission (fwc.gov.au)