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Digital Leadership Day Queensland
Registration & Networking Coffee
8:00 AM - 9:00 AM (60 mins)
Opening from Public Sector Network
9:00 AM - 9:10 AM (10 mins)
Welcome from Event Chair
9:10 AM - 9:20 AM (10 mins)
Navigating The Digital Era: Essential Skills for Government Leaders
9:20 AM - 9:40 AM (20 mins)
Stories that stick: Leading People Through Digital Change
9:40 AM - 10:00 AM (20 mins)
- Why digital projects fail - and how to flip the script
- The 3S Stortyelling Framework every leader needs to enrol people in change
- Resilience as your secret weapon so that teams thrive through disruption instead of fearing it
- From Rollout to Buy-In: how to make change stick in your next digital project
People Leadership in the Digital Era: Leading Through Complexity and Building a Future-Ready Workforce
10:00 AM - 10:50 AM (50 mins)
Discussion Points:
- Cultivating a leadership style that thrives amidst the complexities of the digital era.
- How to upskill and reskill public sector staff for a digital future present
- How does diversity and inclusion work in a digital era.
- Fostering a workforce that thrives in an era of rapid technological change.
- Cultivating digital literacy, addressing skills gaps, and creating a culture of innovation and adaptability.
Morning Tea and Networking
10:50 AM - 11:20 AM (30 mins)
Operations Leadership in the Digital Age: Supercharging Process for Digital Excellence
11:20 AM - 12:10 PM (50 mins)
Discussion Points:
- Integrating and aligning AI with people and process to supercharge efficiencies, accuracy and speed.
- Simplifying complex processes to enhance citizen outcomes.
- Aligning QLD’s priority digital initiatives with governmental policies while leading through bureaucratic complexities.
- Instilling agile thinking to reshape traditional processes within the QLD public sector.
- Activating key leadership strategies to balance innovation with compliance amidst evolving regulations.
- Analysing the most effective approaches adopted within QLD public sector and inter-state to manage resources and maximise impact in tech projects.
- Traversing industry relationships and relationships to cultivate fruitful partnerships that drive technological advancement.
Lunch & Networking
12:10 PM - 1:10 PM (60 mins)
Roundtable 1: AI readiness reality check: How to assess your agency's AI maturity, align leadership & culture, and scale responsible AI initiatives
1:10 PM - 2:10 PM (60 mins)
AI promises transformation, but only if you have the leadership, data, techniology and culture in place. Is your agency ready? Engage with senior peers to assess where your agency is on its AI journey.
- Leadership & Culture Activation – How to set a digital vision and drive change while managing operational realities, building the right culture and leading change with confidence.
- Holistic AI Maturity – Understand where you are in your AI journey. Explore frameworks for assessing data quality, governance, technology infrastructure and workforce capability. Identify blockers like legacy systems, siloed date, and tech debt and how to overcome them
- Safe-to-Fail Experimentation - Discover how to experiment safely with AI, and scale initiatives that deliver real impact. Discuss case studies of successful (and stalled) AI initiatives in government.
- Scalable Roadmap & Scorecard - What does the technology and data roadmap look like to be AI ready?
Roundtable 2: AI & technology don’t transform government — people do
1:10 PM - 2:10 PM (60 mins)
As government addresses the pace of change in AI and digital technology, it’s increasingly clear: technology alone won’t deliver transformation - people will. This roundtable explores the critical role of leadership, culture, skills, change management, and strategic partnerships in unlocking the full potential of technology in the public sector.
- People Strategy is Digital Strategy: Digital transformation is not just a tech challenge—it’s a leadership and capability challenge. Consider how best to build digital fluency, confidence, and adaptability at every level, focussing on change readiness, not just system readiness.
- Trust is Your Licence to Operate: Ethical AI, robust information and data management, and inclusive experience design are non-negotiables. Unlock how to embed ethics, explainability, and accountability into digital and AI programs to ensure trust and adoption success.
- Creating synergy between people, systems & culture: Explore this powerful combination that determines whether digital ambitions deliver public impact – the difference between digital investments that simply modernise operations and those that truly transform communities.
Roundtable 3: AI-enabled transformation for Government | Re-shaping functions, processes, and service delivery
1:10 PM - 2:10 PM (60 mins)
Attendees will explore the unique challenges and strategic opportunities for government leaders implementing AI technologies. Join the session as the speaker outlines practical approaches for effective digital transformation in the public sector.
- Build Digital Trust in the Age of AI: Learn practical steps government leaders can take to add AI while staying transparent and strengthening public confidence
- Connect the Dots Without Ripping and Replacing: See how integrating AI with BPM, ECM, and CCM turns siloed processes into smooth, end-to-end services on top of existing systems
- Measure What Matters Most: Understand why the real success metrics are citizen satisfaction, accessibility, and trust—not just cost saving
Roundtable 4: Practical automation strategies and continuous process improvement for enhanced efficiency
1:10 PM - 2:10 PM (60 mins)
- Successful Automation Strategies: Discuss practical approaches to automating routine functions within government operations for improved efficiency and accuracy.
- Continuous Process Improvement: Identify ways to enhance processes through continual automation efforts, leading to better service delivery and responsiveness to citizen needs.
- Transparent AI decision-making that adheres to policy and compliance requirements and adapts to changes in Government
Roundtable 5: Measuring what matters: moving from outputs to outcomes and adjusting investments based on performance
1:10 PM - 2:10 PM (60 mins)
- Explore how agencies can build impact measurement frameworks that align funding with government objectives. We will discuss how to identify meaningful metrics that reflect community outcomes rather than simply counting activities.
- Aligning funding to strategy - examine how real‑time data enables agencies to adjust investments based on performance. Participants can share strategies for recognising when programs are delivering strong outcomes and when to redirect resources.
- Building confidence through governance and transparency - discuss the importance of structured governance and regular audits; the Queensland Audit Office found that a lack of transparency can erode public trust. Learn how digital funding platforms centralise data and automate documentation to improve accountability
Roundtable 6: The strategies and AI use cases transforming how government agencies are managing employee spend
1:10 PM - 2:10 PM (60 mins)
In this interactive session we will share and discuss how AI-enabled expense management is transforming government finance processes — from eradicating manual workloads to vastly improving policy compliance and spend visibility. We’ll explore practical use cases, real-world examples from the public sector, and quick-win strategies to drive efficiency, integration and faster return to value.
This roundtable is for anyone interested in finding out what other agencies and Shared Service departments are doing to modernise spend management through AI and automation. We’ll focus on practical steps and examples for how to:
- Get better visibility and control. Reduce leakage, boost auditability, and ensure funding is used effectively
- Leverage AI-powered tools to cut processing time, reduce errors and duplicates, and increase policy compliance
- Start with AI in low-risk, high-impact ways — without a full tech overhaul.
- Automate to empower your teams and ease admin burdens
- Hear how other agencies are driving impact with AI-enabled spend management
Strategic Technology Leadership: Steering Innovation in a Changing Landscape
2:10 PM - 2:50 PM (40 mins)
Discussion Points:
- Trends shaping the future of public sector technology adoption.
- Navigating barriers to technology adoption, and how to overcome these with strategic leadership.
- How to effectively manage risks associated with emerging technologies.
- Balancing innovation with ethical considerations and data security.
- Building scalable, interoperable systems that adapt to future needs.
- Gaining investment for technology and developing a compelling business case.
- Ensuring new technologies are integrated effectively and with foresight to drive a smart, simple, and secure QLD public service.
- Examining essential qualities for staying ahead in cybersecurity amidst a fast-evolving threat landscape.
- Maintaining AI advancement, and leveraging data analytics to transform public service delivery while maintaining trust and privacy.
Closing Remarks from the Chair
2:50 PM - 3:00 PM (10 mins)