Episode 29: Taking the path less travelled with Sandy Pitcher

The benefit of hindsight is that you can see how things from your past have carefully placed the pieces together to create the path that you’re on. Our next trailblazer, Sandy Pitcher, Chief Executive at the Department of Human Services for the South Australian Government, joins us in our latest episode to talk about this as she reflects on her career. Sandy shares her experiences in growing up in a small country town, how having the desire to change the world led her to the public service, how she rises to the task of many challenges she has been given, and the important lessons she has learned along the way in knowing what your strengths are, using them, and letting others step up in using their strengths towards a shared vision and authorising environment.

Listen to episode twenty-nine:

Also available on Apple Podcasts and Spotify:

About this episode:

This episode offers an honest reflection on how our values and aspirations, even from an early age, can guide us throughout our careers. It also demonstrates that knowing your strengths and recognising strengths in others around you can help you all work towards a shared vision with the authorising environment to achieve great outcomes.

Sandy Pitcher has always been an activist. Even from an early age, she was passionate about gender equality, and she wanted to change the world by changing the laws. Soon, she realised that the best place to do that was in the public service.

In a career marked by many ‘firsts’, Sandy was the first woman to head the South Australian Department of Environment and Water Agency, led Victoria’s COVID response, and was also the inaugural Secretary of the Department of Families, Fairness and Housing in Victoria. Surprisingly, though, for many of these roles, Sandy didn’t put her hand up to take them on; instead, as she says, she was ‘unwillingly volunteered.’

Sandy reflects on these times and provides specific examples from throughout her career, crediting COVID as the hardest, most illustrative, and possibly the most rewarding challenge of her career to date, as well as the invaluable lessons she has learned along the way.

One of these is recognising her strength in the ability to think in systems – seeing how they need to be changed and the role that systems thinking must play in the public service to constantly learn and try ways of doing things better.

Sandy also shares how it’s important to recognise that when you run towards a common goal, you can do things fast and strong, but you will inevitably lose people and things along the way. You lose goodness. Sandy believes that the happy medium is working towards a shared vision and authorising environment and that by doing this, you can achieve great outcomes.

Find out more about this Trailblazer:

Sandy Pitcher

Chief Executive

Department of Human Services

Government of South Australia

Sandy is an accomplished public-sector leader, with experience leading agencies to make significant contributions to public policy and deliver outcomes that improve people’s lives.

As Chief Executive of the South Australian Department of Human Services, Sandy is dedicated to promoting inclusion, independence, community support and modern services.

Prior to this role Sandy was Deputy Under Treasurer with the South Australian Department of Treasury and Finance. 

She was the inaugural Secretary of the Department of Families, Fairness and Housing in Victoria, an agency which includes child protection and women’s policy.

Throughout 2020 Sandy led the Victorian COVID-19 response, returning the state to COVID-19 zero.

Sandy has also held roles with the SA Department of Environment, Water and Natural Resources, the UK’s Commission for Racial Equality and the South Australian Office for Women.

In 2012, Sandy won the Telstra Businesswoman of the year ‘Community and Public Sector’ category, and in 2013 she was inducted as an IPAA National Fellow.

Educated at the University of Adelaide, Sandy has degrees in law and the humanities.

Tune in next week as we speak to a new trailblazer in another episode in our series on Thriving in Uncertainty.

Episode 28: How failure can lead to your biggest success with Tania Rishniw

Do your employees operate with a license to innovate? It's an interesting concept. When you have a real problem to fix where usual solutions haven't worked, understanding the benefits and risks of innovating and articulating that to others around you gives you a licence to try a new and different way forward. But you have to be prepared for failure to be a part of that. Tania Rishniw, Deputy Secretary of Employment and Workforce at the Department of Employment and Workplace Relations (DEWR) joins us in our latest episode to talk about this and much more about how failure can lead to your biggest success.

Listen to episode twenty-eight:

Also available on Apple Podcasts and Spotify:

About this episode:

This episode showcases an engaging and authentic leader whose experience in crises and uncertainty offers excellent advice on overcoming challenges, managing risk, innovating, and building resilience.

Tania talks about how it's necessary sometimes to know not what to do before you can figure out what to do, and you need to think through contingencies and plan for those when you're innovating.

In a point often made by senior leaders in past episodes on overcoming setbacks and building resilience, Tania also acknowledges that you can't get to becoming an SES leader or manager without having made mistakes or experienced times when things haven't gone according to plan.

Tania looks back on those times in her career. She shares a specific example from when an environmental impact assessment's advice that she was involved with to a minister didn't go according to plan. That experience helped her learn an important lesson: Sometimes, the answers to ministers and government are that there is no actual basis for them to make a specific decision. You have to fight your natural inclination to try and give them different options unless it is robust and well-seasoned advice.

Tania also describes her time working on the crisis response to the Montara Oil Spill in 2009, an unprecedented time in Australian history. There was no playbook to follow, so they had to try different things to manage it and think about a different way of operating.  

As she looks back on leading in these times of uncertainty, Tania offers terrific advice that's helpful to anyone overcoming challenges in their workplace and working in uncertainty. This includes having clarity of objectives and a common purpose, building trusted relationships with others, having a team around you that gives you strength, and focusing on an outcome without blaming others when something goes wrong.

Another important element is storytelling because occasionally, you need relativity, perspective, and the knowledge that others have dealt with issues just as hard to help you keep going.

Find out more about this Trailblazer:

Tania Rishniw

Deputy Secretary

Employment and Workforce

Department of Employment and Workplace Relations

Tania is the Deputy Secretary of Employment and Workforce, in the Department Employment and Workplace Relations in the Australian federal government. She leads a range of programs that enable services to support and help people overcome barriers and develop skills to gain employment.

 Prior to commencing with DEWR, Tania worked in the Department of Health from 2015-23 delivering primary and community care policy and programs. She has worked for over 20 years in public administration, across areas of social, environmental, and economic policy.

 Before being appointed as Deputy Secretary in May 2020, she held senior positions in the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet, Department of Finance, Department of Education and Employment, and Department of Environment.

 Tania has delivered policy reform at the federal level in environmental and financial regulation, First Nations' employment and education, primary care and mental health, and service delivery. She led the response to the Montara oil spill, has represented the Australian Government at the United Nations, and successfully negotiated with states and territories in areas of hospital funding, mental health and suicide prevention, primary care COVID arrangements and wider health reform.

 Tania has a Bachelor of Laws (Hons) and a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology, as well as holding an Executive Master's Degree in Public Administration.

Tune in next week as we speak to a new trailblazer in another episode in our series on Thriving in Uncertainty.

Episode 27: Fostering adaptability in teams with Damian Green

Having worked on several significant transformation projects across Queensland Health, eHealth Queensland, and Gold Coast Hospital and Health Service, Damian Green knows a thing (or ten) about what factors are critical in leading successful transformations and delivering them in uncertain times. Damian is currently the Deputy Director-General of Corporate Services at Queensland Health, and he joins us in our latest episode to discuss fostering adaptability in teams.

Listen to episode twenty-seven:

Also available on Apple Podcasts and Spotify:

About this episode:

This episode is a masterclass in leading transformations. It will provide any leader with expert advice on leading change, fostering agility and adaptability in teams, and delivering successfully.

Damian was previously the Deputy Director-General of eHealth Queensland, leading Queensland’s public health digital modernisation agenda, which included the state’s ICT response to the COVID-19 pandemic, virtual healthcare, digital hospitals, and digital uplift in rural and remote Queensland.

In this episode, Damian shares his learning from working through emergency responses. He discusses how Queensland Health, with a workforce of 127,000 people, has built and exercised the ability to mobilise quickly through its management of natural disasters such as cyclones and bushfires. Damian also drills down that, in essence, transformations are about trying to do something differently and that leaders can’t do it on their own – they have to bring people along the journey with them, who are working to a common set of principles, and have good mechanisms in place to get feedback early on and enable stakeholders, including the community to ask questions.

Listen in as Damian provides his unique perspective on the communication aspect in transformation projects and how over-communicating is saying the same thing over and over but not hearing the feedback, responding accordingly to it, or tailoring messages for specific audiences. He also reflects on a time when he was working for eHealth Queensland in designing a new IT system overnight and delivering it in a critical timeframe, which he describes as “flying the plane while we were building it,” and how beneficial he has found setting up an emergency management committee ensuring one officer is accountable for making decisions is critical in helping everyone work in an agile way successfully.

Find out more about this Trailblazer:

Damian Green

Deputy Director-General, Corporate Services

Queensland Health 

Damian Green is the Deputy Director-General, Corporate Services in Queensland Health. The Corporate Services Division partners with the Department of Health and Hospital and Health Services to provide contemporary expert advice and specialist corporate services. The Division works across the health system to deliver services such as Business Services, Corporate Enterprise Solutions, Finance, Governance, Assurance and Information Management, Human Resources, Legal, Supply Chain and System Procurement.

Previously Damian was Deputy Director-General, eHealth Queensland and led Queensland’s public health digital modernisation agenda, including Queensland’s ICT response to the COVID-19 pandemic, virtual healthcare, digital hospitals and digital uplift in rural and remote Queensland.

Damian has held the role of Executive Director, Digital Transformation & Chief Information Officer, Gold Coast Hospital and Health Service. Damian led the delivery of Gold Coast Health’s two-year journey to become a fully digital hospital and was pivotal in driving continuous improvement in health service delivery and quality.

Prior to working with the Gold Coast HHS, Damian worked in professional services organisations for sixteen years specialising in managing implementation of strategic organisational change within the public sector.

Damian’s qualifications include Bachelor of Economics (Hons), Bachelor of Arts, Change Management Qualification (AGSM). He is a Fellow of the Australian College of Health Service Management, Fellow of the Australasian Institute of Digital Health and an Adjunct Professor of the School of Business Strategy and Innovation, Griffith University. Damian is also a Board Director of the Gold Coast Primary Health Network and Board Chair of the Australasian Institute of Digital Health.

Tune in next week as we speak to a new trailblazer in another episode in our series on Thriving in Uncertainty.

Episode 26: Fostering adaptability in teams with Deb Jenkins

What makes a team great? It may seem like a simple question, but the reality is that great teams don’t form and work well together by chance; there is a lot of investment required in making them high-performing. Deb Jenkins, Deputy Secretary of Corporate Enabling Services and Chief Operating Officer for the Department of Employment and Workplace Relations, joins us in our latest episode to talk about fostering adaptability in teams.

Listen to episode twenty-six:

Also available on Apple Podcasts and Spotify:

This episode affirms that to create great teams, you have to work hard at it. Deb shares that the cornerstones of great teams are built on relationships, a clear and shared purpose, and a diverse makeup, and these factors will always be fundamental in leading high-performing teams now and in the future.

Deb also discusses the pivotal role that recruitment plays in ensuring you have the right fit for your team and how evolving your hiring approach to recruit talent can help you succeed in filling key skills gaps.  

The traditional picture of a ‘team’ looks different today than it did a few years ago. While you may not be able to look around and see your direct team sitting next to you, the importance of having a clear direction of where you’re headed together and building connections and relationships with each other is still paramount. Deb reflects on this in our discussion, noting that building personal connections cannot be achieved through a ‘Teams’ call with 20 people. That’s why she makes opportunities to have in-person moments and carefully thinks about how those moments can be fit for purpose.

Deb also shares that understanding how you and the people around you operate can make a significant difference in knowing the tips to succeed in communicating with each other, as well as the importance of giving things time and seeing things from another person’s perspective.

We also speak about innovation and embracing technology, and how it’s important to encourage teams to try new things, have safeguards around experimenting, make failing a learning opportunity, and, as a leader, check yourself to ensure you respond appropriately when things don’t go the way you had hoped they would.

Deb leaves us with an appreciation for how the All Blacks inspire her in their stewardship, putting service before others, and how they embody the principle that no one is bigger than the team. Wise words to build and lead teams by.

Find out more about this Trailblazer:

Deborah Jenkins

Deputy Secretary, Corporate and Enabling Services

Chief Operating Officer

Department of Employment and Workplace Relations

Deborah is Deputy Secretary and Chief Operating Officer at the Department of Employment and Workplace Relations (DEWR) in a broad ranging role supporting the enterprise covering everything from HR, legal, communications, parliamentary, data and finance through to IT and digital solutions.

Her career has spanned the public and private sector in Australia and overseas, including most recently senior APS leadership roles at the Australian Taxation Office and the Australian Charities and Not for Profits Commission.  Prior to joining the APS, Deborah was a partner at KPMG where she held various domestic and international leadership positions with multinational experience in Australia, New Zealand, Asia Pacific and Europe. In Aotearoa/New Zealand she worked in both the public and private sectors, starting her career as a graduate with Inland Revenue before joining a law firm.

Deborah loves executing well designed client and staff experiences to achieve organisational outcomes.  Passionate about communicating and connecting with people, she enjoys developing strong relationships and collaborating with stakeholders.  She works hard to build inclusive teams that value diversity and takes being an active ally seriously. She inspires, leads and motivates those around her through her authentic and engaging leadership.

Her true passions outside of work (apart from her family) are rugby union, travelling and music. She particularly enjoys giving back to the community supporting grass roots rugby.

Tune in next week as we speak to a new trailblazer in another episode in our series on Thriving in Uncertainty.

Episode 25: Leading Through Shifts and Shocks with Steve Vamos

Our next Trailblazer has over forty years of experience in information technology and digital media in Australia, New Zealand, the USA, and Asia, leading companies such as IBM, Apple, Microsoft, ninemsn, and Xero, and as a result, has been on the frontline of every significant technological shift and economic shock since the 1980s. Steve Vamos, Global Executive, and former CEO, joins us in our latest episode to discuss this further as he reflects on his career and provides insights from his book, “Through Shifts and Shocks – Lessons from the Front Line of Technology and Change.”

Listen to episode twenty-five:

About this episode:

Steve’s experience on the frontline of uncertainty has provided him with a unique ability to get straight to the point of what leaders must do today: establish great teams, maximise the potential of individuals in their workforce, effectively achieve alignment of aspirations at every layer of the organisation, and approach challenges with the right mindset.

This episode is a must-listen for leaders today who face increasing uncertainty and volatility.

Having experienced every technology shift and every economic shock in the past five decades certainly has given Steve clarity across key areas, including leadership, culture, and creating great teams. As he explains in our discussion, each of these waves and issues he has experienced represents a change issue, and it’s only human to find change hard. Through his experience, Steve knows too well that meaningful change comes from great teamwork and collaboration. Still, many teams today aren’t working to their collective and even individual potential.

Steve also recognises that creating better teams needs to come from the top, the leadership team. To establish great teams, people leaders need to enable individuals within their teams to speak up and improve how they work together every day, as little changes each day can lead to the creation of a whole new environment.

Steve touches on many other critical parts of his book, “Through Shifts and Shocks – Lessons from the Front Line of Technology and Change,” including the three lenses that he feels from his experience and lessons learned as a global leader that leaders today need to have in approaching change, how essential alignment is in effective communication through every layer of an organisation, and how we need to shift how we manage our workforce going forward from beyond the task level to managing to their individual potential.

He leaves us with key advice for leaders on remaining relevant and for those who may fear change or extinction: keep learning from experiences, failures, and others and be a ‘learn-it-all,’ not a ‘know-it-all.’

Find out more about this Trailblazer:

Steve Vamos

Author, Global Executive,

and former CEO

Steve Vamos is a former CEO and Global Executive with more than 40 years’ experience in information technology and digital media.  Steve served as CEO of Xero from 2018 to 2023.

Steve has lived and worked in Australia, New Zealand, the USA and Asia at the frontline of every significant technology shift and economic shock since the 1980s with companies such as IBM, Apple, Microsoft, and ninemsn.  

Steve has also been a non-executive director of ASX listed companies such as Telstra, Fletcher Building and David Jones and several start-ups and emerging businesses. 

Steve also founded and ran a not for profit called the Society for Knowledge Economics (SKE) from 2005 to 2014. The SKE was a cross industry collaboration aimed at improving the quality of workplace leadership in Australia.

In his newly released book, Through Shifts and Shocks: Lessons from the Front Line of Technology and Change, Steve shares eight Must-Do actions that represent the most important lessons he has learnt about how leaders need to think and act in the face of uncertainty and change. 

Tune in next week as we speak to a new trailblazer in another episode in our series on Thriving in Uncertainty.

Episode 24: Thriving in Uncertainty with Amanda Cattermole

When our next Trailblazer took up the challenge to take on the role of CEO and lead the Australian Digital Health Agency at the height of the pandemic, she felt that it was a near-impossible place to lead from, considering the limitations of not being able to be in the same physical space as most of the staff. But on reflection, Amanda Cattermole now sees how this has shaped the flexible and hybridised work environment that’s now fundamentally everywhere. In our latest episode, Amanda joins us to talk about taking the path less travelled and leading in uncertainty.  

Listen to episode twenty-four:

Also available on Apple Podcasts and Spotify:

About this episode:

This episode is a great example of a leader who is passionate about creating an organisational culture that’s focussed on stewardship, built on deep collaboration, and comprised of leaders at every level who add to the culture by enabling stewardship and innovation and creating a convening role with the broader ecosystem.  

It also conveys a powerful message of the impact that leaders can have in seeing things and pathways for others that they can't necessarily see for themselves and how, with the right encouragement, it can profoundly impact their career journey in a really positive way.

Even in the midst of the pandemic's uncertainty, Amanda could immediately see that everything had changed in the world of health and digital innovation. The conversation had changed. No longer was the debate around privacy and security, though these were still critically important; it was now about accessing healthcare immediately.

Amanda shares how another important change at that time was that the players in the healthcare ecosystems had to come together in a completely different way, which required radical and immediate collaboration. These fundamental changes saw the introduction of telehealth and electronic prescribing, things that had been spoken about for years, being implemented in six weeks.

As a response to these pivotal changes, the Agency needed to be really different, too. They needed to step into the role of convenors of the system. Leaders needed to have a relational skill set in crafting and amplifying the Agency's role as a steward and deliverer and focus on the organisational culture.

Amanda details this further, diving into the importance of hiring the right people, how every leader at every level needs to contribute something to the collaborative culture of the organisation, and how you can create an environment where the artefacts and daily ways of working exemplify what you have said your organisation is going to be. By creating artefacts that reflect this, you show clarity, which trust is built on.

 “Some of the most unexpected ones (jobs) are the ones that I kind of couldn’t have seen if you’d gone back to my earlier self that I wouldn’t have predicted in anyway, have in some ways been the most incredible.”

Having also served as interim CEO of Services Australia during the 2019/2020 bushfire season, you may presume that Amanda has always been one for taking up challenges. Still, as Amanda describes, whilst the sense of making a difference and seeking purpose have been a common thread throughout her career stemming from her childhood and influenced by her parent's deep passion and dedication as public education teachers, it has also come from the privilege of working for leaders who have seen things and pathways for her, that she couldn't see for herself, and who were caring enough to press her in the right ways to take on roles that were seen as riskier.

Through these critical junctures, Amanda has overcome her own uncertainty in taking on roles that seemed unfamiliar to her at the time to realise that her skills aren't bound to the particular area that she worked in. Rather, they are broader and could be applied in different places and in different ways of leading teams during change, nurturing other leaders, and setting and creating positive cultures.

Find out more about this Trailblazer:

Amanda Cattermole

Chief Executive Officer

Australian Digital Health Agency

Ms Amanda Cattermole PSM is the Chief Executive Officer of the Australian Digital Health Agency, a role she commenced in September 2020.

Auspiced by the governments of Australia, the Agency is the steward for digital enablement of Australia’s health system, with a lead role in coordinating national engagement, delivery and adoption of digital health to enable person-centred, connected healthcare.

The Agency also builds national health infrastructure and delivers national digital health products and services that make it easier for healthcare providers and Australian healthcare consumers to access, manage and share health information and that support a sustainable health system delivering safe, high-quality health services for all Australians.

Prior to this Amanda held several senior roles at Services Australia, including interim Chief Executive, Chief Operating Officer, and Deputy Secretary, Health and Aged Care Group, where she was responsible for the delivery of payments and services to Australians under Medicare, the Pharmaceutical Benefits scheme and in the aged care sector.

Amanda has previously held senior roles in Commonwealth departments, including Treasury, the former Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs Department and Prime Minister and Cabinet.  She has held senior State government roles in the Victorian Department of Health and Human Services and the Western Australian Department of Indigenous Affairs. In her earlier career Amanda worked as a lawyer in Victoria, the Northern Territory and Western Australia.

Amanda holds a Bachelor of Laws, a Bachelor of Commerce, a Master of Laws and a Master of Business Administration. In 2013, she received the Public Service Medal for outstanding public service leading reform in providing housing for Indigenous people in remote communities and the National Gambling Reform laws.

Tune in next week as we speak to a new trailblazer in another episode in our series on Thriving in Uncertainty.

Thriving in Uncertainty with Tim Beresford

When you've had a thirty-five-year-long career that spans industries and sectors as our next Trailblazer has, you have the benefit of seeing how organisational learning has changed and if it's changed for the better or worse. Tim Beresford, Chief Executive at the Australian Financial Security Authority, or AFSA, joins us to talk about this and much more in our latest episode on becoming a learning organisation.

Listen to episode twenty-three:

Also available on Apple Podcasts and Spotify:

About this episode:

This compelling episode offers great advice to other leaders on shifting from knowledge organisations to learning organisations and on how important it is to be open, adaptable, and resilient to foster a continuous learning mindset in your workforce.

Tim dives into the key differences in how organisational learning has changed throughout his career, from focusing more on skillsets at the beginning in terms of what knowledge you could bring to an organisation to now being more focussed on mindsets and what you're willing to learn.

He explains how this fundamental shift from knowledge organisations to learning organisations is for the better, as this has created much more of a two-way dialogue in how organisations communicate, which promotes sharing, teamwork, and curiosity in the workforce.

Tim elaborates on why mindset is so critical in today's workforces, which are facing more external shocks in an increasingly uncertain and ambiguous world. This uncertainty requires all of us to develop resiliency and agility to be more adept at dealing with these external changes and shocks.

From an industry-agnostic perspective, Tim shares three aspects for creating a learning organisation: systems thinking, a genuine openness to self-awareness and reflection, and a diverse team approach to solving problems. He provides advice to leaders on how to drive self-awareness, empathy, and engagement in the workplace, enabling individuals to want to foster and enable themselves to grow, lean into, and become more self-aware.

References from this episode:

Don't Fence Me In by Wendy McCarthy

ISBN: 9780855616953, Published 4 February 2000.

Wendy McCarthy LinkedIn

Find out more about this Trailblazer:

Tim Beresford

Chief Executive and Inspector-General in Bankruptcy

Australian Financial Security Authority

(AFSA)

Tim Beresford is the Chief Executive at the Australian Financial Security Authority (AFSA), having joined the agency in mid-2022.

AFSA’s role is to support a strong credit system for Australia and is a visible, modern and contemporary regulator. The agency administers and regulates the personal insolvency and personal property securities systems and manages criminal assets.

Tim is a Board member of the St George Community Housing (SGCH) and the immediate past Chair of the Benevolent Society (TBS), Australia’s oldest non-Indigenous not for profit. Previously, Tim has held the roles of Acting Chief Executive of the Australian Trade and Investment Commission (Austrade), Deputy Vice-Chancellor of Macquarie University and First Assistant Secretary of the Social Policy Division in Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet.

He has significant leadership experience in the higher education, government, not-for-profit, financial services and professional services sectors. His areas of expertise include strategy, governance, public policy, change management and organisational design. He holds a Bachelor of Economics (Honours), Bachelor of Laws, a Masters of Philosophy (International Relations) and is a Fellow of the Australian Institute of Company Directors.

Tune in next week as we speak to a new trailblazer in another episode in our series on Thriving in Uncertainty.

Thriving in Uncertainty with Josh Thomas

What does learning look like in an organisation when a high proportion of your workforce is already doctorate-level educated, formally trained marine scientists and former teachers? Josh Thomas, Chief Executive Officer at the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority, talks about this and much more as he joins us to discuss becoming a learning organisation in our latest podcast episode.

Listen to episode twenty-two:

Also available on Apple Podcasts and Spotify:

About this episode:

The Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority has a critical job of being guardians and protectors of the Great Barrier Reef, a world heritage-listed coral reef, for future generations. With a high percentage of their workforce made up of marine scientists, their unique organisational DNA is centred on understanding the world around them and has a natural and instinctive curiosity-driven culture that helps fuel their courage to experiment and test ideas about tackling existing and emerging threats to the ecosystem.

As CEO, Josh explains how risk is a key element that drives their organisational strategy and how they approach learning and development, as understanding risks in your environment is critical in understanding what you need to learn and lean into, and if an organisation is calibrated to understanding medium to long term risks, it will be more proactive in addressing challenges and returning value to stakeholders. Josh discusses this further in how their organisation views themselves as a learning and evolving organisation that's generous with knowledge sharing, have honest relationships with peers, and is led through a coaching mindset – leading others to come to their own conclusions on how they want to take a given piece of work and where they want to focus their learning and development on, within boundaries.

He also talks about how information is more publicly available than ever before; their organisation doesn't have a mortgage as being a 'knowledge holder,' instead, they see their role in knowledge sharing, and they are generous with it with the programs of work that the Reef Authority delivers, including educating over 300 schools in Queensland and internationally, working with 19 Reef Guardian Councils, producing outlook and Reef health reporting, broadcasting podcasts, attending multilateral forums, and more.

This episode is an excellent example of a learning organisation that is curious and generous with its knowledge sharing and a leader who is passionate, authentic, and respectful in helping his workforce work in uncertainty.

Find out more about this Trailblazer:

Josh Thomas

Chief Executive Officer

Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority

Josh has over 20 years’ experience in the public and private sector in Australia and overseas. He has helped shape and lead environmental policy and programs for the Great Barrier Reef and in terrestrial natural resource management.

Josh has worked in a number of senior public sector roles and across the environment, agriculture and finance portfolios, as well as in federal Ministerial offices. He has a strong track record of public engagement on matters affecting Australia’s World Heritage sites, and through major environmental programs such as the Biodiversity Fund and Caring for our Country.

Josh’s policy experience in the marine environment extends across the Great Barrier Reef and its catchments, migratory and endangered species, whaling matters, marine parks and Antarctica. He is committed to enhancing Australia’s natural environment and has been a strong advocate for incorporating both contemporary science and Indigenous traditional knowledge into environmental management throughout his career.

Josh lives in Townsville and holds a Master of Business Administration, Master of International Affairs, Bachelor of Science, and Bachelor of Arts (Honours).

Tune in next week as we speak to a new trailblazer in another episode in our series on Thriving in Uncertainty.

Thriving in Uncertainty with Marie Boland

Our next Trailblazer’s interest in history and learning from it, particularly the history of labour movements and work, has been a common theme that has led her throughout her fascinating career. Marie Boland, Chief Executive Officer at Safe Work Australia, discusses this further in our latest episode on Taking the Path Less Travelled.

Listen to episode twenty-one:

About this episode:

Marie talks about growing up in Ireland and how her dad, who was a great history buff, used to take them around Dublin, telling stories and looking at statues of famous people. He particularly liked stopping at statues of great union leaders, and the stories and figures stuck with her.

After moving to Australia in 1992, Marie worked as a curator in museums. While working at one particularly council-run museum, Marie had the opportunity to be a staff representative during council amalgamations in South Australia, where she was part of the negotiations and enterprise bargaining. And the rest, as they say, is history. Through this experience, Marie ultimately became a union member, reigniting her interest in law and then studying law with the long-term aim of being a labour lawyer and working in industrial relations.

Listen in to hear from Marie as she talks about both personal and professional drivers that keep her going during confronting and tough times at work. She explains how she is focused on harmonising and strengthening tripartism during her tenure as CEO of Safe Work Australia, working with unions, businesses, and the government to reach consensus outcomes. Marie also talks about how she believes your time will come and the importance of backing yourself.

We also discuss Marie’s 2018 national review of model work, health, and safety laws and how this helped to influence the Commonwealth to change the 2011 regulations to include psychological health. Together, we discuss the pivotal role that leaders need to play in keeping up to date with what’s going on in their organisation through risk management and consultation and the importance of the work design piece in potentially eliminating potential hazards at the point of deciding how work is done.

Whether you believe in fate or not, this enthralling episode is a testament to how interests and passions in your life, even from a young age, can help lead you to the path you were meant to be on.  

Episode references:

Codes of Practice

https://www.safeworkaustralia.gov.au/law-and-regulation/codes-practice

Find out more about this Trailblazer:

Marie Boland

Chief Executive Officer

Safe Work Australia

Marie Boland has been the Chief Executive Officer of Safe Work Australia since 1 November 2023.

Marie is a Member of Safe Work Australia and its subsidiary committees and a Commissioner of the Safety, Rehabilitation and Compensation Commission. She is a member of the Respect@Work Council and the G20 Occupational Safety and Health Expert Network, and an observer on the Heads of Workplace Safety Authorities and the Heads of Workers’ Compensation Authorities.

Before joining Safe Work Australia, Marie offered independent work health and safety and workplace relations consultancy services.

Marie’s work health and safety experience spans many roles, including completing the 2023 review of the Office of the Federal Safety Commissioner, the 2022 Review of the Conduct of Work Health and Safety Prosecutions in the Australian Capital Territory, an independent review of the South Australian local government sector's One System WHS Management System in December 2020 and the 2018 National Review of the model work health and safety laws (Boland Review). Marie was the 2021 Inaugural Thinker in Residence at the University of South Australia's Psychosocial Safety Climate Global Observatory. Marie has held senior roles at SafeWork South Australia as an Executive Director, Policy and Community Engagement Director and Chief Policy Officer.

Marie holds a Bachelor of Arts (Hons) and Master of Arts from University College, Dublin, and a Bachelor of Laws (Hons) from the University of Adelaide.

Tune in next time as we speak to a new trailblazer in another episode in our series on Thriving in Uncertainty.

Thriving in Uncertainty with Marina Bowshall

For many leaders in the public sector, there are very few times in your career when you have the opportunity to develop a new agency for a state government entity. Our next Trailblazer, Marina Bowshall, had the chance to do just that as she took on the Chief Executive of Preventive Health SA role in September of 2023. Marina joins us in our latest episode to talk about her experience in leading through a machinery of government change.

Listen to episode twenty:

Also available on Apple Podcasts and Spotify:

About this episode:

Taking on such an opportunity can be energy-giving and exciting as a leader, but Marina also knew that she had to approach this change with a lot of empathy for others. She understood that staff would have mixed responses to the change and that some would be asking many questions with different narratives.

Listen in as Marina shares how the biggest challenge in leading this MoG change was the cultural change and bringing people along with the change to see themselves in it, and the strategies she used to build an open door policy and establish rapport with teams, which involved meeting with every team, regardless of size, to understanding each teams priorities and passions, and how she used the fascinating insights she gleaned from these meetings to offer further support, increase collaboration and deepen engagement across the workforce.

Marina also discusses how she involved the broader stakeholder ecosystem in the MoG change through both formal and informal approaches and empowered her staff, regardless of their position, to engage with key people outside of the agency to grow their stakeholder base and build networks.

It’s a great episode for anyone who is leading change or experiencing change in their organisation. Through engagement and consultation, you can achieve strategic alignment, improve collaboration, encourage knowledge sharing, and bring a little more laughter into your organisation, too.

Find out more about this Trailblazer:

Marina Bowshall

Chief Executive

Preventive Health SA

Marina commenced as Chief Executive, Preventive Health SA in September 2023.

Marina led and collaborated on national and state health policy, strategy, and programs throughout her career. This has included leading legislative change; implementing state-wide and community-based programs; developing, implementing and evaluating whole of government strategies; partnering with agencies to implement evidence-based prevention approaches; and implementing business systems to support effective governance and the achievement of measurable outcomes.

Marina is the Co-Chair of the National Tobacco Officials Group, Presiding Member of South Australia’s Controlled Substances Advisory Council, a member of the Suicide Prevention Council, and works collaboratively across Australia with a range of research, policy, and service organisations.

Tune in next time as we speak to a new trailblazer in another episode in our series on Thriving in Uncertainty.

Thriving in Uncertainty with Sue McCarrey

As an experienced leader who has worked across multiple industries and now is the Chief Executive Officer of the National Offshore Petroleum Safety and Environmental Authority or NOPSEMA, our next guest, Sue McCarrey, has certainly seen her share of times when things haven’t gone according to plan or achieved an unexpected outcome. Sue joins our latest podcast to discuss how challenges can lead to your biggest success.

Listen to episode nineteen:

Also available on Apple Podcasts and Spotify:

About this episode:

Sue provides an honest reflection from earlier in her career when she was younger, and how, like many of us, she would often perceive things that didn’t go to plan or when things went wrong as failures and take them to heart. Sue shares that as time goes on and you build your experience in your career, you develop the ability to look at things more critically, observing what’s occurred and distinguishing if it was really a failure, if it was potentially inevitable, or if it’s something you can look at to see then the opportunity to do it differently.

Sue also talks about the importance for leaders in providing a safety net of support to younger people in the organisation, not putting failure on them personally as this may then inhibit their confidence in having a go, trying things, and putting ideas forward in the future, which are essential for innovation. She also stresses how leaders can help staff not to feel too disappointed when projects don’t go ahead, reinforcing that the work isn’t wasted and may be able to be used in another area at a different time, providing an example from her time as National Rail Regulator.

In her role as Chief Executive Officer at NOPSEMA, Sue discusses the importance of the ability to critically analyse issues that can be complex, how being a good communicator isn’t just about being a good talker, and how leaders need to look out for people who can think for themselves and put ideas forward respectfully when building teams. She also names the most essential skill in the regulatory space as courage – having the courage to make decisions and not to interfere where you don’t believe it’s your role to interfere.

It’s a great episode that will challenge your thinking about failure and how you can support and encourage younger members of your workforce to be resilient, courageous, and confident.

Find out more about this Trailblazer:

Sue McCarrey

Chief Executive Officer

National Offshore Petroleum Safety and Environmental Management Authority

(NOPSEMA)

Sue Joined NOPSEMA as the Chief Executive Officer in February 2023 following eight years as the Chief Executive and National Rail Safety Regulator at the Office of the National Rail Safety Regulator.

A career of over forty years in Government, Sue has held a range of roles across Education, including time as a school principal, the Public Transport Authority and as Deputy Director General of Policy, Planning and Investment at the WA Department of Transport. In these roles, Sue developed experience and expertise in government policy and regulatory frameworks and risk management in safety and environmental management, which she applies in her current role.

Sue holds a Bachelor of Law from Murdoch University, a Masters of Education from Edith Cowan University, and is a graduate of the Australian Institute of Company Directors.  Sue is a member of the National Association of Women in Operations, National Women in Transport, and is a Fellow of the Institute of Public Administration. 

Tune in next week as we speak to a new trailblazer in another episode in our series on Thriving in Uncertainty.

Thriving in Uncertainty with Liz Tydd

It was a privilege to talk with Liz Tydd, the Australian Information Commissioner, as she shared the future of the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner or OAIC with us and how their postural organisational changes over the past year have positioned them to be at the forefront of being a contemporary regulator.

Listen to episode eighteen:

Also available through Apple Podcasts and Spotify:

About this episode:

In this special broadcast edition of our podcast series on Thriving in Uncertainty, Liz takes us through the latest figures on data breaches from their recent report. She explains how an additional dimension of misinformation (e.g.,  deepfakes) can become an accepted truth in the mind of the audience, highlighting how even the human brain is grappling to adjust to this very real and growing threat and its manifestations.

Liz also shares how the latest data tells us that the information from data breaches across various industries has commonalities in the fact that it is sensitive and valuable information about us that defines who we are and can be used to recreate identities.

The OAIC’s work centres on access to information to promote truth and accountability, particularly in government, but also to promote privacy and protect people from the devastating impacts of misinformation and cybersecurity breaches that result in a loss of identity. To perform this critical work, the OAICs need to have the confidence to operate in this new digital world safely and securely, taking a human-rights-centred approach in a dynamic and ever-changing regulatory environment.

In this enlightening episode, you’ll learn the OAIC’s latest thinking on the eight key elements in ensuring there is a human-rights-centred approach in the AI space and how essential it is for their workforce to be committed to preserving human rights, be curious and work collegially, and how the organisation has developed four pillars to manifest in their culture and operations which are proactive, proportionate, purpose-driven, and people-focussed.

She also explains how the OAIC has a unique vantage point on top of the hill in that they can look at the sectors they regulate, pull out common themes, and inform the guidance.

As a knowledge-based organisation, Liz highlights the critical need for knowledge to be shared internally and several ways that the OAIC are doing that through cross-collaboration teams, cross-professional teams, and communities of practice to share expertise, new approaches and ways of working, and refining skills which enables their organisation to then share that knowledge externally and amplify their messaging.

Liz’s leadership approach of being open to change, developing the ability to respond effectively in a dynamic landscape, and taking a human-rights approach to designing for trust is a masterclass for any leader in leading through change and dealing with complexity in a dynamic environment.     

Find out more about this Trailblazer:

Elizabeth Tydd

Australian Information Commissioner

Office of the Australian Information Officer (OAIC)

Elizabeth Tydd took up the position of Australian Information Commissioner in August 2024 for a 5-year term.

Elizabeth joined the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner in February 2024 as Freedom of Information Commissioner after two 5-year terms as the Information Commissioner at the Information and Privacy Commission (IPC) of New South Wales.

Elizabeth’s role at the IPC was to promote public awareness and understanding of the right to access government information in NSW, as well as providing information, support, advice, assistance and training to agencies and the general public.

Elizabeth has occupied a number of statutory decision‑making roles in NSW commissions and tribunals, including deputy president of the Workers Compensation Commission and deputy chairperson of the former Consumer, Trader and Tenancy Tribunal.

Elizabeth has extensive regulatory and governance experience at an executive and board level in a range of jurisdictions and industries, including commercial, not for profit and public sector oversight.

She holds a Bachelor of Laws and Master of Laws from the University of Technology Sydney, as well as postgraduate certificates in executive management and governance together with post graduate qualifications in leadership and policy from Harvard University. Elizabeth possesses expertise in digital government and has written extensively on this subject.

Tune in next week as we speak to a new trailblazer in another episode in our series on Thriving in Uncertainty.

Thriving in Uncertainty with David MacLennan

Our next trailblazer, David MacLennan, has had an interesting career. He started out working in the Commonwealth Government, mainly in the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade in Canberra and then overseas, before joining the Western Australian State Government in the Department of Planning and now as the CEO of the City of Vincent. David joins us in our latest episode to talk about his journey as a CEO in improving organisational performance.

Listen to episode seventeen now:

Also available through Apple Podcasts and Spotify:

About this episode:

Serving as a diplomat in Mexico City, Lima in Peru, and London, David MacLennan describes himself as a student of cities, and that interest was deepened in joining the Western Australian Department of Planning and being involved in the planning of metropolitan projects. Serving as CEO of the City of Vincent for the past five years, David has come full circle, being directly responsible for delivering projects on the ground that directly impact the community.

We often talk about leaders inheriting existing work cultures, but for many CEOs coming into an existing organisation, they also inherit existing ‘to-do lists’ as well as projects and processes on service delivery too. David shares his journey of learning how he got comfortable in his new role, how important it was in determining priorities and what to tackle first, and how he developed a structured way to allocate his time and energy to deliver on what his stakeholders wanted, and what he needed to improve internally with his workforce to do it.

Listen as David shares how he deeply engaged with his team to look at how they could improve processes, policies, and systems in how they worked together and how they delivered services, and how he then drew conclusions on what the most significant pain points were and what he could influence as the CEO to take out the inefficiencies quickly to start improving their processes and capability across the organisation’s 14 different areas.

David also talks about how he gave his teams extreme accountability by empowering staff to make changes internally without needing to ask permission so that they could reorientate the way they delivered services through a Service Delivery Review Program. David’s unique perspective on innovation and how budget and staff restraints can drive it instead of impede it are refreshing, as is his view on keeping good ideas alive and being ready to seize the moment when that window or door opens.

We hope that you enjoy listening to David’s advice on improving organisational performance and that you can apply his many insights to your organisation today.

• Service Delivery Review Program Case Study

  Giving accountability to your team to self-improve their maturity year-on-year across service delivery, project management, and running programs.

  The challenge:

  Many organisations face a challenge when a valued and experienced team member leaves, leaving a huge skills and capability gap that can’t be filled quickly or easily. This often results in the inconsistent delivery of key services.

  The City of Vincent was no exception, having undertaken a self-assessment of the level of maturity in how their different services were being delivered, rating this on a capability matrix of 1 to 5. The initial results revealed that while they had diligent and good staff in their roles of delivering services, there was no backup or redundancy if that staff member left or was sick or away. The organisation needed to build up a level of maturity within their teams so that there was consistent service delivery, regardless of who was delivering it. 

  The solution:

  The City of Vincent, in collaboration with CorbettPrice, developed a Strategic Planning Program for each of its 14 different areas, which run distinctive services and businesses. The program enables each team to improve its maturity in service delivery, project management, and program management year on year.

  The process:

  The process started with a self-assessment of the maturity level in how different services were delivered as a council and rating those on a capability matrix of 1 to 5. Maturity levels: 1—ad hoc, 2—getting there, 3—managed, 4—much higher levels of performance.

  The CEO set the goal for all teams to be at least at level 3. All teams then engaged in service delivery planning to put short-, medium-, and long-term business plans in place to improve maturity in a scaled way that avoided the often painful change management endured through external and large consultancies.

  Outcomes:

  • Improved service delivery year-on-year.

  • An ability to demonstrate to the council how resources are allocated.

  • Team resilience is strengthened by the ability to survive big disruptions, which was tested with COVID-19, staffing, or other shocks.

  • Improved engagement through extreme accountability for each team to self-manage and lead their own performance journey.

  • Completed internally at the team level, where managers engage with staff and staff then understand their role in delivering team outcomes.

  • Improved collaboration.

  • Improved innovation.

Find out more about this Trailblazer:

David MacLennan

Chief Executive Officer

City of Vincent

David MacLennan is the CEO of the City of Vincent and Chair of the Australian Urban Design Research Centre at the University of Western Australia.

He has extensive public policy and strategy experience at local, state, federal and international levels.

David was previously Assistant Director General at the Department of Planning.

He is a former diplomat with the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade with overseas posting experience in the UK, Peru, Mexico and Papua New Guinea.

David is a graduate of UWA and has a Masters of Management from ANU.

His passions are family and fitness.

Tune in next week as we speak to a new trailblazer in another episode in our series on Thriving in Uncertainty.

Thriving in Uncertainty with Samantha Palmer

We know that there are many modes of learning. One that has been spoken about in recent episodes as critically important is on-the-job learning and how, knowledge sharing between peers, even from different areas of an organisation, can help fuel new ideas and ways of working.

Another important learning and development opportunity in the APS is mobility. In our latest episode, Sam Palmer joins us to discuss this and so much more on the topic of learning organisations. Sam is Secretary and a Fellow of IPAA and currently serves as APS reviewer on the independent capability review of the Commonwealth Department of Education on secondment from Austrade.

Listen to episode sixteen:

Also available through Apple Podcasts and Spotify:

Sam has over 35 years of diverse experience, with 25 years of those in senior executive service roles in the APS. She is a passionate advocate for having variety in your working career and how, from her personal experience, moving sideways into different roles and taking on new experiences through mobility opportunities has assisted her in seeing things from a different framing or mindset.

Sam provides excellent examples from throughout her career of how experiencing different contexts in departments has helped her transfer her learnings into other roles and how, in Austrade today, they also benefit from bringing in various people from other parts of the organisation into their division to give new insights and skills when Sam and her colleagues are acting in other positions.

In our discussion, Sam reflects on how championing diversity and inclusion has been one of the most rewarding parts of her career, and we also talk about the relationship between change and learning as Sam shares her time at the Australian Bureau of Statistics and involvement in the marriage equality survey and how the short turnaround time of just 99 days required the department to work with a different momentum and process to make it happen while also maintaining procurement requirements.

Another powerful part of our conversation is the role mentors and champions play in professional development. Sam shares a great metaphor of champions being like elephants: They have big ears to listen, big trunks to communicate and talk, big feet and bodies to make a path through barriers, and a caring nature that they work with heart. If you're thinking about taking on a new or different opportunity or how, as a leader, you can help your staff grow and develop, this is definitely an episode that you won't want to miss.

References from this episode:

• APS Charter of Engagement and Partnerships including link to good practice guide

• Report on the conduct of the Australian Marriage Law Postal Survey

• Paper on measuring culture and leadership at the ABS during transformation

• Youth Engagement Toolkit

• Diversity and Inclusion APSC

• Champions are like elephants

• APSC Mobility Framework

Find out more about this Trailblazer:

Samantha Palmer

General Manager

Visitor Economy and Client Programs Division

   Australian Trade and Investment Commission (Austrade)

Samantha Palmer is temporarily seconded from her position as General Manager of Austrade’s Visitor Economy and Client Programs Division to work with the Australian Public Service Commission as a Senior APS Reviewer on the Capability Review of the Australian Government Department of Education. She is also a Diversity and Inclusion Champion.

Samantha brings 35-plus years of diverse experience with more than 25 in senior executive service roles. She has led policy, programs and corporate transformations in the Queensland, WA and Commonwealth governments in many areas relevant to the visitor economy. These areas include fair trading and consumer protection, environmental protection and national parks, land transport and road safety, housing, disability, and Indigenous communities. She has also run businesses and worked in the arts, university and community sectors.

Career highlights include achieving a 79.5% response rate for the Australian Marriage Law Postal Survey; leading the development of the 10-year Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Plan policy framework; and being appointed the ‘cleanskin’ inaugural Deputy Director General Governance, Integrity and Reform following Australia’s largest public service corruption incident at the WA Communities Department.

Samantha is a National Fellow of the Institute of Public Administration Australia (IPAA). She was one of the 2013 Australian Financial Review/Westpac 100 Women of Influence, and the 2013 Australian Human Resource Institute Diversity Champion of the Year (HR).

Samantha was elected Secretary of the National Institute of Public Administration Australia (the professional body for public servants) in 2024 having served on both National and ACT IPAA Councils for some time. She has a Master of Public Administration and a Bachelor of Business (Communication).

Tune in next time as we speak to a new trailblazer in another episode in our series on Thriving in Uncertainty.

Innovating in Uncertainty with David Thodey

We are thrilled to present our exclusive broadcast with David Thodey, who joins our podcast to discuss Innovating in Uncertainty. David is a Business Leader with a career active in business, healthcare, public policy, innovation, tertiary education, the environment, and corporate governance. He has over 30 years of experience, including previously being the CEO of Telstra and IBM Australia and New Zealand.  

Listen to episode fifteen:

Also available through Apple Podcasts and Spotify:

David is currently Chair of Xero, Chair of Ramsay Health Care, and was appointed the 19th Chancellor of the University of Sydney in July 2024. He is also co-chair of the Great Barrier Reef Foundation and was recently announced as a member of the Reserve Bank of Australia Governance Board.  For the public sector specifically, David's review of the APS in 2019, dubbed "The Thodey Review," is synonymous with the APS Reform, which builds on the recommendations from this review.

In our latest episode, we catch up with David to discuss the concept of "Innovating in Uncertainty." Together, we discuss the continued importance of driving innovation in a rapidly changing world that brings uncertainty with it and how great leaders are those who can adapt to the ambiguity that surrounds them.

David has the unique ability to provide pragmatic advice intertwined with examples throughout his career, spanning industries. Through his experience and knowledge of the APS, he also offers specific perspectives for the public sector, acknowledging the unique and strong position that APS leaders have in their ability to lead in ambiguity.

There's much to unpack from our conversation with David as he reflects on the APS Review. He also discusses how innovation takes discipline, rigour, and accountability comes with trust. Together, we talk about the role of technology in enabling an authorising environment for innovation and the importance of leaning into that going forward.  David also shares his unique views on reframing failure into a learning opportunity and how critical it is for leaders to keep focussing on the agility and flexibility of their workforce to adapt and change now and in the future.

Listening to David inspires you to approach things new and differently, not just because you should, but because you feel compelled to do so to make a difference.

Find out more about this Trailblazer:

David Thodey AO

Business Leader

Chair, Xero and Ramsay Healthcare

Chancellor, The University of Sydney

Co-chair, Great Barrier Reef Foundation

Member, The Reserve Bank of Australia Governance Board

David Thodey is a business leader with a career active in business, healthcare, public policy, innovation, tertiary education, the environment and corporate governance. 

He is currently Chair of Xero, a global cloud-based accounting solution and Ramsay Health Care, a global hospital group.

He was appointed as the 19th Chancellor of the University of Sydney in July 2024.

Mr Thodey also co-chairs the Great Barrier Reef Foundation, an Australian non-profit established to help preserve the Great Barrier Reef and was recently announced as a member of the Reserve Bank of Australia Governance Board.

Previously, Mr Thodey was Chair of the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO), and Tyro, Australia’s largest independent payments company.

Active in public policy, he led an Independent Review of the Australian Public Service (APS). He also chaired an NSW Government appointed Panel to lead an independent review of Federal Financial Relations and led a user audit of the myGov government services digital portal.

In 2020, Mr Thodey was Deputy Chair of the Federal Government’s National COVID-19 Coordination Commission (NCC) Advisory Board, supporting the Government to navigate the challenges faced during the early stages of the pandemic.

Prior to his non-executive career, he had a successful career as CEO of Telstra, and before that, CEO of IBM Australia and New Zealand. 

Mr Thodey was awarded an Honorary Doctorate in Science and Technology from Deakin University and Honorary Doctor of Business from both University of Technology Sydney and the University of Sydney.

He was made an Officer (AO) in the General Division of the Order of Australia for ethical business leadership.

Tune in next week as we speak to a new trailblazer in another episode in our series on Thriving in Uncertainty.

Thriving in Uncertainty with Tim Bullard

In many of our conversations with public sector leaders on the podcast, we hear about the strength of having a common purpose, a shared vision that you work towards, and how that can give you energy and motivation to keep going even when you are dealing with highly complex circumstances and environments.

Teachers continue to face increasingly complex circumstances in education but remain motivated to work towards that light on the hill, a common purpose, in making a difference in children and young people's lives. Teachers who use their knowledge, skills, and capabilities to adapt successfully in a constantly changing environment are highly engaged and thrive to achieve meaningful outcomes.

Tim Bullard, Chief Executive Officer at the Australian Institute of Teaching and School Leadership (AITSL), joins us in our latest episode to discuss adaptability. Tim knows too well how adaptability can directly influence your engagement at work, having managed the Department of Education and then the Department of Education, Children, and Young People in Tasmania through tremendous amounts of change, including COVID-19, a merger of two organisations, and other significant events.

In this episode, Tim reflects on these experiences, sharing that no off-the-shelf guidebook or download from the internet provided the way forward in these complex circumstances and how important it was to work with others around him to come up with innovative and creative solutions to solving the problems they faced.

Tim also provides his perspectives on how to develop adaptability within the workforce, the importance of having a growth mindset to always be learning and looking at how things can be done differently, how organisations need to inject some fun back into the workplace, how crucial it is to leverage the skills and talents of every generation in your workforce, and how essential it is to be responsible for your own wellbeing in taking time out for yourself which then, in turn, will make you more available for others.

This 30-minute episode is packed with practical, knowledgeable, and encouraging advice from an energetic leader in the education industry.

Listen to episode fourteen:

Also available through Apple Podcasts and Spotify:

Find out more about this Trailblazer:

Tim Bullard

Chief Executive Officer

Australian Institute of Teaching and School Leadership

(AITSL)

Tim graduated from the University of Tasmania in 1994 with an Arts/Law (Hons) degree. He initially worked as a lawyer in the Office of the Solicitor-General, before transitioning into policy whilst working in the United Kingdom.  

From 2004 to 2016, Tim held various policy roles for the Department of Premier and Cabinet and commenced as Deputy Secretary Policy in 2014. During this time, he played a key role in education initiatives, leading the development of Tasmania’s Child and Family Learning Centres, and negotiating the ‘Gonski’ schools funding agreement.

Tim joined the Department of Education in 2016 as Deputy Secretary Strategy and Performance and was appointed as Secretary in 2018.

In 2022 Tim was appointed as Secretary of the Department for Education, Children and Young People. In this role Tim oversaw the bringing together of child safety, youth justice, and education into a values-based organisation that provides all children and young people with a bright life and positive future, through being known safe, well and learning.

Tim has been appointed to the role of AITSL CEO for a 5-year period, commencing October 2024.

Tune in next week as we speak to a new trailblazer in another episode in our series on Thriving in Uncertainty.

Thriving in Uncertainty with Dr Ivan Williams

The Australian Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety Agency (ARPANSA) 's work is incredibly important. ARPANSA is  Australia's primary authority on radiation protection and nuclear safety, regulating all aspects of Commonwealth activity in the radiation space. Its mandate is to assist in maintaining the safety of Australia's people and biota in the face of potential radiation risks. Dr Ivan Williams, the Chief Medical Radiation Scientist at ARPANSA, joins us in our latest episode to discuss the topic of becoming a learning organisation.

Critical to performing ARPANSA's work is being across enormous amounts of data, research, regulations, and audits. Staff must also be across contemporary developments in technology, medical practice, and clinical practice. Due to the nature of their work, it is these reasons why there is an expectation that staff invest in their own learning and development.

In this compelling chat, Ivan outlines the vast range of methods that they use to galvanise learning across the organisation, which include sitting on international and national organisations in producing authoritative papers, in-house training with people returning from conferences to distribute relevant information across the agency, monthly knowledge hubs for management, sitting on international committees, staff performing pHD’s at hospitals, and much more.

Ivan also discusses the modes of learning and how, with the nature of their work being technical and hands-on, ARPANSA needs to demonstrate competence to internal and external independent observers, regulators, or reviewers. On-the-job training is particularly beneficial as it provides a lot of practical technical expertise that cannot be achieved by just reading books.

It's a great conversation that provides an understanding of the critical work that ARPANSA provides to Australia and how, as an organisation, they prioritise learning while delivering their huge and essential remit.

Listen to episode thirteen:

Also available through Apple Podcasts and Spotify:

Find out more about this Trailblazer:

Dr Ivan Williams

Chief Medical Radiation Scientist and

Medical Radiation Branch Head

Australian Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety Agency (ARPANSA)

Dr Ivan Williams is an internationally recognised and nationally certified expert in radiation oncology medical physics and medical radiation protection. Ivan trained as a radiation oncology medical physicist at the Peter MacCallum Cancer Institute, Melbourne, Australia and has worked internationally.

Ivan started with the Australian Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety Agency as the inaugural Director of the Australian Clinical Dosimetry Service which he planned and built to be a nationally impacting service with international recognition.

In 2021, he was appointed to the International Commission on Radiation Protection’s committee on medical radiation protection. In 2024, he represented Australia at the United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation.

Ivan is particularly passionate about the appropriate use of science, data and information to improve patient and public health with national impact.

Tune in next week as we speak to a new trailblazer in another episode in our series on Thriving in Uncertainty.

Thriving in Uncertainty – Episode Twelve with David Coltman

We often speak about the importance of everyone continuing to learn. After all, learning, in its essence, is about being alive. While some may approach learning with curiosity and be open to the possibilities it may provide for us, others may find it overwhelming to be able to decide in the direction to go. David Coltman, Chief Executive of TAFE SA, joins us to discuss this and much more in our latest podcast episode on change resilience.  

David shares his perspectives on the role of leaders going forward in helping people find pathways through what can feel like a dense forest at times. With an extensive career in education, David has witnessed the shift in education delivery, becoming more demand-driven, just-in-time, or just-enough training in focus, and how that is shaping education now and in the future.

He’s also no stranger to leading in challenging times, having come into TAFE SA at a time when the organisation needed to transform and be led in a new direction. David reflects on that time, having moved from Victoria to Adelaide for the role, and how he used that journey in becoming South Australian to humanise himself with his new workforce rather than it just being about becoming the new Chief Executive of TAFE SA.

He also talks about the importance of alleviating fear in the workforce through authentic communication that cuts through the jargon, giving people the opportunity to be heard, and how being physically present, where people can see him, provides an anchor for his workforce. David also shares how important it is to lead with kindness, but that, like good parenting, being human doesn’t mean just being Mr Nice Guy all the time; it’s also providing boundaries for people to work with and being consistent with them.

This episode isn’t just a masterclass in leading change, it’s also a great example of how to lead authentically and with kindness.

Listen to episode twelve:

Also available through Apple Podcasts and Spotify:

Find out more about this Trailblazer:

David Coltman

Chief Executive

TAFE SA

David Coltman is the Chief Executive of TAFE SA. Prior to joining TAFE SA in April 2019, David was Deputy Vice Chancellor at Swinburne University of Technology and Chair of the National Institute of Circus Arts (NICA). 

David is a New Zealander who made Australia his home in 2014. 

David holds postgraduate qualifications in Adult Education and Public Administration. His early career work focused on the delivery of programs that sought to increase participation in higher education of underrepresented communities. 

More recently David’s work has focused on the use of digital technologies to improve access and participation in post-compulsory education.

Tune in next week as we speak to a new trailblazer in another episode in our series on Thriving in Uncertainty.

Thriving in Uncertainty – Episode Eleven with Tess Bishop

An open-minded approach to leadership and working with others is a highly desirable attribute that staff look for in a leader. After all, if you have a new idea or want to give feedback on a change or a project, knowing that you can approach these leaders, have a constructive dialogue, and work together to solve it is helpful.

Tess Bishop, Chief Operating Officer and Deputy Secretary of Strategy, Enterprise, and Engagement at the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries, and Forestry (DAFF), is one of these leaders. She joins us in our latest episode to discuss a growth mindset approach to change.

You can’t help but feel the passion and energy that Tess brings to her team at DAFF as she shares her experiences leading a very large transformation agenda with multiple aspects in response to their capability review in 2024. Tess provides her perspectives on how success can only be achieved through an open-minded approach, engaging in open dialogue with others, and adapting and supporting staff along the way.

As a leader, she acknowledges that you are only as good as your team and the importance of learning every day and passing that learning on to others. Tess also shares how she is passionate about getting out to meet her team and how seeing how things work firsthand can really bring policy to life, enabling her to receive direct feedback firsthand.

Tess is a passionate and energetic leader with an open-minded approach to leading others. We hope that you will feel as uplifted as we did after listening to our conversation.

Listen to episode eleven:

Also available through Apple Podcasts and Spotify:

Find out more about this Trailblazer:

Tess Bishop

Chief Operating Officer

Deputy Secretary of Strategy, Enterprise, and Engagement

Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry

Tess has over 20 years' experience across the public, private and not for profit sectors in Australia and the United Kingdom. Since January 2017, she has held Deputy Secretary roles at both the state and federal level, achieving major outcomes with lasting positive impact. This includes leading priority projects such as founding the Office for Rural and Regional Queensland, establishing the Priority and Delivery Unit for the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet and delivering the Transformation Action Plan for the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry.

Tess is currently the Chief Operating Officer and Deputy Secretary of the Strategy, Enterprise, and Engagement Group in the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry. It is a pivotal role overseeing the full suite of corporate and assurance services, as well as navigating high risk, complex and varied policy and enterprise strategy.

An experienced Non-Executive Director, Tess has recently been appointed to the Council of the Institute of Public Administration Australia ACT. She previously served on the Board of Screen Queensland, the Queensland Chapter of the Australian Institute of International Affairs, the Board of the Townsville Port Authority, and the Pathways to Resilience Trust.

Tess holds a Master of International Relations, a Graduate Certificate in Business Management and a Bachelor of Arts majoring in Political Science and Public Policy.  She has also completed the Australia New Zealand School of Government Executive Fellows Program and is a graduate of the AICD Company Board of Directors program.

Professional memberships include the Institute of Public Administration Australia and IAP2 Australasia.

Tune in next week as we speak to a new trailblazer in another episode in our series on Thriving in Uncertainty.

Thriving in Uncertainty - Episode ten with Judith Formston

Often, asking simple questions such as “Is everything OK?”, “What’s happening with you?” or “What are you working on at the moment?” can help us learn more about the people around us and form connections with one another. Many post-pandemic workplaces have a range of flexible working arrangements, and it can be challenging for those workers to feel connected to others, leaving many lonely, burnt out, or disengaged.

Judith Formston, Deputy Chief Executive of Corporate Services at the Department of Health and Wellbeing SA, joins us in this episode to discuss authentic leadership. Judith shares her experience leading others by showing her human side, which helps her team realise she is just like everyone else. She also provides strategies for how her organisation fosters connections to create a safe space where everyone is invited and feels that they can express themselves freely through a range of initiatives, that help workers to disconnect from the workplace, but connect with each other, including coffee breaks, Friday night wines, groups, and communities of practice.

Listen in as Judith talks about key takeaways from the Jarwun Program she participated in. She enjoyed the yarning circle, where she connected to others during lunchtimes by basket weaving and talking. She also discusses the current journey her department is on to give their employees a better experience and improve mental health through organising meditation sessions.

Judith is a great example of a humble, authentic, and ‘human’ leader. We hope that you get as many takeaways from this episode as we did.  

Listen to episode ten:

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Find out more about this Trailblazer:

Judith Formston

Deputy Chief Executive of Corporate Services

Department of Health and Wellbeing

South Australia

Judith is a Deputy Chief Executive of Corporate and Infrastructure, at the Department of Health & Wellbeing, where she has Executive responsibility for Workforce, Finance, Procurement and Contracting and Infrastructure Projects. Judith has worked in Government over 20 years and has held Executive and Senior Management positions across a number of Government agencies in South Australia.

Judith is leading the project delivery team, in delivering the new Women’s and Childrens Hospital to the South Australia, being the State’s largest health infrastructure project.

Judith has a passion for reform and project delivery, leading a number of reform projects across Corporate Services, driving change and innovation across systems and processes. Judith has a key focus on the Employee Value proposition and embedding diversity, equity and inclusion in the workplace.

Tune in next week as we speak to a new trailblazer in another episode in our series on Thriving in Uncertainty.