intouch spoke to new IPWEA SA President Rita Excell about being the first woman on the SA Board, managing the Australian Driverless Cars Initiative in her role as ARRB Group Regional Manager SA, and what she hopes to bring to IPWEA SA.
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Rita, can you give us a snapshot of your professional life and involvement with IPWEA?
I’m a qualified civil engineer, and I studied at the University of South Australia. My first job as a graduate was with the City of Port Adelaide. It was a very exciting time for a young graduate – my passion was stormwater and sustainability. The Council had more than its fair share of water issues being a Port, near the coast with low lying land and regular flooding issues. It was a great opportunity and I gained a lot of exposure working in a small, innovative council.
I had a number of roles there and then we had council amalgamations, and we amalgamated with a nearby, larger council. With that came great opportunities as well, with regard to a bigger council area, broader focus and exposure to a number of very experienced people.
Both of my senior managers at the time were active members of IPWEA, although it was called the Institute of Municipal Engineers Australia at the time. They’d both had quite senior roles with the Institute, and they encouraged me as a young engineer to join, and supported and introduced me to a range of people who were quite a bit more experienced.
When we amalgamated, I was given an opportunity to take on a different role and I moved on to traffic and transport planning. I worked with a very experienced and learned traffic planner.
Dealing with the community, understanding the need to match the technical solutions with community expectations, brought me into a different role professionally.
I joined the Royal Automobile Association, and I was there for just over 12 years – that’s really where my career started in the road safety area. Now, my career has moved into that of strategic road safety policy, stakeholder management and advocacy.
Tell us about your current role with ARRB – it sounds like you’re working on some exciting projects.
ARRB is the leading provider of road research and best practice workshops in Australia and my role is the Regional Manager for South Australia.
I look after all members, who include all the councils in South Australia, as well as the state road authority.
I’m also leading the Australian Driverless Vehicle Initiative in South Australia – that’s where my focus has been over the last 18 months, with the support of the South Australian government. ARRB is leading a collaboration of researchers, industry and government organisations to accelerate the safe and successful introduction of driverless vehicles onto Australian roads. It’s a very exciting time for everyone involved with transport. For local government, it’s really about understanding what it means and how transformational it will be for the way they currently plan and manage their council.
The other thing I’m involved in is the Austroads update to the Guide to Asset Management. I’m the project manager for the update to that significant suite of guides. We’re working very closely with aligning with IPWEA and the IIMM and all the products that IPWEA produce to support that.
Obviously, with my links back into local roads and local government through IPWEA, I’m looking to make sure that the Austroads guides have recognition of local roads and greater alignment for the needs of people who manage low-volume and local roads as well.
It’s very exciting cross-pollination. It’s a way of really raising awareness of those people in the road agencies of the great work IPWEA are doing, and it’s a way of bringing the two levels of road management together.
What has your experience been as a woman working in an infamously male-dominated industry?
Going to university was good preparation for what the workforce was going to be like – there were probably only four female students in our first year class!
I would really like to encourage more women to go into the STEM areas. I really support the government with their focus on the innovation agenda that’s just been released. I encourage young students to really explore the maths and sciences – I’ve never regretted the direction that I took.
Dealing with an industry that continues to be male-dominated was challenging at the time, but one of the things throughout our industry is that people respect your professional opinion and judgement if it’s technically correct. It’s important for all engineers to make sure they give accurate advice, and advice that is founded on evidence.
Now, when I look at the people I deal with, it’s getting close to about 40% females. In our driverless vehicle initiative we have an executive steering committee, and 60% of the people on that board are females.
Even with our IPWEA SA Board, we’ve had three females, although one has just stepped down.
I was very lucky throughout my career that my employers were very accommodating. I’ve got two teenage children, and my employers were and have been very accommodating to allow me to have a balance of family and work, but still have a meaningful and significant role in my organisation, without having to take a back step or leave, which was the case in the generations before me.
I’ve never felt that I’ve been discriminated against because I was a female, but like any engineer, we need to understand that our judgement will be questioned and we need to ensure that the advice we give is correct and justifiable.
I think I won’t be the last woman IPWEA SA President, and I understand there’s going to be other female Division Presidents coming through this year, and I think that’s an opportunity to bring a different focus to the National Board.
What are you hoping to bring to IPWEA SA during your presidency?
I really have got more out of IPWEA than I’ve been able to put in – it’s a great experience, and I want to be able to promote that to members, our young people, and that even very experienced people can leverage off the networks, the collaboration and the community of IPWEA.
Throughout my long involvement with IPWEA SA, I’ve really been able to experience different styles that the different presidents have brought to it, and I think the opportunity I see is really combining some of the strengths that each one of my predecessors had.
For SA, we’ve got a significant program of research activities. It’s about bringing innovation and understanding what the benefits are for councils in doing things better and smarter, and highlighting the innovations that already exists in councils.
Having worked for councils in part of my career as well as being in a non-council role, I really understand the opportunities that sponsors are seeking to get from being part of the association.
We were the second state to launch a Young IPWEA, and our YIPWEA has been very active. We really want to support them, and continue to support and retain young professionals within public works, and expose them to the full range of opportunities within the public works profession.
What opportunities do you think IPWEA SA needs to capitalise on?
The SA public works community is quite an active one and the interests are quite diverse. We see more and more, there’s pressure in the economic environment, and people are stretched and struggling to contribute to associations like IPWEA, and I think we need to make it more accessible to people to be able to participate in the areas they’re interested in.
We’ve recently done a survey of our membership and asked them what they’d like us to focus on, what’s important in their roles and positions, so we’re going to tailor our 2016 Annual Conference program, being held on 27 May, to the feedback we’ve received.
For young graduates coming out of university, it’s really critical we keep them in the public works profession. The job and employment situation in SA is quite weak at the moment, and what I don’t want to see is a big gap like in the 1990s, where a lot of engineers graduated and couldn’t find a job in the profession, and then moved out into different disciplines.
It’s about really trying to encourage our public works partners to provide training, work experience and support for the graduates that are coming out of university over the next couple of years.
What are you and the IPWEA SA Board looking forward to, heading into 2016?
We would look to have a stronger role in promoting the interests of our membership. I come from a strong advocacy background, and I think we’ve got an opportunity to support National in their advocacy on issues that affect the public works industry.
Our membership is quite strong – we’ve 540 members at the moment, with 250 student members, we’ve also got a good balance of contractors and local government public works engineers. I would like to see that extend to people working in state government as well. It’s really just broadening the sector we are relevant to. We’ve got a very strong Board, so we’re really keen to work together, and continue the great work of those that have come before me.
It’s an exciting time for the public works industry at the moment and IPWEA. Public works professionals are really the closest link to the community and understand how to deliver services that the community need and want. The same can be said for IPWEA we have a close link to our membership and hopefully that translates to providing services to them that meet their needs. I’m really looking forward to engaging with our members over the next couple of years through my presidency, and having a role on the national agenda.
I’m also looking forward to encouraging more people into the profession and supporting them. I think it’s important to demonstrate that this is a great career opportunity for all young professionals. For women, if I can provide some assistance or guidance, or even just an opportunity to demonstrate where my career has taken me and the opportunities I’ve had by being part of IPWEA that would be a very fulfilling outcome of being the IPWEA SA Division President.