Review into the treatment of women at the Australian Defence Force ...

Chapter 10: Minimising Risk, Managing Incidents and Ensuring the Safety of the Workplace – Recommendations 22-31108Intent of RecommendationTo date, there has been very little comparative work done on unacceptable behaviour in differentorganisations. The aim of this Recommendation was to offer ADFA a basis for comparison with othertertiary and training establishments, and to use the work done by ADFA and DSPR for a wider nationalbenefit.Implementation actionsThe RIT held discussions with a number of stakeholders in the development stage of the new survey.Specifically, discussions were conducted between RIT members and university representatives at the‘Linking with Universities’ forums in November 2011, March 2012 and June 2012. 13DSPR subsequently developed two different versions of the Unacceptable Behaviour Survey thatwere similar to the ADFA Unacceptable Behaviour Survey, but applicable to other universities and ADFtraining establishments. DSPR received ethics approval to run a pilot of the training establishmentsurvey in September 2012 and discussions continue about other universities. 14The training establishment survey was piloted at RMC Duntroon in September 2012. While there aresome complicating factors when making direct comparison, 15 the results broadly suggest that:• Unacceptable behaviour is more prevalent at ADFA than RMC Duntroon• The residential domain at RMC Duntroon is not an issue to the degree it is at ADFA• The number of people seeking support and making complaints is low at both sites, but evenlower at ADFA than RMC Duntroon• Opinions about unacceptable behaviour suggest there is less tolerance for unacceptablebehaviour at RMC Duntroon than ADFA. 16Factors underlying direct comparisons between ADFA and RMC Duntroon include comparative age andgender breakdowns, and the differences in the physical layout at RMC Duntroon. However, results suchas these legitimise the focus and efforts that the ADF has made at ADFA.Plans to administer the survey at other training establishments and universities have advanced withmixed results. DSPR is currently finalising plans to administer the survey to all personnel at trainingestablishments in 2013, and negotiations are continuing with other universities about administration. 17DSPR expects to provide survey results to Defence leadership, and fact sheets to individual researchparticipants and their organisations for all surveying completed. 18Audit findingsMuch effort has gone into meeting the intent of this Recommendation. DSPR, ADFA and the RIT havedeveloped a survey that appears to be transferrable from ADFA to other Defence establishments andcivilian university settings. They have also pursued the rollout of the survey, and sought innovativesolutions to complex problems that presented themselves along the way. The Audit commends the RIT,ADFA and DSPR on the leadership role they have taken.UniversitiesDSPR and the RIT originally envisaged surveying a number of Group of Eight (Go8) residential colleges,as these would provide the best comparators to ADFA, however there have been issues with makingthis happen. Many colleges initially expressed interest at being involved in the project, but to date havenot made a formal commitment. At this stage, the ANU alone has committed to the process, and this isexpected to happen in mid-2013.