A former public servant with the Department of Prime Minister & Cabinet has spoken of what it takes for a bureaucracy to punch above its weight and deliver for the government.
Lin Hatfield Dodds has told a Chifley Research Centre conference audience that in a world characterised by volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity (aka ‘VUCA’) the APS needed three capability essentials.
“Key capabilities, in my mind, fall into three key domains: collaboration, cooperation and culture,” Hatfield Dodds said.
“Leadership is, more and more, characterised by the ability to make good judgments, having a view about the purpose and the objects of whatever you are leading, and then be able to inspire, equip, and strategise with others, and to bring people along on that journey.”
The Benevolent Society CEO said public sector capability was critical to delivering the agenda of the government of the day. This was the case for whoever held power, she added.
“In terms of public policy, in this country, we’ve been fortunate enough to solve a lot of our big problems,” Hatfield Dodds said.
“We’ve got a Medicare system, we’ve got a really good public education system, we’ve gone after some of those things that have really set us up to be a thriving nation and to leave us few people behind as we can.”
For an APS operating in an increasingly complex ‘VUCA’ context, Hatfield Dodds explained collaboration and cooperation with NGO and private sector actors were needed for lasting and maximal impact.
“I grew up in a world of certainty. Most of us in our 50s, 60s, possibly even into our 40s, grew up in a world that was much more certain than the world we live in now,” she said.
But the need for collaboration and cooperation also extended across borders to work with other jurisdictions and cut across all levels of government.
“In a really complex environment, the only certainty we have is that we need to collaborate and cooperate with each other across industry lines across sectors, in order to actually deliver real-world outcomes that are going to make an enduring difference.
“The federation works best when it works together, and where different levels of government — including local government — bring the capabilities, expertise, insights and understanding they have from the domain of governance in which they operate to solve for complexity.
“If what’s left is complex, and if what’s required is collaboration, it’s really important that the public servants, the APS, and the commonwealth takes that serious seriously,” Hatfield Dodds said.
The former social policy deputy secretary with PM&C (2016-2019) and ANZSOG associate dean made her remarks as part of a Labor think tank panel at the weekend. Joining her on the panel was public service minister Katy Gallagher, Chifley Research Centre board member and economist Amit Singh and former PwC partner Frances Maguire.
.@SenKatyG closing out a massive @ChifleyResearch conference with a discussion on rebuilding the capacity, strategic intellect and heft of the Australian public service. pic.twitter.com/Ru02r6PCIy
— Elliot Stein (@ElliotJStein) February 5, 2023
Hatfield Dodds said she was involved in some capacity in at least six new government reforms areas spanning humans, productivity and the state of our economy.
“Those things at first glance are interrelated, and harmonising, that work is really critical,” she said, pointing to the example of domestic allied health services which needed the right migration settings to attract mid to late-career professionals and fill gaps in the workforce.
“One of the challenges that the public service minister and Gordon de Brouwer will have is working out how to bake the requirement for harmonisation into the APS — it has to be a core competency of leadership into the future,” she said.
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