Digital Transformation: The Big Picture

Our first breakfast panel in a series focusing on Digital Transformation within human led services kicked off on 23 October 2019.

With a panel of five leaders from across Queensland Health; Department of Child Safety, Youth and Women; and Department of Justice and Attorney General, an MC and utilising the product Slido for our audience to ask questions, we kicked off an hour of insights.

Our panel:

  • Nichole Aird, Senior Director Digital Application Services, Queensland Health
  • Thomas Allsop, Director, Department of Child Safety, Youth & Women
  • John Bowden, Senior Director Digital Health & Business Solutions, Queensland Health
  • Sandra Gray, Independent Consultant | Previously National Manager Innovation & Design, Department of Human Services
  • Felix Padovan, a/Manager, Business Transformation, Department of Justice and Attorney General QLD

Facilitator: Alastair Newman, Lead Consultant and Connection Specialist, Coffee With Me Consulting

It was fantastic to bring together a group of like minded professionals, providing a platform of connectivity for them to learn from one another and build valuable networks. Here are some of the takeaways which stood out to me;

There was a big focus on using technology to reduce risk, especially within health, where predictive analytics are recognising major health risks and allowing treatment to be readied before even the patient is aware. A couple of our panelists talked about building a product or application which solves a real need, but without training the adoption might not happen. Humans are a key component to digital transformation, and both need the other to work.

It was encouraging to hear how applications are being used to enhance and promote human interactions and how some leaders are tackling the issue of changes in leadership during a long term program, by ensuring valuable IP is retained & captured. This then enables them to easily take a new leader through the program/project journey and explain the ‘why’ behind what they are doing?

‘ITIL is dead and Dev Ops is the way forward!…’ was one statement which certainly stood out and sometimes what the business wants, the technology can’t yet deliver. When working in an Agile world, continuous check ins are the key to success, ensuring all parties are involved and the solution is fit for purpose.

With such a passionate panel we could have continued for hours, although in the hour that we had we certainly covered a lot. Digital Transformation within human led services is complicated and must be balanced with the constraints of technology and risk.

As we continue with this series of panel events, we will explore specific aspects of Digital Transformation in more detail with leaders from forward looking organisations across Australia. I am so excited to begin planning our next event due to take place next quarter. If there are topics you think would be valuable and interesting in this space, or if you would like to speak at a future event, please don’t hesitate to reach out.

If you would like to be kept in the loop on future Digital Transformation events, please drop me an email: johanna.bullin@mtr.com.au.

Do also check out M&T Resources’ events page for any upcoming events.