2022 SATA Small Employer of the Year Finalists

Regional Anangu Services Aboriginal Corporation (RASAC) delivers a range of services, including municipal services and community patrols, across the APY lands in the far northwest corner of South Australia, in some of the most remote and disadvantaged Aboriginal communities in Australia. RASAC is the largest employer of local Anangu workers and has a fierce determination to train local workers to fill jobs in their communities and progress to supervisory roles.

RASAC has culturally inclusive work practices and invests in development of culturally appropriate training resources and methodologies, including resources narrated in local Pitjantjatjara language. RASAC collaborates with TAFE SA so that internal training is mapped to accredited training and RASAC supervisors and TAFE lecturers work together to deliver training, gather workplace evidence for recognition of prior learning and assessments.

RASAC has created a learning culture which supports English LLN and foundation skills for work, and knowledge that are directly linked to work roles. Training leads to formal qualifications which has resulted in Anangu workers achieving Certificate I, II and III levels.

Working with TAFE SA, RASAC is breaking through barriers of disadvantage faced by workers in these very remote communities, to forge new pathways for them to gain skills, build confidence, achieve qualifications and secure employment and career advancement. We want to share this success with other Anangu organisations to achieve the vision of our Anangu Board to ‘Improve the quality of life for Anangu on the APY lands and create opportunities to improve sustainable outcomes for Anangu’.

Bungala Aboriginal Corporation is a Port Augusta-based, Indigenous owned and controlled organisation. Established in 1994, Bungala has a long history of running successful employment, training, education and community-based initiatives across the Far North SA region. Social, cultural, and economic wellbeing for the region’s Aboriginal people is at the heart of everything Bungala does. For decades, Bungala has been helping Aboriginal people to overcome disadvantages in the labour market.

Bungala's flagship program, Bungala Food Services, is a thriving social enterprise that has grown from a canteen with two staff to an eighteen-employee operation in less than four years. The program provides tangible outcomes for the Aboriginal community by employing and upskilling long-term unemployed people, some of whom have never worked before.

Bungala’s Food Services Program aims to empower Aboriginal people through providing skills, training and employment so they can reach financial independence and live healthy and fulfilling lives. Pre-employment support, training, mentoring, and transition-to-work support is provided to all trainees. The program is delivered through a culturally-informed approach in a caring, inclusive and supportive work environment.

The Food Services Program provides a much-needed nutritious food delivery service to the aged and vulnerable across the Far North SA region. The team currently distributes meals to 450 clients in Port Augusta, Whyalla, Quorn, Coober Pedy and Oodnadatta. This innovative service delivers healthy meals that are fresh – they are not cooked, chilled and reheated – and this is changing the lives of many Aboriginal people through nutrition.

Stairlock is a third-generation family-owned business that started with their grandfather’s Adelaide hardware store, where a shared knowledge of timber led them to start building stairs nearly 40 years ago. Stair Lock now have state of the art machinery in their purpose-built manufacturing plant in South Australia, with sales and installation teams operating in Adelaide, Melbourne and Sydney.

Stair Lock have seen first-hand the value that investing in trainees and apprentices has had on both business outcomes and the engagement of their teams. Their commitment to training and development of staff has provided highly skilled and qualified staff, as well as key partnerships with training providers and high schools. Stair Lock offer a range of programs and opportunities throughout the life of their training, across all departments in the organisation, providing Stair Lock with emerging leaders that become the future of the business.

Stair Lock doesn’t underestimate the value that working in partnership with schools, training providers and employees have on the both the success of their business along with the personal achievement it provides staff who now have formal qualifications and unlimited career opportunities.