Leadership expert and executive coach Dr Kym Davis will lead an online NSW Public Sector Grades 9-10 Critical-Thinking & Problem-Solving event from 31 August — 1 September. Photo: Supplied.
VIC Public Sector Leading and Managing Change
Date: 25 — 26 August
Time: 9 am — 4:30 pm
Location: Cliftons Melbourne
Email: [email protected]
Overview
Lead your team through change with clarity, resilience and a shared vision.
- Strengthen your leadership skills to manage change across teams and projects.
- Create a supportive environment to help your team stay focused during transitions.
- Learn how to inspire resilience and engagement during times of uncertainty.
- Develop strategies to drive successful and sustainable change.
Trainer Rebecca Cattran has spent three decades navigating the evolving world of work, from building high-performing teams to leading enterprise-wide change across the public and private sectors.
With a background in science and communication, she brings a clear, systems-based lens to the complexities of organisational change, helping individuals and organisations move forward with confidence.
As a leadership and career coach, facilitator and adviser, Rebecca draws on deep cross-sector experience to unlock potential and build capability.
Public Sector Advanced Leadership Program
Date: 25 — 26 August
Time: 9 am — 4:30 pm
Location: Online
Email: [email protected]
Overview
Master essential leadership skills for public sector success.
- Understand the shift from micro to macro leadership.
- Learn early identification and problem-solving techniques.
- Build self-awareness to increase your impact as a leader.
- Develop skills to build team, division and agency collaboration.
AI for Professional Writing & Communications
Date: 26 August
Time: 9 am — 4:30 pm
Location: Online
Email: [email protected]
Overview
Use AI as a thinking partner to plan, draft and refine professional writing.
- Write faster without sacrificing quality.
- Use AI to strengthen clarity, tone and impact.
- Critically evaluate and improve AI-generated writing.
Trainer Adrian Cropley OAM is a certified Strategic Communication Management Professional (SCMP) and a former global chair of the International Association of Business Communicators (IABC), with more than 35 years’ global experience in strategic and change communication.
He advises Fortune 500 companies and governments on communication strategy, leadership capability and organisational transformation.
Women in Leadership Workshop
Date: 26 — 27 August
Time: 9:00 am – 4:30 pm
Location: Online
Email: [email protected]
Overview
Enhance your effectiveness as a leader in an evolving professional landscape.
- Develop your individual leadership style.
- Build confidence to lead authentically and effectively.
- Learn the art of confident communication.
- Strengthen your ability to influence.
Trainer Dr Karen Whittingham is one of Australia’s leading executive management development specialists, having worked with thousands of executives to transition them into senior leadership roles quickly and effectively. She is an organisational psychologist passionate about people’s success and facilitating their careers to rise.
MasterCraft Series — The role of the law and lawyers in delivering government priorities
Date: 27 August
Time: 11 am — noon
Duration: One one-hour face-to-screen session
Location: Virtual
Email: https://apslearn.apsacademy.gov.au/user_login
The government relies on sound, informed and well-reasoned policy and legal advice to effectively deliver its commitments. Multiple delivery options may need to be fully explored to identify lawful avenues to achieve policy objectives.
It is important that legal advice is sought early, considered carefully and communicated accurately to decision-makers. Legal advice is an essential tool for the APS to support the effective and lawful implementation of policy.
The panellists for this session are:
- Secretary of the Department of Health, Disability and Ageing, Blair Comely
- Secretary of the Federal Education Department, Tony Cook
- Deputy Secretary Legal Group, Department of Home Affairs, Brooke Hartigan.
This content is suitable for all staff.
Professional Writing Essentials for Government
Date: 27 August
Time: 9 am — 4:30 pm
Location: Online
Email: [email protected]
Overview
Transform your writing skills in government with this high-impact toolkit.
- Enhance the impact and engagement of your writing.
- Write with confidence, mastering clear and concise messages.
- Identify common writing mistakes and learn how to avoid them.
- Plan and tailor your writing to resonate with your audience.
Trainer Adrian Cropley is a certified strategic communication management professional and a former global chair of the International Association of Business Communicators. He is recognised globally as a leading expert in strategic and change communication, with more than 35 years’ experience.
How to Engage Lived Experience Ethically & Effectively
Date: 27 August
Time: 9 am — 1 pm
Location: Online
Email: [email protected]
Making lived and cultural experience work for everyone. Structure is what makes lived experience matter. The language of lived and cultural experience is everywhere in our sector. The infrastructure to support it ethically, effectively and sustainably is often not.
Survivors and cultural experts are invited onto stages and never told what happened to what they shared. Organisations state they are centring lived and cultural experience, while the people whose expertise they are drawing on have no defined role, no compensation framework, and no way to know whether anything they contributed was actually utilised or made a difference.
This seminar is for leaders and practitioners ready to change that. Hosted by the Safe & Together Institute — whose own practices form part of the working model — it will give you the frameworks, tools and language to move your organisation from good intention to genuine structural accountability. You will leave with a clear picture of where you actually stand, and one concrete commitment forward.
Facilitator Ruth Reymundo Mandel has been in training and implementation since 1995. She is dedicated to issues surrounding social justice and violence. Drawing on her childhood experiences growing up in an abusive religious cult and as a survivor, she is a fierce advocate for those who have experienced abuse.
Ruth is dedicated to helping survivors and allies understand behavioural coping mechanisms arising out of trauma and mitigating societal and personal judgments surrounding common human responses to violence and harm.
NSW Public Sector Grades 9-10 Critical Thinking & Problem Solving
Date: 31 August — 1 September
Time: 9 am — 4:30 pm
Location: Online
Email: [email protected]
Overview
Practical, outcome-driven models for critical thinking and problem solving.
- Apply critical thinking as a structured process to solve everyday problems.
- Use systems thinking to analyse issues and design effective solutions.
- Leverage creative and lateral thinking to address complex challenges.
- Overcome roadblocks to improve decision-making and group problem solving.
Trainer Dr Kym Davis brings a deep understanding of complex systems and the people who drive them. With a professional doctorate in employee engagement and extensive experience in teaching, consulting and coaching, she translates research into practical insights that help teams think critically and solve problems.
From leading university operations to coaching executives across sectors, her work spans the public and private sectors and throughout her career. Dr Davis has demonstrated a commitment to cultivating effective teams, optimising processes and achieving organisational goals. Her approach blends leadership, strategy and development, creating learning experiences that make a real difference.
Public Sector — Persuasive Public Sector Writing Masterclass
Date: 2 September — 28 October
Time: 9 am – 1 pm
Location: In-person
Email: [email protected]
Improve your writing in government for impact and influence. All writing should be clear, concise and correct. Good-quality public sector writing should also be professional, persuasive and polished. Public sector writing can be challenging and time-consuming. You have to contend with different audiences, rigid deadlines and complex topics.
While the basic skills of good writing are critical, you need more to meet the demands of more involved government communication. You need to be able to present every case confidently and well, regardless of who you are writing to or what you are writing about. You must be able to use words, structure, flow and more to deliver compelling arguments and convincing information that people will want to read.
Facilitator Bev Sullivan has decades of experience in running written communication workshops for public servants at all levels and from all tiers of government. Her specialty is helping people to use (and tweak) their existing skills and experience to make writing less of a chore and deliver better results.
University of Canberra Open Day Fest 2026
Date: 12 September
Time: 10 am — 3 pm
Location: University of Canberra, Bruce campus
Entry: Free, registration required
The best of a university open day and a community festival will unite everyone who attends the University of Canberra’s (UC) Open Day Fest on Saturday, 12 September.
Come and see us at the Adult Learner Hub, where you can chat to our career advisers about your future, get a free LinkedIn headshot, or join an industry session to learn about how your work and life experience could count towards entry or credit for a UC degree.
Extend your time on campus and enjoy the free live music festival, as well as exhibitions from SLAM! Pro Wrestling and some of Australia’s best woodchoppers as they put on a showcase of their impressive skills. Hit up the local food and drink stands or relax at the Capital Brewing Beer Garden. On top of all that, there are academic and student meet-and-greets, campus and accommodation tours, family activities (including a jumping castle and passenger train), and lots more.
UC Open Day Fest is about more than what you study; it’s about meeting people, discovering possibilities and finding a place where everyone belongs.
Visit UC’s website to learn more and register for the event!
