Getting down to business - the "how" in actioning the APS Reform Agenda

When Senator Katy Gallagher stepped up to deliver the Albanese Government’s APS Reform agenda speech at the IPAA conference in Canberra, she meant business. The business of reform. Specifically, resetting and rebuilding the APS based on relooking at the key recommendations made in the 2019 Independent Review of the APS: Priorities for Change, known as the Thodey Review.

Senator Gallagher worked in consultation with a team of advisors and support staff to put together The APS Reform Agenda, which included public sector reform secretary Dr Gordon de Brouwer. As reported by The Mandarin, PM&C boss Professor Glyn Davis also made an appearance at the IPAA event in show of support to the senator in the delivery of her speech. This is important, as these two specific leaders formed part of the panel that produced what has been dubbed as the Thodey Review in 2019, along with other panellists Belinda Hutchinson, David Thodey, Alison Watson and Maile Carnegie.?

Why is the “The Thodey Review” still relevant?

Let’s go back in time three years to review and extract what we believe are the key conclusions and recommendations from this review…

Firstly, the purpose of the review was “to ensure the APS is fit for purpose in the decades to come”. Not just looking into 2019, this report looked further into the future. To do this, they looked at what the APS’s operating environment could look like in 2030 and they achieved this through scenario planning. This approach helped them to go beyond immediate, 2019 problems to potential profound changes ahead, some of which have now been realised. And with these possible changes in the future it became apparent that the APS needed to be adaptable and resilient. These outcomes are even more relevant today.

Secondly, the report acknowledged that the underlying capacity of the APS had weakened over time, and this is reflected in many reports and media commentary today that mention the same challenges of skills shortages, winning or losing the talent war to the private sector and loss of connection within our region and the rest of the world. You only need to look at the APS Workforce Strategy 2025 to see the three areas of action on how the government is responding to these key areas on talent, workforce models and leadership.

Thirdly, it called out the need for trust. The aspiration from the report was “We need a trusted APS, united in serving all Australians… Trust is founded on integrity, transparency and reliability”. In Senator Gallagher’s speech she referred to the fact that Australia has suffered one of the world’s largest declines in public trust, quoting that according to the Edelman Public Trust Barometer, only 52% of Australians trust government and its institutions to do the right thing, down from 61% in 2021. This is also reflected in The index of Government Effectiveness which captures the perceptions of the quality of public services. Australia was ranked 15th in the world (of 192 countries listed) in 2021 with an effectiveness score of 1.51 (a score of -2.5 is considered weak and a score of 2.5 is considered strong). One thing is clear, there is a decline in trust of government, and winning back that trust is a challenge that the government and its institutions must succeed on.

Lastly, the report raised concerns about the APS operating model and how it may hinder people, skills and resources being deployed in the most efficient and effective manner. The State of Service 2020-21 Report, calls out the needs for increased responsiveness, adoption of more agile ways of working, a review of structures, increased performance and accountability, and the flexibility to support both employee wellbeing and operational needs.

The risk that the Thodey Review called out was that “Australia will find itself with an APS that struggles to provide successive governments with integrated advice and support – informed by a deep understanding of the needs of the Australian people – to best tackle complex problems”.

We rest our case.

Where to from here??

“There is however, work to be done in repairing years of neglect suffered by our public institutions. Outsourcing, poor resourcing, clunky systems, and a decade of deliberate devaluing of the APS has meant that the Australian people are looking at our institutions with a more jaundiced eye.” APS Reform Agenda

Building on the Thodey Review recommendations, the key priorities set in the APS Reform Agenda focus on integrity, people, workplace culture and workforce capabilities. These are backed by initiatives to strengthen the APS, build resiliency and most importantly, ‘win-back’ the public’s trust in government.

The enabler for achieving these priorities is the operating model. An operating model acts as the mechanism that bridges the gap between strategic priorities and day-to-day operations and by taking this approach, true transformation can be realised. ??

Taking an operating model approach

?“Organisations that adopt more dynamic operating models respond faster to changing priorities, better meet the needs of people they serve, and engage and empower employees.”?Thodey Review, 2019

An operating model is the combination of elements or building blocks, including people, structures, processes, systems and partnerships that are required to deliver products and services to customers. This holistic and visual representation of an organisation helps leaders to succeed on achieving their strategic priorities as it provides them with increased transparency into both complex and subtle interactions between building blocks. An operating model enables effective change without unintended consequences, empowers leaders with information to build better governance models and highlights possible capability gaps inhibiting efficient service delivery.

An operating model provides the mechanism; the how, needed to successfully execute change in the form of adopting new approaches, reconfiguring teams and deploying skills where and when they are most needed to provide impact and change. We have discussed a further approach to this in our article titled Finding a way forward – agility at scale within government.

Reviewing your agency’s performance barometer

Answer the following five questions to see how your agency is performing:

1. How highly would you rate your customers’ level of trust that the information your team provides them with is correct where 1 is untrusted and 5 is very trusted?
2. How highly would you rate your customers’ satisfaction that the service provided to them is in their best interests where 1 is unsatisfactory and 5 is very satisfied?
3. How highly would you rate your employee satisfaction with your agency’s current service model where 1 is unsatisfied and 5 is very satisfied?
4. How highly would you rate your teams overall ability to provide effective and efficient service to your customers where 1 is very inefficient and 5 is very efficient?

If you have all 5’s we want to connect with you and use your agency as a benchmark! If you average 3.5 and below, please connect with us to see how we can assist you, or read more about our Northstar program.