Requirement C

Published

(c) Supporting and contributing to a workplace culture that sustains core knowledge, expertise, and standards of professionalism to deliver intended results with integrity

All APS employees have a role to play in building a workplace culture that embodies the spirit of public service. As stewards of the APS, we recognise the unique and significant role of the APS in Australia’s democratic system, and strive to be trusted by the government of the day, the Parliament, and the community to work professionally in the public interest. We demonstrate our professionalism by doing the right thing, in the right way, at the right time.

At the heart of professionalism in the APS is our institutional knowledge and expertise. The experience each of us acquires in serving the government and the community over time, and our deep expertise as a service in the range of matters on which we advise and deliver for government, is a national resource in its own right.

This is not to say that we must continue ways of working simply because ‘we have always done it that way’. Our work, and our approach to it, must adapt and evolve, and the APS cannot remain effective without innovation. Nevertheless, we have institutional wisdom unique to the APS, and, as stewards, we must recognise its value and take care to safeguard and sustain it.

Ask yourself:

Who can I learn from?

Who can learn from me?

What knowledge and resources do we have in our team that help us do our best work?

What contribution can I make to these?

How we share our knowledge and expertise—and our resources more broadly—is also fundamental to our stewardship of the APS. While it is necessary and appropriate to cultivate agency-specific understanding and capability, there are significant areas of commonality across the APS where sharing and cooperation can benefit the service as a whole.

This can range from agency heads making staff available to meet surge needs, to agency corporate areas collaborating on or sharing strategies, policies, and guidance on matters common to the APS. In this regard, stewardship of the APS includes maximising economies of scale to avoid needless duplication of effort and ensure equity among agencies, so that we can all reap the benefits of great ideas and hard work.

For APS employees, demonstrating stewardship can look like:

  • appropriately sharing knowledge and resources with colleagues:
    • within our teams;
    • in other teams in our agency;
    • in other agencies; and
    • externally—e.g. those in the private, academic, or community sectors, or in other jurisdictions;
  • proactively considering ways to improve work processes or systems;
  • working collaboratively to achieve outcomes;
  • being open to new ideas;
  • engaging in ongoing learning and development, both formal and informal;
  • handing over key tasks and know-how to team members when departing a role or simply taking leave;
  • taking appropriate responsibility for raising issues and concerns; and
  • overall being mindful of the kind of workplace culture we contribute to.

Additional consideration for leaders

SES and other managers can demonstrate stewardship by:

  • taking the time to explain or share processes or rationale to ensure work is supported by full information;
  • supporting employees’ ongoing learning and development;
  • fostering and investing in subject matter expertise;
  • sharing resources appropriately with counterparts in other agencies;
  • working openly with staff in other APS agencies to promote whole of government outcomes;
  • engaging in robust succession planning;
  • fostering a culture in which diverse perspectives, lived experiences, and skill sets are recognised as critical to achieving agency goals;
  • effectively managing diverse and dispersed teams;
  • working to make the APS a model employer now and into the future;
  • supporting, mentoring and coaching the next generation of APS staff; and
  • fostering psychologically safe workplaces where staff feel safe to raise issues or concerns.

Agency heads can demonstrate stewardship by:

  • ensuring their agency is staffed in a way that sustains core knowledge and expertise;
  • promoting and demonstrating collaboration across the APS;
  • promoting employee understanding of what it means to be a public servant; and
  • personally role-modelling APS professionalism in a way that is genuine and visible to staff.

Case Studies—Stewardship in Practice

Ivan is an EL1 subject matter expert who has been in his role for over 20 years, and is nearing retirement. Ivan’s deep knowledge and expertise are relied upon not only within his team, but across the agency and by external stakeholders. While he has supervised junior team members during his career, there have not been opportunities for him to share his store of knowledge in a sustained or systematic way, and colleagues have become habituated to approaching Ivan for input on matters relevant to his area.

Ivan informs his EL2 manager, Deborah, that he is seeking to retire within six to twelve months. Ivan reflects that he has spent much of his career feeling that he had to focus on delivering outcomes and being immediately responsive as a subject matter expert, and did not feel he could take the time to transfer his knowledge and expertise to colleagues. With retirement approaching, Ivan would like to remedy this, and asks for Deborah’s advice on how he can do so effectively. He knows he needs to make sure key records and resources are saved and accessible to the team, but understands that this will not be enough on its own to equip the team into the future.

Deborah agrees that up-to-date recordkeeping is essential, and she also knows that the greatest value in Ivan’s expertise is his capacity to judge which information is most relevant to the matter at hand; to draw connections between different topics, tasks, or priorities to inform a richer product; and to recall historical factors relevant to current work and determine how they might apply in the present. Of equal value are the working relationships Ivan has cultivated throughout his career, which inform his work in key ways, support partnership and collaboration, and contribute to the good reputation of the agency with stakeholders.

What happens next?

Deborah believes Ivan’s knowledge can best be transferred to Ivan’s colleagues by direct experience, and suggests that in the time available the most effective approach would be to have at least one team member at a time shadow Ivan in key functions of his work. 

Ivan agrees, and undertakes to develop a work plan for the coming months to ensure all areas of his work can be observed by colleagues. He suggests that he could also work jointly with colleagues to develop or update key team documents and operating procedures to support their understanding, ownership, and maintenance of these resources. Deborah and Ivan agree on this way forward, and undertake to discuss progress regularly both in one-on-one catch-ups and team meetings.

Ivan and Deborah both demonstrate Stewardship in their respective roles and responsibilities by looking ahead to sustain the core knowledge and expertise of the team through effective recordkeeping, succession planning, and capability building.

Fatima is an experienced APS 5 Project Officer who has worked in the same project delivery role for the past five years. Fatima’s team is responsible for delivering the digital programming infrastructure for a new quarantine facility that will strengthen Australia’s biosecurity. This important work plays a critical role in reducing risks posed to the nation by invasive pests and diseases. Fatima’s team works in close collaboration with partners across Government and industry and is entrusted to plan and deliver complex digital IT projects.

A new SES Band 1, Shaun, has been appointed following the retirement of Peta, who had been in the position for many years. Fatima had very much enjoyed working with Peta, who had supported an excellent team culture. Peta had set high expectations for their work—but also valued each team member’s specialised knowledge and expertise, and supported ongoing learning. Peta had also been willing to listen to team members and regularly invited healthy dissent in team meetings, by asking, ‘What am I missing here?’. Under her guidance they were confident to raise issues and proactively treat mistakes as opportunities to improve work processes to avoid future failures.

The team culture has changed since Shaun’s arrival. While he also wants the team to do a good job, it is becoming clear that his primary focus is on achieving results, and he frequently tells staff he does not want to hear about problems, only solutions. The team now does not feel safe to raise issues or concerns with Shaun, or to indicate when they feel uncertain and need further support or direction from him.

Shaun tells the directors in his branch that he has advised the Executive that a project milestone would be delivered three weeks early. Fatima’s EL2 director, Jana, respectfully challenges Shaun’s decision, advising that it is unrealistic to set that expectation, that the capacity of the team may not accommodate it, and it could upset the workflow of the overall project. Shaun replies that Jana will simply need to find a way to make it happen.

What happens next?

A week later, Fatima finds an issue in the digital programming that means some shipments of goods being imported may miss their quarantine inspection. Fatima raises this with Jana, and they agree that to fix the issue they would need to rewrite the initial programming, which would delay the completion date by months. They are aware that Shaun had promised stakeholders the project would be delivered under time, and know that he will not react well to this news. They decide not to share the information, but feel extremely uncomfortable about the possible implications to Australia’s biosecurity.

Due to the culture Shaun has created in his branch, Fatima and Jana do not feel safe to raise concerns that could have serious implications beyond the workplace. Shaun’s refusal to listen to the advice of experts in his branch, and his dismissive approach to hearing ‘bad news’, demonstrates a fundamental failure of Stewardship, creating a powerful disincentive for staff to raise serious concerns with Shaun, or to escalate them further for fear of reprisal.

Glenn is a non-ongoing EL2 employee who was engaged to provide IT security expertise to a department upgrading its cyber security infrastructure to meet legislative requirements. 

Glenn has a wealth of government experience, having worked in multiple departments and being an active member of several government-led IT security Communities of Practice. For this, Glenn is considered a key stakeholder in the agency’s commitment to meet broader security requirements and therefore attends Board and Executive meetings to provide his expert advice for senior decision-makers.

Glenn’s department decides that Glenn has shared enough of his expertise that the bulk of his work can now be done by a more junior employee, and Glenn’s position will not continue in the next financial year. Glenn knows that while some tasks can be handled by the junior employee, he believes that they do not have the depth of expertise the department needs in the role, nor the stakeholder relationships.

Glenn communicates this to his SES Band 1 manager, Diane, who tells him that she is happy to work with Glenn and the team to support Glenn to transfer his knowledge and set his colleague up for success. Glenn is disappointed that Diane has not changed her mind about his position ending.

What happens next?

Glenn starts to feel disengaged, and while he used to bring back new and relevant ideas from his external stakeholder meetings, he doesn’t feel like there’s much point to participating in team conversations or offering anything substantial any more. 

The last Community of Practice meeting he attended included a robust discussion on a specific tool that would not only meet compliance but would also streamline department processes and provide an immediate return on investment. However, Glenn doesn’t bother to offer this as a solution to the department, choosing instead to focus on his job search.

Diane is later informed of the Community of Practice discussion by a colleague. She counsels Glenn, advising him that non-ongoing employees have the same obligations as ongoing employees. Diane acknowledges Glenn’s disappointment about his role ending, but reminds him that while he is still an APS employee he is required to demonstrate stewardship by contributing to the department and sharing his expertise and knowledge.

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