Climbing out of the political abyss.
Australia is in a political abyss. How do we climb out of it? Do we need a ‘Courage Party’ to address major long term issues, such as refugees, climate change and taxation?

In October of 2016 we heard from Professor Barry Jones as he delivered the annual oration.

Listen to the oration here.

The IPAA 2016 National Conference was a provocative look at political, social, and economic reform in Australia. You can watch every plenary session below.

For 50 years Flinders University has been a focus for long term and systematic education and research in the field of public policy and administration.  Its public policy activities have always had a strong collaborative element working with government.

Over the past 50 years the public administration landscape has changed dramatically and the fundamental issues of organising our society to steer new directions, and harness our resources to deliver public value has been highly contestable.  Our public servants have very hard jobs giving policy advice and managing programs

This half day seminar provided pointers to the future, and looked at lessons we can learn from the past.

The session was chaired by Professor Adam Graycar, School of Social and Policy Studies, Flinders University. 

Our two keynote speakers brought knowledge, vision and experience

Dr Zeger van der Wal
The 21st Century Public Manager: Trends, Challenges, and Competencies

Drawing on cutting edge research, Dr van der Wal will outline how public managers, faced with volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity can face future challenges and risks.

He will show that these challenges and risks also provide unprecedented opportunities, enabling public managers to be more entrepreneurial, faster, “flatter”, responsive, and innovative in their ability to respond to citizen needs, policy challenges, and demands and assignments from political and administrative bosses.   In his outline of how to deliver “better” public management he will draw upon his forthcoming book The 21st Century Public Manager. His opening address will cover:

• Key drivers and trends affecting the operating environment of public managers in the 21st century, such as Climate Change, Aging, Ultra-urbanization, Economic Interconnectedness, and Disruptive Technological Change
• Seven clusters of demands, dilemmas, and enablers resulting from these trends, such as Managing Stakeholder Multiplicity, Managing Authority Turbulence, and Managing the New Work (Force)
• The potential of a new paradigm of 21st Century Public Management to complement Traditional Public Administration, New Public Management, and New Public Governance
• The ability of our field to stay relevant to practice amidst rapidly changing and highly dynamic environments and contexts

Mr Kym Kelly
Lessons from the past: Values to lead and Capacity to manage

Following the coffee break we heard from four people closely associated with the School, two who have been involved in teaching, and two Masters graduates

• Dr Cassandra Star,  Associate Professor in Public Policy
• Dr Jo Baulderstone, former Associate Professor in Public Policy
• Mr Phil Fagan-Schmidt,  currently Executive Director, Housing SA
• Ms Barbara Dickens currently with RenewalSA

The Office for the Public Sector, along with IPAA, was delighted to present A Level Playing Field – Gender Equality in Leadership Summit, an inaugural event to empower public sector employees to drive inclusive leadership where men and women are equally represented, valued and rewarded.

The program featured:

• Rabia Siddique – hostage survivor, former war crimes prosecutor, international humanitarian and retired British Army officer
• Christine Nixon – Men, Women and Systems “, what needs to be done to achieve equality.
  For quite some time it has been suggested that if we just “fix the women”, or “if the men just stepped up”, or if the HR, recruitment, reward systems worked fairly then all would be solved.
  The presentation will focus on the key changes that need to be made by Men and Women and to the systems they work within.
• a lively debate between public sector leaders including Chief Executives
• presentation on unconscious bias by Male Champion of Change, Martin Parkinson, Secretary, Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet
• hands-on leadership development exercises “Keep your brain on the game” with Anna Lee.

Amanda Blair, Co-Chair of the Premier’s Council for Women was the MC for the day.

The new Gender Equality in Leadership Strategy was launched featuring the gender equality hat-trick: Leadership Accountability, an Empowered Workplace and Sustainable Talent Pipeline.

During this On the Couch Dr Campbell Gemmell was interviewed by Fraser Bell from Thomas Lawyers.

Dr Campbell Gemmell is Chief Executive of the Environment Protection Authority, South Australia’s independent environment regulator and sits on South Australia’s Senior Management Council.

Before taking up the position in January 2012, Dr Gemmell was Chief Executive of the Scottish Environment Protection Agency (SEPA), for 9 years.

In his earlier career, he worked in the fields of economic development and environmental consultancy.

During the 1980s he held a post-doctoral research lectureship at Christ Church, Oxford and was involved in a range of scientific expeditions and field studies in Alaska, Iceland, Kenya, Norway and Switzerland.

In the 1990s Dr Gemmell ran the UK’s largest community forestry organisation, was Chairman of Landwise, and a member of Scottish Ministerial groups dealing with Forestry for People, Rural Focus and Sustainable Development.

He was a member of Scotland’s Government Resilience and Emergency Planning Bodies for 10 years, and up to the end of 2011 led Scotland’s Environment and Rural Services (SEARS) frontline delivery process, designing and implementing reform of rural delivery service by 9 public bodies for the previous 5 years.

Dr Gemmell has a first-class honours degree in Geography and a PhD in Glaciology from Aberdeen University. Since 2007 he has been Professor of Environmental Regulation and Policy at Glasgow University.

He is a Life Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, and a former Member of Court (governing body) at Stirling University.

Since arriving in South Australia, Campbell has joined the Senior Officials Committee for SCEW, been a member of the Vibrant City Senior Officers Group, and has led a Change Program to enhance the performance and capability of the EPA, working with government, industry and community partners.