Organisational Transformation

Strong leadership and a performance-based culture have transformed Australia Post into one of the world's top-performing posts.

Since the early 1990s, there has been a transformation in customer service, in business processes, and in workforce culture at Australia Post. From a traditional bureaucratic postal organization with an uninspiring product range, indifferent service, and marginal financial results, Australia Post is now achieving high levels of performance across the spectrum of business indicators.

Some organizations can perform well in specific areas or have exceptional results in a particular year. A true, high performance organization is one that achieves excellent results across the full range of key measures and not only sustains those results over a long period, but continues to improve.

Australia Post's performance over the last decade measures up strongly against such tests as:

* Service performance rising steadily to a record 96.5 percent in 2002-2003 for standard letters and 99.9 percent for express;

* Standard letter price-freezing for 11 years through to 2003 (and with ongoing reductions in bulk mail prices); and

* Labor productivity running at double the Australian industry average over the decade.

Despite the challenges of deregulation, competition, and substitution, the post has achieved a succession of record profits reaching AUD$462 million in 2002-2003 with a healthy return on revenue of 11.6 percent and a return on assets of 14 percent.

High Performance Drivers

The above figures demonstrate that good results in one area have not been at the expense of another; profitability has grown sharply yet customers have also shared