The Point Group CEO Brett Robinson joins forces with Buildcorp Foundation to put hospitality workers mental health at forefront

The Point Group CEO Brett Robinson joins forces with Buildcorp Foundation to put hospitality workers mental health at forefront.

A stock image showing workers at a restaurant in Brisbane, Wednesday, May 15, 2019. Wednesday's data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) showed the wage price index rose 0.5% in the three months ended March, unchanged from the December quarter. (AAP Image/Dan Peled) NO ARCHIVING

Along with staff shortages and supply chain issues, hospitality leader Brett Robinson, believes it’s the mental health and wellbeing of staff that is the biggest priority for hospitality businesses.

Robinson is the CEO of The Point Group, which runs Sydney hot spots Shell House and The Dolphin

While Covid put the mental health issue in the spotlight, the severity of it hit home for Robinson when the group lost one of their own staff to suicide earlier this year.

“Our staff are a close knit group and we all saw no signs of any issues,” Robinson said. “We had systems and safeguards in place to give people an outlet but when something like this happens it hits home and makes me question, “What more can we do?”

Brett Robinson pictured at Shell House Sydney. Source: Supplied

R U OK? reports that in a 2018 survey, 80 per cent of hospitality workers were concerned about their mental health.

Robinson has joined forces with Buildcorp Foundation, run by Josephine Sukkar AM, which raises money for Lifeline as well as mental health education program Smiling Mind.

Buildcorp Foundation started after Sukkar, who founded high profile construction giant Buildcorp with her husband Tony Sukkar, saw the mental health issues plaguing male construction workers.

An RUOK survey found 80 per cent of hospitality workers are concerned about their mental health. (AAP Image/Dan Peled)

After working closely with hospitality venues to build venues like Rockpool and Shell House, Sukkar realised the hospitality sector was facing similar issues to construction when it came to mental health.

“Like us in construction, [hospitality] is high pressure, high risk, long hours. They are similar environments and we’ve got to look after our people,” Sukkar said.

The Buildcorp Foundation has raised over $4.73 million for the mental health space.

“At the same time we’ve been raising money, the issue has just grown bigger and bigger,“ Sukkar said. ”The numbers of people using Lifeline are growing so we’ve also realised as well as supporting them, we‘ve got to go back to cause and get tools into the hands of young people so that in 10 years time they don’t have to get to that crisis support stage.”

Tony & Josephine Sukkar at the Buildcorp Foundation black tie fund raiser dinner.

Robinson is set to host a fundraiser on July 17th at Shell House for Buildcorp Foundation. The second instalment of the Wet, Cold & Delicious dinner will be held in Clocktower Bar and The Dining Room. The centrepiece of the dinner is the traditional Tsukiji fish market-style auction, where parts of a 120kg Southern Bluefin Tuna will be auctioned off for charity, with sections expected to go for $20 000 to $30 000.

“Over the years our industry has done a lot of work to create more of a work life balance for our employees. In the past we used to talk about customer experience being paramount, now we spend the same time talking about employee experience,” Robinson said.

“We are doing our little bit to help because what’s happened has rocked us.

“If every restaurant did something small, maybe we would make an even greater impact on knowledge and awareness and prevention.”

— Lifeline 13 11 14