Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islanders at Queensland Department of Housing

We are committed to creating a culturally capable workplace where we value the diverse knowledge, skills, history, traditions, and cultures of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people and seek to maximise their employment and career development opportunities.

We recognise that many First Nations people have considerable knowledge of land, natural resources and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities and organisations, and that this knowledge should be properly and fairly recognised in the employment and career development process.

We aim to create an environment that embeds cultural safety in all aspects of the organisation, that enhances our engagement, partnerships, service delivery and workforce processes being more culturally diverse and inclusive by:

• Building culturally safe workplaces and service delivery with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples – through inclusive, accountable leadership and clear processes that aims to build the cultural capabilities of all staff
• Implementing culturally safe recruitment, induction and retention processes – through more inclusive and improved policy, practices and procedures
• Strengthening our response to racism and discrimination – through a zero tolerance to racism, managing conscious and unconscious bias, and developing policies, procedures and practices to educate and support people.

To accelerate progress towards increasing the proportion of Aboriginal peoples and Torres Strait Islanders working in our department, we participate in the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander career pathways service which supports First Nations employees to develop and progress their careers into leadership and decision-making roles. Participants gain access to cross-agency and external career development opportunities, giving them the ability to grow personal networks and identify mentors within a culturally safe space.