Wed 29 Jul 2026
View event detailsRegistration, Coffee & Hellos
8:00 AM - 8:50 AM (50 mins)
Settle in, grab a coffee, and meet a few friendly faces before we begin.
Welcome & How to Make the Most of Today
8:50 AM - 9:10 AM (20 mins)
A short welcome, plus a few quick tips to help you connect, share, and get real value from the day. We’ll also run a couple of quick polls to see what everyone’s interested in and what people are working on right now.
Ministerial Address
9:10 AM - 9:20 AM (10 mins)
Solving the Innovation Paradox: Hard-Won Lessons from the Arizona Desert
9:20 AM - 9:40 AM (20 mins)
In the race to modernise the public sector, leaders often face a paradox: the guardrails intended to ensure safety and trust are frequently perceived as roadblocks to the very progress residents expect. Drawing on his tenure as Arizona’s inaugural Chief Data and Analytics Officer and previous role as the Director of the Government Transformation Office, Joshua Wagner demonstrates how governance frameworks can be a catalyst for fostering innovation and improving outcomes for both the public and the public sector workforce.
Industry Insights
9:40 AM - 10:00 AM (20 mins)
Thinking Ahead to Prioritise Now: Championing A Responsible, Reliable, and Future Ready NSW Public Service
10:00 AM - 10:30 AM (30 mins)
Looking ahead to 2027 and beyond, it is pivotal for NSW government priorities to be spot on. Determining the right investments, strengthening leadership and workforce capability, and delivering operational efficiency at scale without compromising quality, equity, or public trust will be at the centre of it all. This session examines smart adoption of emerging technologies, clear governance and accountability, and the sustainability considerations essential in shaping a resilient public sector for the future New South Wales.
- How AI is reshaping government operations, roles, and decision-making, and what this will mean for leadership and workforce planning through 2026–2027
- Achieving operational efficiency at scale without compromising quality, equity, or integrity
- Global vs local solutions - Considering whether to build, adapt, or adopt AI models for NSW’s unique context
- Ethics and responsibility - Ensuring AI deployment is transparent, accountable, and aligned with public trust
- Environmental and sustainability considerations when adopting new technologies, progressing capabilities, and managing data centres
Industry Insights
10:30 AM - 10:50 AM (20 mins)
Morning Tea & Mingling
10:50 AM - 11:20 AM (30 mins)
Perfect time to swap notes and compare what’s working across teams and sectors.
Welcome from Track Chair
11:20 AM - 11:30 AM (10 mins)
Setting the tone for the priorities and thorniest challenges Digital and CX professionals are facing.
Welcome from Track Chair
11:20 AM - 11:30 AM (10 mins)
Setting the tone for the priorities and thorniest challenges Tech and Data professionals are facing.
Welcome from Track Chair
11:20 AM - 11:30 AM (10 mins)
Setting the tone for the priorities and thorniest challenges Workforce and Operations professionals are facing.
The New Pace of NSW Public Education: How a Monolithic Organisation Rebranded Itself with One of the Most Innovative Digital Refreshes
11:30 AM - 11:50 AM (20 mins)
- Refreshing all public facing school websites at a scale and speed that has never been done before in any Australian government dept
- NSW EduChat – How DET run the world’s largest leading instillation of safe, closed-loop generative AI in education
- Resetting the entire technology agenda – Restructuring their IT function at scale, for the first time in the history of the department
- Ensuring decisions and initiatives resonate with the public schools and broader education communities DET serves
From Policy to Practice: Enabling Safe, Scalable AI Innovation Across NSW Government
11:30 AM - 11:50 AM (20 mins)
Tackling Busy, Burdensome Tasks: AI in Daily Government Operations
11:30 AM - 11:50 AM (20 mins)
- Moving from task automation to decision augmentation, and designing decision support not decision replacement
- Risks of over-automation in government
- Protecting service quality while increasing efficiency, consistency and accuracy
- Practical use cases across policy, operations and frontline teams
Industry Insights
11:50 AM - 12:10 PM (20 mins)
Industry Insights
11:50 AM - 12:10 PM (20 mins)
Industry Insights
11:50 AM - 12:10 PM (20 mins)
Smarter Services, Better Outcomes: Advancing Service and Digital Innovation Across NSW Government
12:10 PM - 12:40 PM (30 mins)
Services should be designed around responding to real-time user needs, not held up by organisational silos and friction-filled digital journeys. This session refines what is needed to scale successful innovation across agencies in ways that lift operational efficiency without compromising service quality.
- Designing services around citizen needs, not internal structures or agency boundaries
- Reducing complexity and friction across online service journeys
- Scaling successful service pilots across agencies while maintaining consistency and trust
- Ensuring digital innovation enhances operational efficiency without compromising service quality
Integrating and Upholding Secure, Responsible and Resilient Data and AI Systems
12:10 PM - 12:40 PM (30 mins)
Trust must be designed into digital services from the outset — not retrofitted after risk emerges. This session explores how strong data governance, clear guardrails, and transparent, accountable AI practices form the foundation for responsible innovation— enabling progress without compromising public trust.
- Protecting privacy and maintaining transparency and trust in citizen-facing AI and data initiatives (designing transparency into services by default)
- Data governance as the foundation for AI - Establishing policies, standards, and oversight mechanisms to ensure safe and ethical AI adoption
- Striking the balance between innovation and risk to ensure lasting progress and retained trust
- Adhering to guardrails, guidance and frameworks
- Why trust is government’s most fragile asset
- How to handle mistakes in a digital-first world
Building a Future-Ready Workforce and Reskilling for the AI Era: Required Skills for 2026-2030
12:10 PM - 12:40 PM (30 mins)
The future-ready NSW government will not be defined by people or technology alone, but by how seamlessly the two can work together. This session explores how AI is reshaping government roles through 2027 and beyond — enhancing productivity by augmenting frontline work rather than replacing it.
- People + AI: Building the Future Public Sector Workforce - how do we best align the two for enhanced productivity
- The evolving public service - How AI will reshape government roles into 2027 and beyond? - unpacking where AI tools have improved productivity by assisting, not automating, frontline roles
- Future workforce readiness: Assessing workforce trends that are materialising, how are people starting to use AI, and what skills are required/missing
- Upskilling for AI: Equipping public sector teams to work smarter – reducing fear and increasing engagement for AI-enabled workflows through targeted digital and data capability building
Industry Insights
12:40 PM - 1:00 PM (20 mins)
Industry Insights
12:40 PM - 1:00 PM (20 mins)
Industry Insights
12:40 PM - 1:00 PM (20 mins)
From Access to Confidence: Creating Trusted and Inclusive Public Services
1:00 PM - 1:20 PM (20 mins)
- Designing inclusive, accessible human-centred services for all
- Addressing the digital divide: ensuring all people in NSW can access, afford, and safely engage with digital technologies and online resources
- Ensuring AI supports equity and avoids creating new barriers or bias
- Measuring inclusion, not uptake, and using data insights to continuously improve services
- How NSW Health’s Single Front Door Program is providing effective virtual care modalities and increasing equity of access for patients across the state
From Foundations to Function: Building (AI) Products for Whole-of-Government Impact
1:00 PM - 1:20 PM (20 mins)
- Designing for impact from day one
- Turning capability into reusable products
- Building a government that can evolve
- Partnering with industry strategically, not transactionally
Culture, Skills and Change: Why Technology Alone Doesn’t Deliver Productivity Gains
1:00 PM - 1:20 PM (20 mins)
- Building AI literacy across non-technical teams
- Addressing fear, resistance and ethical concerns (especially within a medical context)
- Sustaining productivity improvements over time - training beyond “how to use the tool”
Lunch: Wander, Discover, Connect
1:20 PM - 2:20 PM (60 mins)
Grab lunch, have a wander, and chat with industry partners and peers about practical ideas you can take back to work. Arguably the most important part of the day!
Roundtable 1: AI in Operations - Automating the Mundane, Elevating the Strategic
2:20 PM - 3:20 PM (60 mins)
Roundtable 2: Building Digital and Data Capability Across the Workforce
2:20 PM - 3:20 PM (60 mins)
Roundtable 3: Citizen Trust in the Age of Digital Government
2:20 PM - 3:20 PM (60 mins)
Roundtable 4: Service Experience 2.0: Redesigning Citizen Journeys with AI and Automation
2:20 PM - 3:20 PM (60 mins)
Roundtable 5: From Pilots to Platforms: Scaling Innovation Across Government
2:20 PM - 3:20 PM (60 mins)
Roundtable 6: Predictive Government - Using Data to Anticipate, Not Just React
2:20 PM - 3:20 PM (60 mins)
Roundtable 7: Digital Twin Technology: Creating Virtual Models for Real-Time Decision Making
2:20 PM - 3:20 PM (60 mins)
Roundtable 8: Navigating Legacy Tech Debt in a Rapidly Advancing Digital Landscape
2:20 PM - 3:20 PM (60 mins)
Roundtable 9: Future Ready Tech in Emergency Services - Accelerating Operations to Optimise Response
2:20 PM - 3:20 PM (60 mins)
Roundtable 10: Operation Co-Design - Moving from Consultation to Collaboration to Face the Challenges and Opportunities of AI
2:20 PM - 3:20 PM (60 mins)
Roundtable 11: Getting AI Governance Right - From Principles to Practice
2:20 PM - 3:20 PM (60 mins)
Roundtable 12: Balancing Fairness, Equity and Compliance - Leveraging Real-Time Insights and Linking Datasets Across Agencies
2:20 PM - 3:20 PM (60 mins)
Becoming AI-Enabled: Building Capability for Scalable Government Adoption
3:20 PM - 3:55 PM (35 mins)
AI adoption is not just a technology decision—it’s an organisational capability challenge. This panel explores how government agencies can take a systems-based approach to becoming AI-enabled, from workforce skills and change management to governance, operating models and reusable delivery patterns. Moderated by Dan Roelink, the discussion will unpack how agencies can identify unknowns, establish the right foundations, and build repeatable processes that enable AI benefits to scale safely and efficiently across government.
- What “AI-enabled” really means for government: moving beyond pilots to embed AI into operating models, workflows and decision-making.
- Building capability at scale: workforce skills, change management, and leadership readiness to support adoption across teams—not just technical units.
- Governance that enables (not blocks): managing risk, ethics, privacy and unknowns while still accelerating delivery and experimentation.
- Reuse and repeatability across agencies: creating shared patterns, tools and processes that reduce duplication and enable faster, more efficient implementation across government.
Closing Keynote: Topic TBC
3:55 PM - 4:15 PM (20 mins)
Closing Remarks: What We’re Taking with Us
4:15 PM - 4:25 PM (10 mins)
We’ll pull out a few highlights from the day, share what’s coming next, and point you to ways to stay connected.
Networking Reception: Stay for a Chat
4:25 PM - 5:25 PM (60 mins)
Wrap up the day with good conversation and a few new connections. Thanks for making GIW your one-stop shop for benchmarking, industry updates, and great conversations.
Ready to register?
Registration is free for government