A lot has changed over the past ten years, and the Department of Health, Disability and Ageing is no exception! From the 2016 capability review, the COVID pandemic, the Royal Commission into Aged Care Quality and Safety, and the second capability review in late 2022, DoHAC stands at a critical point in its history, having evolved considerably in how it approaches change and prepares itself for the future. Rachel Balmanno, First Assistant Secretary of the People, Communication, and Parliamentary Branch, at the department, joins us to discuss a future-oriented approach to change in our latest episode.

Brad Archer, Chief Executive Officer of the Climate Change Authority, joins us to discuss leading through significant and rapid growth, exploring the opportunities, challenges, and achievements it brings in our latest episode. This episode offers an honest reflection on leading and managing rapid organisational change, highlighting some of the challenges that arose from significant growth in recruiting a new workforce that had to come together quickly to start delivering on an expanded remit of work.

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.

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, and much more.

In today’s episode, we are steering off course - literally! Mandy Young, Chief Executive at the NSW State Insurance Regulatory Authority or SIRA, joins us to discuss ‘Taking the path less travelled.’

Mandy has diverse leadership and public sector experience, with a background in social work at the Department of Communities and Justice. She has also worked as the Deputy Secretary and Chief Operating Officer for the NSW Department of Customer Service during COVID-19.

In today’s episode, Janet Schorer, a senior public sector leader and Chief Delivery Officer at TAFE NSW, joins us to discuss growth and adaptability.

In this uplifting chat, Janet shares her experiences from her early career, how other leaders helped her grow and develop, and how she leans on these experiences to help others grow and develop today. She also explains how important it is for leaders to put themselves in someone else’s shoes, acknowledging that the world is now different from what it was, that workplaces themselves are different too, and that it’s through a connection with purpose that you can keep yourself, and your team, motivated through times of continuous change and uncertainty.

In the final episode of our first series, we explore the seventh dimension of organisational health, the relational dimension, which is all about learning and development.

David Powell, author, founder, and life skills mentor of The Golden Thread, joins Andy in this enlivening discussion to provide ways that L&D managers can offer learning and development opportunities that build self, relationship, and team interpersonal skills to empower their workforce in their lifelong learning journey to mastery.

The leadership style of an organisation can profoundly impact an organisation's health, affecting the workplace culture, employee experience, engagement, performance, and organisational agility and resilience.

The prolific global expert in open and digital government and former public servant Pia Andrews joins us as we discuss how public sector professionals must lead and navigate their teams now and in the future.

This episode explores the 2nd dimension of organisational health: Mental – organisational agility and resilience.

Scott Johnston, Deputy Secretary of Revenue, New South Wales, Chief Commissioner of State Revenue, and Commissioner of Fines Administration, joins Andy in this episode to discuss how Revenue NSW has applied agile principles to transform their organisation to become adaptive and responsive now and in the future.

In our first episode, Andy Corbett leads us through an overview of organisational health and the seven wellness dimensions that this series will explore. As a trailblazer in operating model design and implementation, Andy will switch hats to be interviewed by Associate Director and Head of Training of CorbettPrice, Lauren Chowdry.