Redland City Council has taken out a major industry award for its commitment to driving inclusivity through the rollout of the Hidden Disabilities Sunflower initiative.
The internationally recognised initiative aims to support people living with non-visible disabilities, such as vision or hearing impairment, arthritis, diabetes, autism, and chronic illness, by fostering inclusivity, acceptance and understanding.
Mayor Jos Mitchell said Council’s customer service centres took out the Diversity and Inclusion award in the Employee Experience Initiative of the Year category at the Queensland Auscontact State Excellence Awards, held in Brisbane on Friday 30 August.
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“Many local government and private sector contact centres across Queensland took part in the selection process and I am delighted Council’s team received the award,” she said.
“The award recognises organisational programs and projects that support, build and nurture an environment where diversity and inclusion are celebrated.
“Being recognised in this way illustrates the care the team has for community focused initiatives.
“We have implemented the Hidden Disabilities Sunflower initiative at several of our customer-facing facilities, including our visitor information centre, galleries, libraries, Indigiscapes and Redland Performing Arts Centre.”
Mayor Mitchell said Council teams had embraced the initiative since day one and were living Council’s values of ‘making a difference’ and ‘making it count’ for their peers and the community.
“Our customer contact centre employees are diversity and inclusion champions who are very deserving recipients of this award,” she said.
“To demonstrate the scale of the initiative’s reach within Council, more than 290 employees across the organisation have now completed Hidden Disabilities Sunflower training, including all contact centre teams.
“As part of the initiative, employees can wear white sunflower lanyards or pins to show those with a non-visible disability that they are there to provide support and extra help if needed.
“Individuals can also choose to wear a green sunflower lanyard, wristband or badge if they want to voluntarily disclose to others that they have a hidden disability as a way of indicating that they may need some help, assistance or simply more time to complete their task. I have completed the training and wear a lanyard.
“More than 50 lanyards, pins and wristbands have been provided to customers, and our staff have had many conversations with customers about the initiative since its launch in February.
“I extend my congratulations to our Council officers for their dedication to ensuring everyone feels welcome on Redlands Coast.”
To read more about the Hidden Disabilities Sunflower initiative, visit the Council website.
Redland City Council provides a suite of services to 166,873 residents and more than 63,000 residential households across Redlands Coast. Our naturally wonderful city on Quandamooka Country is home to more than 335 kilometres of coastline, six island communities and 12 mainland suburbs.
