Week 122

Our Guidance and Support team have been working to make it easier to understand the steps involved in exporting agricultural goods. This week, the team showcased a prototype of a new interactive guidance product. It’s a decision tree that, given the circumstances of an export business, shows you specific pieces of relevant content. Next up, we’re looking at what it will take to get the prototype shipped into production.

On Wednesday evening, it was great to attend the launch of the Innovation Papers, a collection of short essays collated by James and Corrie at InnovationAus.com about the opportunities and challenges in Australia’s technology and innovation ecosystem. It was published as an actual printed newspaper, but there’s also a digital edition you can read online. A couple of the articles I’ve read so far include Lesley Seebeck on digital delivery in government and Ellen Broad on regulating artificial intelligence.

Later in the week, I travelled up to Sydney to spend time with members of our team. It was great to have coffee and formally welcome Matt O’Neill. Matt has recently joined as a service designer from the City of Sydney and the NSW Government. He’s joined our team connecting the Export Service with the whole-of-government trade agenda led by the Simplified Trade System taskforce.

I spent Friday in our Sydney office with Felicity, Alzbeta, and Flavius, who are looking at our end-to-end service and future strategy, and with Matti, who leads our Export Intelligence team. It was also great to catch up and brief Jo. Our division head Nick is on leave for the next couple of weeks. I will be holding the fort in his absence, and Jo will be doing the same for our branch.

Whilst on the road, I dialled into a meeting of the Trade Reform Board on Friday afternoon. The board meets quarterly to oversee the progress of all of our digital and regulatory reform work underway in the Agricultural Trade Group. It’s the most senior governance forum for our program. We briefed the board on our performance for the last quarter and the plans for Quarter 1.

Reading Cate McLaurin’s week notes, I was pleased to come across the Uncertain Times project. It provides a collection of cards, a workbook, and a daily planner to help deal with uncertain environments and looks a helpful resource for building individual and team resilience.

There’s been a bit in the news recently about the Uluru Statement from the Heart. To learn more about the statement and its background, I have been reading the book Truth-Telling: History, sovereignty and the Uluru Statement by Henry Reynolds.