Avetta®, the leader in intelligent work readiness across global supply chains, today revealed new research that highlights a significant readiness gap across Australia’s high-risk industries, with organisations struggling to verify workers, manage risk and maintain real-time visibility throughout their worksites. Specifically, the findings reveal that only 15% of respondents report being able to quickly verify that a worker is “ready to work” in real-time, while 42% say workers often or sometimes start work before all required safety checks or credentials are fully verified. At the same time, 59% report having limited, partial or no real-time visibility into who is on-site, their role or their risk profile.

This widening readiness gap reflects a growing challenge for organisations operating in high-risk environments: risk is evolving faster than traditional approaches to workforce and supply chain oversight can keep pace. The challenge is amplified by increasingly complex supply networks, evolving regulations and growing governance requirements. Yet, as the study shows, many organisations continue to rely on disconnected systems and manual processes, limiting their ability to validate worker qualifications, identify emerging risks and maintain an accurate view of workforce readiness across sites.

To better understand this issue, Avetta partnered with PureProfile in May of this year to survey more than 500 professionals across Australia’s manufacturing, construction, resources, data centre, facilities management and other high-risk industries.

The findings, published in a new report titled “Closing the Work Readiness Gap: Why Compliance Alone is Not Enough,” reveal that readiness challenges often stem from gaps in visibility, coordination and accountability. For example, 42% of respondents said workers often or sometimes begin work before all required safety checks or credentials have been fully verified.

The research also found that organisations often struggle to address emerging risks before they escalate. Respondents cited risks falling outside formal compliance requirements (17%), skills gaps (12%) and lack of time (11%) as the leading reasons hazards go unaddressed. Time pressure emerged as a particularly significant challenge, with 70% saying safety or compliance decisions are made under time constraints at least sometimes.

“As organisations face increasing workforce complexity and resource pressures, the ability to manage risk as a system, rather than a collection of standalone initiatives, becomes a critical capability,” said Lynda Richards, APAC Principal for HSE at Avetta. “Health, safety, sustainability and psychosocial wellbeing are interconnected elements of a single organisational ecosystem. Organisations that thrive will be those that understand, measure and continuously challenge the relationships between these elements, turning complexity into resilience, performance and sustainable value.”

Despite the challenges faced by organisations in managing risk, many are still hesitant to leverage AI to improve supplier safety, streamline compliance and accelerate work readiness. The survey found that 41% of respondents don’t trust AI to make critical workforce decisions, while almost three-quarters (73%) said their organisations are either not ready or only in the early stages of scaling AI across the workforce.

Other key findings from the report include:

  • 72% of respondents said their safety, procurement and operations teams are only moderately aligned (36%), slightly aligned (18%) or not aligned at all (18%) in managing supply chain risk.

  • 41% said there is a gap between safety systems and on-site realities, while 25% reported risks are often or very often seen as under control even though they are not fully resolved.

  • 37% said they notice health and safety risks in their workplace that have already been acknowledged by management but remain unaddressed at least once a week, with 11% encountering such situations daily and 7% multiple times per day.

“The findings point to a broader readiness challenge across high-risk industries,” said Luke Boyle, Vice President of Operations, APAC at Avetta. “When organisations lack visibility into who is on-site, whether workers are fully qualified and what risks are emerging in real-time, it becomes harder to respond quickly and confidently. Closing that gap requires connected systems, stronger cross-functional alignment and a shared commitment to work readiness. When organisations can verify that the right people are qualified, compliant and prepared before work begins, they can reduce uncertainty, respond with confidence and keep work moving safely.”

Click here to access the full report and visit www.avetta.com/en-au to learn more about how Avetta can help businesses close the readiness gap.

About Avetta

Avetta is building the largest global community of hiring clients and suppliers that are Ready to Work. Its unified platform streamlines compliance, prequalification, safety and performance benchmarking in a single, integrated experience. Trusted by over 360,000 businesses across more than 120 countries, Avetta blends AI-driven insights and human expertise to close risk gaps and strengthen supplier reliability so projects start on time, risks are managed proactively and operations scale with certainty.

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