Supporting the wellbeing of people in a high-pressure, high-profile industry

The sporting industry is a high-pressure one and, for Cricket Australia, having such an iconic brand presence attracts a lot of media attention, especially regarding decisions made by head office.

Managing such a complicated organisation requires the ability to not only oversee state-based operations but work with each state’s individual HR teams who also have local issues to contend with due to large travelling squads, pressure to perform through the season and COVID restrictions on player contact.

Cricket Australia needed an organisation that understood the pressure of the industry as well as the relationship between the talent (players) and those who work to provide entertainment and the highest quality sporting product.

Issue/Objective:

Cricket Australia needed a new EAP provider that could understand the needs of employees during on-season, off-season and during crises attracting media attention.

Strategic Approach:

Utilising our experience working with media (Nine, ABC, SBS) we were able to connect easily with the privacy required around a contract with known talent and provide that security around confidentiality.

To launch the EAP program with Converge we connected face to face with all state-based HR teams and built bridges between local client relationship managers and local HR to make them feel included and heard. We were able to set up the report format in a way that provided strong insight and set this up for a frequent reporting schedule to give high transparency to the program.

Reporting also included information around response times and satisfaction to show the impact we were making. When we got a few good initial comments from Cricket Australia employees this was fed back to the larger HR community to build momentum with a new provider and increase confidence that the choice was worthwhile.

The Solution:

Our 8 stream EAP program was set up along with critical incident support not just for Cricket Australia employees but for community cricket as well. This was unfortunately used very early on with a major incident and Converge International was able to respond to this need promptly.

The program was led by head office with engagement from all state-based contacts. All state-based contacts were set up for regular reporting and information from Converge so they had a sense of ownership over the program for their people locally.

Outcome:

Through a strong working relationship as well as highly responsive care, Cricket Australia has seen a 40% increase in their utilisation rate in the last 2 years as people have built trust in the program.

Cricket Australia have also consulted with Converge about other potential larger programs involving supporting their people nationally for specific demands of the role which are under discussion. The net promoter score is also at 50 which indicates very high levels of satisfaction with the service.