The Canterbury Region provided some hands-on experience of the infrastructure industry to 34 young women taking part in “Girls with Hi-Vis Day” recently.

Fulton Hogan supports efforts by the national training body Connexis, which oversees “Girls with Hi-Vis Day” in a bid to improve significantly on the 4 per cent of women in the infrastructure sector at present.

Participants spent the afternoon at Fulton Hogan’s training ground at Hornby, where they got the chance to operate excavators, dump trucks, graders and other machines, supervised by training staff and assessors.

During another session, Fulton Hogan female staff explained their career pathways and all the opportunities that had opened up for them.

General Manager People Di Walsh told them part of Fulton Hogan’s appeal was that while it was a big company it had a family feel.

“Fulton Hogan offers over 7000 people to learn from, we have over 50 locations to work in, you get to be involved in all types of infrastructure that connects and supports our communities, you have a chance to learn lots and an opportunity for a fantastic career,” she said. Another factor was that diversity of age, education, nationalities, gender and a willingness to tap into everyone’s strengths, has been vital to its success.

Training Manager Andrea Wilson added: “We want to open girls’ eyes to the possibilities and help them understand that their career pathway will be supported with training.”

It was also a chance to promote the Canterbury Region’s new cadet programme that will be accepting its first intake later this year, following on from the hiring of cadets in Australia and other New Zealand regions.