Sentrient Workplace Compliance System Explained by Gavin Altus on Kalkine TV

Key Takeaways From the Interview

• Fast set-up: Sentrient’s online workplace compliance system lets small and medium businesses roll out core workplace relations and safety courses and policies in 15 to 30 minutes.
• Reasonable steps: Training and legally endorsed policies for new starters, refreshed at least every two years, help show you have taken all reasonable steps.
• Culture over tick-box: Gavin is clear that a 15-minute course alone does not change behaviour. Training works when it sits with policies and a culture where people feel safe to speak up.
• COVID response: Sentrient made free working-from-home safety content publicly available during the pandemic.

Full Interview Transcript

Rachael Jones: All to Executive Corner expert talks. Today, I’m with Gavin Altus. Gavin is the Managing Director of Sentrient.

Now Sentrient helps businesses take steps to deliver workplace relations and safety training, policy management and mandatory reporting via their online workplace compliance system.

Here at Kalkine, we bring you industry leaders, successful business owners, market, and equity advocates all under one roof to help you discover the insights of the markets and help you understand how you can create multiple passive income streams.

Welcome, Gavin. How are you today?

Gavin Altus: Yeah, really well. And thank you for having us on Kalkine TV.

Rachael Jones: Excellent. Great to chat with you today.

We’ll be looking forward to hearing your insights. So firstly, in your opinion, how important is it for any business to have a reliable compliance system?

Apparently, around seven in ten Australian businesses don’t have them.

Gavin Altus: Yeah, well, compliance means a whole lot of different things to different people.

And in the realms of what we do, compliance is around helping directors take all reasonable steps for training and policy management.

And we’d be surprised how many businesses, both small and large, have got gaps in that undertaking.

Rachael Jones: So, could you please briefly explain to our viewers the services that Sentrient does provide?

Gavin Altus: Yeah. What we’ve done is develop a piece of software and a compliance solution that enables small and medium-sized businesses to get up and running within 15 minutes to half an hour with all of the bread-and-butter workplace relations and safety courses.

I think safety, bullying, sexual harassment, privacy, this type of thing. Then, it comes with legally endorsed policies as well.

So effectively, you can add staff just like you would any accounting software.

First name, last name, email, roll out the necessary training and policies and show that you’ve taken all reasonable steps for any new starters.

But then, on an ongoing basis, we’d expect that at least once every two years, you would be doing this as a bit of a benchmark across all industry sectors.

Rachael Jones: So why do you believe Sentrient is better than the legacy compliance regimes?

Gavin Altus: Oh look, I think what happened several years ago when we disrupted the market, gone are the days of spending tens of thousands of dollars establishing software with five-year contracts and really quite exorbitant fees.

We just made it a lot easier for a business that might have five or ten staff up to those with a few hundred.

And so, what we’re really focused on is our brand promise of smiles, not frowns. And it’s all about making that whole process much easier.

So that you know, a one-person HR manager and HR function can get this stuff done without it being a painful exercise.

Rachael Jones: Excellent. And as work conditions have significantly altered due to the COVID-19 pandemic, how has Sentrient risen to the challenge? And also, how have they evolved during that time?

Gavin Altus: Yeah, I think. I mean, here in Australia, but globally, one country at a time, it took everyone by surprise.

So, we were going through all the same processes, our clients, and many businesses back in February-March of 2020.

Well, it seems a long time ago, and everyone was going to that remote working from home.

And we had a number of clients that had come to us and said, Hey guys, do you think you could give us a helping hand in training for infection control and COVID safety and working from home we were able to very quickly, within the space of several weeks, construct a package to help organizations with training and policies.

And not only did we decide to do it for our own clients, but we made it publicly available from our website at no cost.

And so, we’ve seen thousands of people register for this every day since back in February and March. And it’s gone quite global as well.

Many health authorities and others from outside of Australia have taken on the free content and transcribed it into other languages.

And it’s just been our little way to add a bit of value during some pretty tough times. It’s one less thing a business needs to pay for.

Rachael Jones: Excellent. That sounds great. So how does your compliance system support an optimally safe, inclusive, and respectful workplace?

Gavin Altus: Yeah, I think it’s really interesting how you position a product because does a 15-minute sexual harassment course change someone from what we read about in the media to not being one to harass or discriminate overnight?

Well, I’m the first to say that’s a no. So, it’s less about the actual training element and more about the education process.

If an employee is coming into our business, we’d like to educate them that we take things like harassment, bullying, and discrimination quite seriously.

So, here’s some training that helps you identify it, report it, and help the organization resolve it if that should happen.

So, what this is very much about is that cultural change is not just a standalone training element, but it’s training with policies, encouraging people to put their hand up and have a conversation and feel safe to do so.

And so that whole broader element of making people feel safe at work and that they’re being taken seriously is what we’re about. And, yes, there’s an important undertone to the compliance elements of this, too.

Rachael Jones: And do you think that your compliance system has been imperative in workplaces as many people have started to work from home over the last couple of years?

Gavin Altus: Yeah. I think it’s fascinating because of the amount of businesses that have now gone to online training and policy sign-off as a result of COVID.

We sit here most grateful that, in our particular case, our business has grown in the last 12 to 18 months.

We provide a safe spot for our employees. We provide a really important service to our clients, and very much the COVID, working from home has driven that as well, for which we feel quite blessed.

We’ll continue to add modules as we have, moved beyond compliance to onboarding and leave management.

And we’ve seen the performance module become more apparent because people are working from home, how we’re having these conversations around performance.

So, I think it’s become accepted e-learning is a part of the business over the years. I think it’s become more of a requirement for many more businesses during these times.

Rachael Jones: Well, Gavin, it’s been great to chat with you today. It’ll be very interesting to watch your company go from strength to strength as time goes on. Thank you so much for your time today.

Gavin Altus: Thanks very much for having Sentrient. It’s all about smiles, not frowns. So, thanks very much. Bye.

Rachael Jones: I love that. And with that, I’ll sign off for now. Watch this space for more. Till then, stay apprised and invest wisely with Kalkine.

Frequently Asked Questions

1. Who is Gavin Altus?

Gavin Altus is a co-founder of Sentrient, an Australian workplace compliance company. In this Kalkine TV interview he explains how Sentrient helps small and medium businesses deliver workplace relations and safety training, policy management and reporting.

2. What does Sentrient’s workplace compliance system do?

It delivers online compliance courses on topics such as safety, bullying, sexual harassment and privacy, provides legally endorsed policies, tracks completions and acknowledgements, and keeps records so employers can show the steps they have taken.

3. How often should staff complete compliance training?

In the interview, Gavin suggests training new starters when they join and refreshing core courses at least every two years. Some topics or higher-risk roles may need more frequent refreshers.

4. Does compliance training on its own prevent sexual harassment?

No. Training is one part of prevention. Since December 2022, employers have had a positive duty under the Sex Discrimination Act to take reasonable and proportionate measures to eliminate sexual harassment, which also covers leadership, policies, reporting and response.

Sources

Kalkine TV on YouTube: Gavin Altus interview

Australian Human Rights Commission: Guidelines for complying with the positive duty

Last reviewed: October 2026