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We all have an endless pursuit of both productivity and customer experience, however the two are often not complementary. This session will identify challenges that inhibit productivity, degrade customer experience, and describe how an optimal balance can be found with these competing priorities to succeed with both.

As organisations race to get ready for AI, Objective will cut through the hype, uncover emerging themes, and spotlight real-world use cases that are already making an impact. Plus, we'll share the pitfalls to avoid. Presented by Ian Jansen VP of Solutions at Objective, who understands the realities of digital transformation having held high-profile public-sector positions including Chief Digital Officer and CIO in both the public and private sector.

This session presents striking insights from roundtables and interviews with over 160 Chief People Officers from leading organisations across public, private and NFP sectors. Participants have identified what they see as the most significant drivers, theatres of adaptation and immediate priorities for re-designing work, organisations and workforces. Anthony Mitchell from Bendelta will synthesise the most cogent points and provide guidance on keys to successful workforce transformation and transition.

• Driving digital capability within Health and Education – unpacking strategic priorities for 2026.
• Overcoming challenges associated with digital delivery – lessons learnt and key considerations for success going forward.
• Unveiling innovative initiatives in the pipeline: unpacking the next steps to roll out.

Brian Schumacher

First Assistant Secretary, Digital Transformation and Delivery, Department of Health and Aged Care

Megan Doherty

Acting Branch Manager, Customer Experience and Products, Australian Digital Health Agency

Peter Ingram

Assistant Secretary, Digital Services, Department of Education

Melissa Hankinson

Chief Information Officer, University of Canberra

Rob Bollard PSM

Industry Principal Public Sector APJ, Pegaystems

• Responsible AI in government: building trust and transparency.
• Navigating AI governance: frameworks for public sector implementation.
• Protecting public trust: risk management for government AI.
• AI safeguards: ensuring accountability in government applications.
• Ethical AI for public service: balancing innovation and responsibility.

Kara Beckles

Executive Director, Privacy and AI Policy, Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat

Andreas Bleich

Data Champion/Assistant Secretary, Data, Research, Strategy Division, Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development, Communications and the Arts

Alex Reuter Town

Executive Director, Data Analytics, ACCC

• What are the key requirements for a future workforce?
• The evolving public service: how AI will reshape government roles into 2026 and beyond?
• Capability building and preparing for jobs that don’t exist yet - with an AI lens.
• The new workforce: Aligning people and AI/technology, - what tasks should stay with people, and which with technology?
• Upskilling staff for the AI era.

Karina Rasanen

Director, Workforce Capability, Department of Defence

Katische Vinning

Chief Information Officer, Defence Housing Australia

Melanie Morrissey

Executive Consultant, Management Consulting, RPS Group

Customer expectations are complex and higher than ever—they want fast, personalised, and seamless digital journeys, ensuring and delivering predicable and tangible outcomes based on:

1. Predictive analytics
2. Proactive remediations
3. User productivity uptime and Sentiment scores
4. And cost savings to business.

Legacy systems slow operations, increase costs, and limit scalability. Datacom’s AI-powered approach helps organisations modernise faster and more efficiently by deploying intelligent agents alongside software engineers. These agents are already operational in major public and private sector projects, performing key functions across:

• AI development teams: Autonomous agents acting as project managers, analysts, developers, and testers to accelerate delivery.
  • Operational efficiency: Intelligent agents acting as account leads and incident managers to proactively resolve issues.
  • Customer service: AI agents improving citizen experiences and boosting Net Promoter Scores.
  • Government expertise: Domain-specific agents supporting faster, policy-aligned decisions.

• Why technology doesn’t innovate - people do.
• Why it’s not just about cyber or technical skills.
• How work really fits into our lives today.
• What leaders can do to unlock the true human advantage.

• Navigating the emerging AI terrain.
• Copilot for M365 trial experiences.
• AI potential to assist interactions with policy and guidelines.
• AI in corporate applications.
• Exploring the AI leading edge in other organisations.
• Harnessing the power of partnerships: working effectively with vendors.

• Thinking differently in workforce planning: differentiating between a role and a skill.
• Developing digital capability and a tech empowered workforce: practical and successful steps to building the necessary skillsets.
• Workforce capabilities in tech: overlaying a digital strategy with existing skillsets, understanding required skills, identifying gaps and cross-skilling.

• Inclusive by design, accessible by default – revolutionising the approach to ‘no one left behind’.
• Progressing a customer-centric government and a truly inclusive society though co-design.
• Expanding the way we think about accessibility.
• The power of data in delivering connected, personalised services to all citizens.

Public sector organisations are shifting from digital-first to AI-native by building strong data foundations. By connecting data across departments and integrating AI, governments can unlock real-time insights, automate services, personalise citizen engagement, and boost efficiency. This transformation is creating connected ecosystems that drive a broader Data & AI economy to better serve citizens.

• How can we work more effectively and efficiently to refer and share talent across Government?
• How can we reduce competition and isolation, and increase collaboration?
• Solving the skills shortage: how can we better utilise resources across government.
• Attracting and keeping leading edge talent within government.
• Creating the central mechanism for a talent collaboration in Federal Government.

Layla Morrow

Assistant Secretary, Enterprise Portfolio Management and Commercial, Department of Health and Aged Care

Tammy Braybrook

Senior Director Data Capability and Analytics, Australian Maritime Safety Authority

David Bain-Smith

Managing Director, Calleo Resourcing

• The future of Digital ID in Australian Public Service: creating more seamless, interconnected government services.
• The expansion of Australia’s Digital ID System: where are we headed over 2026 and beyond?
• Ensuring a secure, convenient, voluntary and inclusive Digital ID system.

• Strategies for achieving meaningful outcomes and return on investment from AI initiatives within the public sector.
• AI that delivers: ensuring value from public sector implementation.
• Beyond the pilot: scaling AI impact across government services.
• Measuring what matters: defining success for government AI projects.
• AI as a force multiplier: enhancing existing government capabilities.
• Citizen-centred AI: focusing on outcomes that matter.

Heather Cotching

Assistant Secretary/ Branch Head, Data, Digital and Analytics, Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet

Hiro Noda

Coordinator, Artificial Intelligence and Emerging Technology, Australian Federal Police

Eleanor Williams

Managing Director, Australian Centre for Evaluation, Australian Treasury

Clara Lubbers

Director – Strategy, Digital Services, Department of Health, Disability and Ageing

Dan Saldi

Founder & Applied AI Director, Xaana

• Workforce strategy for a digital workforce: navigating the emerging landscape.
• The new requirements for workforce planning into 2026 and beyond.
• Successfully setting up a transformation office.

• Assessing information, providing insight and assisting decision makers to make decisions.
• Building intelligence and strategic decision-making capability across the organisation and within senior leadership.
• Developing proactivity and harnessing insights to better understand and predict trends/needs.
• Uplifting knowledge and data management capabilities – removing siloes, leveraging existing systems and interlinking data.

• Culture and change management in the AI era: critical considerations, concerns, and emerging priorities leading into 2026.
• Rethinking ‘Innovation’: micro changes + cultural change = greatest benefit.
• Creating culture as the foundation and constant for ever-evolving technology change.
• Managing the ‘people side’ of change management to ensure the change sticks: including people on the journey.
• Improving employee engagement and wellbeing to enhance culture and deliver better business outcomes.

Jasna Blackwell

Chief People Officer/First Assistant Secretary, Department of Education

Rachael McMahon

Chief People Officer, National Indigenous Australians Agency

Jenni Pain

Director SES Services, National Disability Insurance Agency