The Multifaceted Experts at Lack Group Provide Services to Take On Some of Construction’s Most Difficult Challenges
Construction challenges are often envisioned as issues with skyline altering structures and state-of-the-art features, but the reality is that a great deal of innovation takes place on the ground. From finding and vetting the ideal talent to work on job sites, to managing traffic around build sites and during roadwork, a tremendous amount of creativity, planning, client engagement, and attention to detail is required.
When Australia’s biggest contractors need a trusted partner to handle these critical concerns, they turn to Lack Group. A 15-year tradition of leveraging practical knowledge and expertise ensures that their clients are served efficiently and cost effectively on projects of every size and scope. The firm specializes in traffic management, recruitment, and labour hire services.
Established in 2004 on the Gold Coast, Lack Group has grown to become a partner of choice for many of Australia’s most respected construction enterprises. Their safety record, dedication to customer experience, and ability to succeed in highly regulated environments have brought the firm coast-to-coast success.
Lack Group clients include several Tier 1 companies on some of the country’s largest infrastructure projects. In addition to participating in projects for major road maintenance service providers and large corporate construction firms, Lack Group also works with smaller firms, such as local utilities and horticulture services.
Our clients’ business is our business. We get involved in their systems and their ways of working, and in the planning process. Each client has their own way of doing what they need to do. There are different urgency levels on what they may require. Once we understand what the individual requirements are, we use best practice methodology and our service platform to make sure our clients get what they need,” said David Lewin, the company’s Executive General Manager.
Working alongside the Directors, Lewin’s responsibilities cross every part of the business, from assurance, operations, and risk management, to customer service as he drives the organisation’s commitment to excellence throughout its divisions.
“Our unique service platform concentrates around a centre of excellence whereas the outputs for our client are consistently provided to meet expectations and requirements. What we provide is a very large and reactive service,” he explained. “Everything depends on when our clients require delivery of our services, so we have to be very reactive and scalable. To give you an idea we can go from 350 to 550 field employees in a week. It's quite a significant increase. On a project you could have 60 people working one night, and 150 the next. We have the flexibility to increase resources rapidly and can mobilise a new project requiring 200 skilled people onsite in as little as two weeks.”
Traffic Management
Lack Group is a registered Traffic Management company with a well-established track record of partnering with clients across the construction, infrastructure, mining, government, and private sectors in high profile public environments, to successfully deliver traffic management services which include traffic control, incident response, event management, planning, permits, and equipment hire.
Operating 24 hours a day, the National team is dedicated and structured to ensure the best possible outcomes are delivered; not only for themselves, but for their clients and the communities in which they operate.
Labour Hire & Recruitment
Lack Group has developed a reputation that sets the standard in quality, expertise, and reliability for delivering permanent and supplementary labour hire solutions, across the industries in which they operate.
Their quality permanent and temporary personnel solutions capture a wide range of role disciplines and skills classifications to deliver against their clients’ requirements.
With robust and scalable service delivery methodologies, they ensure that they assist their clients in meeting their workforce objectives in a timely and efficient manner.
They pride themselves on their ability to work within highly regulated environments, while also offering the flexibility to respond to changing requirements for their clients.
Their proven performance, knowledge, and expertise authenticates the ability and effectiveness in achieving the needs of large and small-scale personnel solutions.
Professionalism. Commitment. Communication. Safety.
Every assignment Lack takes on is customised to achieve their clients’ goals, even lending a helping hand where other firms may shy away. “We had a major client and they had some difficulties with resourcing their requirements internally, so we seconded one of our key people out of the business and assigned them to the client for the project to make sure they had the right person in that role. Obviously, it had an effect on our business, but we were able to adapt. We support our clients not just by undertaking the activity and having the ideals that ‘our job is complete’, we actually are part of what they are doing because their job is as special as ours,” Lewin stressed.
Given the highly reactive nature of the construction business, each specialty has its own unique set of complications, requirements, and expectations. Vetting workers, for example, can be a time-consuming undertaking that can impact on a project’s on-time completion.
“In a large corporate environment, it can be challenging to get approvals and means of access to get decisions made, but what I like about this company in particular is the access to decision-makers. We need to react rapidly and work with our clients, and everything we need is here.”
That “everything” includes support of the company’s staff, their clients, and hires. At present, Lack group is focusing significant energy on several social initiatives that they hope will change the landscape of the industry.
Company founder Diane Lack, who passed away last year, was a virago in the male-dominated construction world. She accepted the challenge of being a female CEO and Director over 15 years ago, at a time when women were mostly welcomed in administrative type roles and not in the front line. “She was driven, passionate, very hands-on and a down to earth person who inspired the people around her,” he recalled.
The company’s talent attraction program encourages women to work in non-traditional roles in the industry and offers the opportunities and support they need to succeed. Today, 30 per cent of Lack Group’s workers are women.
LackSafe is the cornerstone of a positive, inclusive, and safe culture where everyone looks out for each other. The program, whose mantra is “Work Safe. Home Safe. #Home Safe.” focuses on improving internal systems, encouraging innovation and industry engagement, improving culture by cultivating employees to have their voices heard in the workplace and in the field, and keeping the lines of communication open at every level of the organization.
“Our work requires a high level of flexibility and the ability to reach out to people quickly,” Lewin stressed, “We have a good reputation in the industry, we're very ethical, and we invest in our people.”
