Telstra Corporation Ltd.

The NRSPP Driver Headspace Working Group was established the NRSPP Steering and by CBA and supported by Telstra, Uniting Care Queensland and Viva Energy. It was formed to explore how Emotional drivers are nearly 10x greater risk of being involved in a crash whereas a driver conversing on the mobile phone is 2.2 and texting is 6.1.

The concern was that being emotional can cloud your judgement and on the road, a vehicle can easily become an outlet for that emotion. Equally an emotional driver is more easily distracted or prone to distraction when driving. To explore the Driver Headspace issue in further detail NRSPP in 2016 conducted research exploring emotional driving triggered by negative and stressful/circumstances and how it was another form of driver distraction. The term used was Driver Headspace’ thus refers to the state of a driver’s psycho-physiological functioning as a result of exposure to a stressful event or adverse circumstance. The research was conducted by Prof. Mike Reagan. The research found

• Driver headspace events can derive from a myriad of negative and stressful events/circumstances and can be categorised based on whether they occur within or outside the workplace, and on whether they are traumatic or non-traumatic in nature.
• There is a high prevalence of driver headspace events across different professional driving work positions due to multiple work-related stressors and increased prevalence of mental health issues.
• Mindfulness can improve focus and emotion management and reduce distraction. It is both an everyday experience and something that can be enhanced through training. Mindfulness training has been shown to significantly improve sustained attention, working memory, distractibility, emotional reactivity, behavioural regulation, empathy and prosocial behaviours.

New Studies since have shown driving while in an emotional state is far more likely to result in a crash than being tired or using a mobile phone.

Who are Telstra?

Telstra operates one of Australia’s largest fleets with over 10,000 vehicles, including approximately 7,000 operational vehicles. The composition of this fleet is mainly light commercial vehicle but does range from small cars to heavy commercial vehicles including heavy plant.
Outside of Australia we operate a small fleet of company cars and only a small number of employees drive as part of their role.
In Australia, Telstra employees also use their personal vehicle for work-related purposes that includes both private vehicles and salary-sacrifice leased vehicles.

What does road safety mean to Telstra?

Driver and vehicle safety is one of Telstra’s highest-ranked HSE risks. The primary concern for Telstra is the risk of failure to operate vehicles in accordance with Telstra’s policies and the law, which may result in a fatality or serious injury to employees, contractors or members of the public and property damage.

Specific risks relate to motor vehicle collisions, speeding, red light infringements, vehicles not being parked properly, driver distraction by technology and driver fatigue. Telstra’s ‘grey fleet’, noted above, presents a number of risks outside of traditional fleet management, including driver licensing and competency, driver demerit points history, vehicle roadworthiness and insurance coverage.

Our commitment to improving driver and vehicle safety both within Telstra and the wider community is consistent with our organisational values of Show You Care and Better Together, i.e. we need to work not only within our organisation but also the wider community to reduce the risk of road trauma.

What are Telstra’s NRSPP road safety commitments?

1. Ongoing thought leadership in relation to driver and vehicle safety given our large fleet and years of experience in fleet operations and managing the associated health and safety risks.
2. Facilitation and venue support for the NRSPP Steering Committee and working group meetings (e.g. Grey Fleet) as was done in 2017.
3. Facilitation and venue support for the NRSPP Utilities Forum as was done in 2017.
4. Commitment, attendance and active participation at all NRSPP Steering Committee and relevant working group and industry forums conducted by the NRSPP as we have done for the Utilities Forum, Grey Fleet and Safer Use of Mobiles in Vehicles projects.
5. Participation in relevant research activities conducted by ARRB and NRSPP partners.
6. Increased offering by acting as a focal point for other major telecommunications providers within Telstra including our Tier 1 subcontractors to raise the profile of the NRSPP and the contribution to its efforts from a number of different organisations.

SA Power Network kindly hosted the first NRSPP Utilities Forum on the 22 July 2015 at Oaks Plaza Pier Hotel at Glenelg. Telstra attended the forum and shared their insights in relation to the Utilities Sector.  What resulted following this forum was the establishment of an amazing network within the utilities sector.

Telstra kindly hosted the second forum in Melbourne in 2016 at their Head Office on Exhibition Street.

The following provides a summary of Telstra as part of the NRSPP Utilities Forum.

• Telstra has been an active Partner of the Utilities Forum Executive since it was formed in 2015.
• Telstra has attended every Utilities since the inaugural forum:
  • 2015 NRSPP Utilities Forum – Final Report represented by David Fitzgerald
  • 2016 NRSPP Utilities Forum – Final Report was hosted by David Fitzgerald
  • 2017 Utilities Forum Final Report represented by David Fitzgerald
  • 2018 NRSPP Utilities Forum Final Report represented by Brendan Callaghan
    • NRSPP Utilities Forum – 2018 Reflections Video
    • IAG featured as part of the first NRSPP Blog following on from the Utilities Forum on sleep
  • 2019 NRSPP Utilities Forum – Final Report represented by Brendan Callaghan

Telstra joined Re:act and become an East Cost Partner for NSW, Qld and Victoria corporate panels.

• Re:act 2019 – Theme Vulnerable road users and drivers: shared responsibility
  • Melbourne Swinburne University: Communication Design students Max Bufardeci, Riley van Ingen, Felicity Lemke and Caitlin Gmehling created the ‘100% Human’ road safety campaign
  • Sydney UTS: Communication Design student Elizabeth Sacco created the ‘#ThanksMate’ road safety campaign.
• Re:act 2020 – Theme: Distraction
  • Melbourne Swinburne University: Communication Design students Stephanie Powell, Thomas Pritchard, Caitlin Xavier & Laura Hughes created the ‘You miss a lot distracted’ road safety campaign
  • Sydney UTS: Ella Mander-Jones’ awesome campaign around killer playlists
  • Brisbane QUT: ‘Where’s Your Sense?’ campaign, from the minds of QUT students Kate Walters, Paulus Pearce, Mea Clifford and Macey Robinson-Stewart,
  • London UAL: Eyes up, Phone Down by Reana Kerai

Telstra is recognised as one of the Founding Partners of NRSPP with Steve Stone kindly helping design and build the foundational elements of the program during its establishment phase.

A key contribution of Telstra through Steve Stone was establishing the initial set of key performance indicators in a workshop hosted by Coca-Cola Amatil,  March 2014.

NRSPP wishes to recognise the contributions of Telstra for helping develop the program.

Steve attended the formal launch of NRSPP on the 5 May, 2014 as part of the UN Decade of Action in Melbourne hosted by RACV.

Steve departed the role in 2014.

Telstra through David Fitzgerald and Siegfried Hecker were founders of the NRSPP Grey Fleet Working Group. Telstra hosted the Victoria Workshop to help provide input from the regulator but also as an employer who has grey fleet on the development of a practical guide.

A key deliverable of the working group was the guide and supporting content.

https://www.nrspp.org.au/resources/15096-2/

In 2017, NRSPP held the inception co-design workshop for Suicide in Road Transport (SiRT) which Telstra attended and actively contributed to. Telstra has continued as a partner of the SiRT National Working Group since it was started.

Telstra has continued to contribute to SiRT which is now in stage 2 with a major national project funded by Austroads and being delivered collaboratively by NRSPP.