Physical Employment Standards

DST Group is developing a set of performance standards that will optimise the matching of personnel capabilities to tasks.

The University of Wollongong is assisting this work through a partnership with DST Group.

The problem with previous work performance standards is that they can lead to individuals either being unnecessarily excluded from a role, or selected for a position for which they are unsuited.

By establishing standards that are truly representative of military tasks, Defence can make an accurate assessment of a person's physical capacity to perform a particular job, regardless of trade classification, rank, age or gender. Better fitness of personnel for the required tasks means improved performance outcomes, reduced injuries, increased availability for operations and training and reduced costs for health care and compensation.

For each of the employment categories within Defence, the process of developing physical employment standards involves:

• undertaking task observation and analysis to identify key employment category tasks to be used for physical employment standards development
• developing employment category-specific physical employment tests and protocols
• refining and verifying these tests and protocols on a representative sample.

This work is being carried out through the Physical Employment Standards Centre of Expertise established by the two organisations in 2009.