As Australia’s largest supplier of MRO, industrial and safety products, Blackwoods is proud to be a business at the forefront of supporting women in the workforce. We continue to work with our suppliers and customers to develop broader clothing and footwear ranges that meet the needs of the modern workplace.
It’s been proven that having a gender-neutral workforce has many benefits for an organisation and its employees from improved workplace safety, increased productivity and profits to improved workplace culture and employee mental health, all of which add to business viability in the long term.
Increasing the number of women in traditional male employment areas has taken a long time and in trades such as carpentry and plumbing, the number of women employed has remained at 2% for 25 years. However, increasing competition for employment is now enabling more women apprentices to enter the trades.
Fiona McDonald, the founder, and Managing Director of Tradeswomen Australia, a not for profit organisation, recently provided a detailed overview of the current employment opportunities for women and some of the issues they face. Click here to read the interview.
THESE BOOTS ARE MADE FOR WORKIN’: MODERNISING WORKWEAR FOR WOMEN
With the number of women picking up the tools increasing, demand has also risen for more stylish, female specific safety clothing. Long gone are the days of gender-neutral clothing, where choosing a women’s work shirt often simply meant choosing a small size men’s.
Today, Blackwoods works closely with established safety brands including Workhorse, Oliver Footwear and KingGee, all of which produce lines of safety clothing tailored specifically to the fit and style demands of the lady tradies.
Importantly, these new lines allow female workers to feel just as comfortable and confident in their PPE as their male counterparts, but probably the most significant development to come from these improvements in style is that it is helping to improve safety. These better fitting garments are encouraging people to always wear their PPE as intended, eliminating the need for alterations or the desire to forego their safety gear completely.
Click here to learn more about why more Australian women are becoming tradies and how it is influencing the design of workwear for supporting women in the workforce.
This Article first appeared in the latest edition of Safety Spotlight. For more safety articles like this one, click below to checkout the online version of the magazine.
To find out more about the extensive range of women’s workwear visit www.blackwoods.com.au or call 13 73 23 today!
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