As Marketing Director at Public Sector Network, Benji Crooks sat down with Chris Hanger, Chief Operating Officer at the New South Wales Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water, to discuss what NSW should prioritise to stay future ready through 2027—particularly AI capability, secure foundations, and cross-sector collaboration. Chris will be speaking at Government Innovation Showcase New South Wales as part of Government Innovation Week New South Wales on Wednesday, 29 July 2026 in the session "Thinking Ahead to Prioritise Now: Championing A Responsible, Reliable, and Future Ready NSW Public Service".
Benji Crooks: Hi everyone. Looking ahead to 2027, what do you think New South Wales needs to prioritize the most to stay future ready?
Chris Hanger: A couple of things. It wouldn't be a conversation in the digital space if we didn't mention, firstly, AI and then cyber.
From a Chief Operating Officer's perspective—particularly someone in a new department that we're building out a lot of capability in—it’s about making sure the foundations are in place. That’s true for AI and cyber, but also more generally: what is our technology roadmap, what is our digital strategy, and how are we making sure that—both for us and for the sector—we are accelerating delivery of the opportunities across all of those areas.
Benji Crooks: All conversations are on AI at the moment. Where do you see AI making the biggest difference in day-to-day operations over the next one to two years?
Chris Hanger: A couple of things—I’ll always start with the people. It’s building the capability of our staff to understand where AI is best applied to the type of work they do.
Before you jump in and get excited, it’s understanding the benefits of AI and making sure you’ve got the guardrails around it. So we always start with the people.
There are a couple of areas we’re looking at initially. Those areas where you have high-volume, repeatable tasks—AI and automation can help with that.
All government departments deal with high-volume correspondence, and we’re no different. So we’re looking at where we can use AI and technology to assist.
Also, as the department that holds all of the state’s environmental, energy and water data, there are opportunities for us to think about how we structure that data, how we connect disparate databases, and how we make that data easy for AI agents to access, understand and consume. Those are a couple of the areas we’re looking at initially.
Benji Crooks: I do a couple of these interviews and the questions always come back to AI. I spoke to someone the other day who didn’t want to introduce any more AI until they saw a proper roadmap for it, because of the risk of introducing it without knowing what to do with it. How can agencies improve efficiencies at scale without losing quality, fairness or public trust?
Chris Hanger: The first thing I would do is recognise the public sector in New South Wales is enormously collaborative—so learn from others. There is amazing work underway across all the major departments, and there is a huge amount we can all learn from each other.
We are working extremely collaboratively with colleague agencies like the Department of Primary Industries and Regional Development and the Department of Planning, Housing and Infrastructure. We’re on common infrastructure, we’re exploring AI, and the three agencies are learning from each other in that context.
A bit of a plug for the upcoming showcase—that’s the reason we bring government together. There are lots of good ideas and lots of use cases being explored, and we should leverage that rather than reinvent wheels.
The other big thing that lots of agencies are exploring is the use of Copilot. Sharing that knowledge and learning from others is probably my big takeout.
There are 450,000 public servants. Significant work has been done right across the public sector around AI and its deployment. We should be learning from and leveraging that, whatever the scale of the agency—whether it’s a major department or a small independent agency. None of us should be starting with a blank sheet of paper in this space.
Benji Crooks: With all the various agencies going off and looking at AI, you run the risk of everyone introducing a different AI and using it separately, and none of it speaking to each other across governments.
Chris Hanger: Yep.
Benji Crooks: Finally, with the upcoming session that you're part of, what’s the one thing you’d like attendees to take away from the session?
Chris Hanger: Learn from your colleagues and work with your colleagues.
The work we are doing in DCCEEW builds off work done by colleague agencies and by the various groups that have come together. Build from what is being done across the sector. Share what you are learning and seeing, because that ultimately benefits the sector and then the citizens of New South Wales, which is what we’re all here for.
Use sessions like the government showcase to connect with colleagues and learn from what they are doing, and try to avoid mistakes that others have made.
One of the great benefits of being a public servant is that we are all here for a common purpose. We should be coming together, sharing ideas, and learning from each other.
Benji Crooks: One sneaky follow-up: with all the different AI technologies introduced across government, is there a skill gap between public sector employees and the technology being introduced?
Chris Hanger: Earlier I mentioned we always start with people and capability uplift—understanding what the technology offers, and understanding the crucial role that human decision-making will continue to play in the work we do.
It always starts with the people. So yes, there’s lots we can do to build capability in our people to make them ready for the opportunities AI presents.
We are piloting, it is people first—understanding where people are at and what they need to get the most out of what AI offers.
Hear Chris Hanger live
Hear Chris Hanger at Government Innovation Showcase New South Wales as part of Government Innovation Week New South Wales on Wednesday, 29 July 2026. Chris will join the panel to discuss how NSW government can prioritise responsible, reliable and future-ready approaches to AI adoption—lifting workforce capability, strengthening guardrails, and scaling efficiency without compromising trust.
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