Organisation: Parliamentary Budget Office Programme Analysis Branch
Job Title: EL 2 – Director – Programme Analysis Branch
Word Limit: Maximum of three pages for all criteria
Location: Parliament of Australia, Canberra, ACT
Written and oral Communication
A confident and experienced communicator, I have had consistent success throughout my career
in conveying messages and reaching my audience. Whether it is one-on-one communication with a
colleague, presenting a brief to senior management, delivering training, or communicating in
writing, I am able to adapt my style to the needs of my audience, ensuring that messages are
presented in a clear, concise and articulate manner.
In the roles that I have undertaken with AAUs, I demonstrated high levels of clear, concise and
effective written and oral communication on a daily basis. Additionally, within my previous role as
Assistant Director for the Financial Analysis and Accounting Support Team for the Department of
Finance, I had to communicate extensively with the Chief Financial Officers from various agencies
regarding technical accounting issues, estimate adjustment advice and costings. On a weekly basis,
I also write ministerial and secretarial briefs, which require extremely high levels of clear and
effective communication. These skills are particularly demonstrated during the budget process,
where I have written many ministerial briefings that have required clear and concise writing within
strict timeframes. The purpose of the briefings is to inform the Finance Minister of financial
implications regarding new policy proposals. As such, it is imperative that the information that I
include contains clear and concise explanations and justifications to enable the Government to
make appropriately informed decisions. Furthermore, my ability to communicate clearly in writing
is demonstrated within my current role when writing costings briefs to the Secretary of the
Department when I have identified that costings are above a certain threshold.
Output management
A self-motivated, results and achievement orientated professional, I take responsibility for
achieving outcomes, meeting targets, mentoring staff and providing advice, as well as leading by
example and devising ways to improve systems, procedures and standards. My experience in
Assistant Director roles has clearly demonstrated my ability to instil innovation and improvement,
whilst developing projects and procedures that have demanded the identification and use of
resources effectively to achieve desired results.
Within the high-pressure environment of the Budget Group for the Department of Finance, I
developed a strong record of achievement for delivering high quality and timely outcomes whilst
upholding the APS values and code of conduct. An example of this was demonstrated when I
worked extended hours during the estimate validation process in order to ensure that outcomes
were achieved in accordance with the budget timeframe. Due to confusion regarding timelines
and estimate adjustment advice, I showed initiative and proactively stepped in to liaise with the
Budget Analysis Branch (BAB), acting as a communication channel with my division and the
agencies with the advice gained from the BAB. Taking personal responsibility for meeting the
objectives and progressing the work, I further assisted the agencies by performing quality
assurance measures on their budget documents and Portfolio Budget Statements. In instances
where the agencies were reluctant to take, or challenged my advice, I dealt with the situation in a
professional and calm manner, clearly explaining my rationale behind my approach to ensure that
I gained their understanding and agreement. As a result of my energy and drive to see that all
goals were achieved, the Budget Group was successful in producing robust estimates that
reflected a true position of the Department within all time constraints.
People skills
With a longstanding career with the Australian Public Service, I have been afforded the
opportunity to develop strong interpersonal skills through my experience working with colleagues
from diverse age groups and cultural backgrounds. This has strengthened my relationship building
skills and has garnered my abilities as an effective leader. Through building trust and mutual
respect with my colleagues, I am confident that I am leading a motivated and enthusiastic
workforce that demonstrates their dedication to their roles. This has been evidenced through staff
members who have submitted their resignation, however remain committed until the last day
before they leave. Moreover, staff are willing to approach me if they are facing issues and less
experienced staff in particular, seek my guidance and advice on costing processes, estimate
updating processes and budget framework policies. I welcome this supportive and mentoring role
and the opportunities that it has presented in contribution to my career success.
Conceptual and Analytical skills
Throughout my career, I have developed the ability to think conceptually, evaluate situations from
a strategic perspective and follow through by making effective and long-term strategic decisions.
My ability to shape conceptual thinking within the department is demonstrated by my practical
experience in analysing the department’s outcomes and how it can add value for the taxpayers
dollars, analysing different models to achieve this and managing the processes by which the
chosen strategies are implemented. This was demonstrated during my time as a member of the
Social Services AAU where I utilised my conceptual and analytical skills to align several policy
papers with the Government ’s priorities. The papers were developed by my team and focused on
savings that could be achieved through modifying how the deeming rates were set for income
support for the seniors program. Although the policy papers were well written and justified how
the savings would achieve the desired outcome, I identified that they could be improved upon by
adding content that clearly aligned with governmental priorities. By doing so, each cost saving
measure recommendation brought together the purpose and direction of the Government ’s
priorities, whilst articulating the savings that would be achieved by the measures. As a result of my
ability to utilise conceptual and analytical skills, the team’s written recommendations were
commended by the Department Secretary and were put forward to the Expenditure Review
Committee for consideration.
Judgement and Leadership
I have excellent skills in harnessing information and opportunities, supporting shared visions, and
am able to think both operationally and strategically while demonstrating judgement, intelligence
and common sense.
During my time as Assistant Director for the Social Policy Division within the Budget Group for the
Department of Finance, I contributed to business improvement initiatives that focused on
streamlining the business process for Agency Advisory Units (AAUs). Working collaboratively with
my team, I led a two-year project that would enable the automation of finance costing
agreements, whilst tracking new policy proposals through the Integrated New Policy and Costing
Tracker (INPACT). During the planning stages, we faced many challenges as this was the first time
that an automated system had been implemented. As the deputy lead for business requirements, I
demonstrated the ability to respond to ongoing changes in requirements in a positive and
strategic manner, communicating the changing vision to stakeholder groups, and championing the
way forward. In order to achieve this, I evaluated the long-term benefits of the automated system
and ensured that all stakeholders were well aware of how it would facilitate improved operational
outcomes. In order to maintain focus for the stakeholder groups throughout the change process, I
created a positive workplace culture through clearly communicating the vision and explaining the
strategic benefits to all stakeholders involved. This assisted with maintaining a sense of purpose,
even when we faced resistance to the changes, and resulted in the gain of support from senior
executives implement the system. As a result, INPACT was successfully released, providing the
AAUs with a number of benefits, including the luxury of retrieving previous costing agreements
with the touch of a button. These new simple and automated processes significantly increased
operational efficiency as manual processes were cut down. Through my effective steering of the
strategic vision for the Division, the team received a Secretary’s Award in recognition of our
effective implementation of INPACT and ability to improve the performance delivery for the
Department of Finance.
As a leader, I demonstrate a passion for consistently meeting at or above the desired level of
results. Throughout my career, I have always shown a commitment to continuous improvement,
whilst maintaining focus, intensity and drive. As these examples verify, I have successfully
managed situations where I have experienced significant challenges, and have been able
effectively and efficiently manage the situation. My success has resulted from my innate ability to
be cognisant of the required results at all time, thus enabling me to provide high levels of
stakeholder satisfaction.
Quantitative Skills, including the ability to take analysis of budget – related issues, such as the
use and development of financial and economic models in the preparation of policy costings
Working at senior levels in Assistant Director roles for the past four years, I have been actively
involved in working with financial models at Department of Finance and in my current role at the
Department of Human Services. Whilst at Finance, I had great exposure to financial models from
various social policy agencies. As a member of the Financial Analysis and Accounting Support
Team, I helped AAUs to understand the financial models, which helped them to agree cost and
validate estimates. My contribution to the Social Policy Division in helping the AAUs with Financial
models was commended by my branch manager. In my previous role at the Department of Human
Services, I was extensively using financial models when deriving monthly and annual estimates for
the department. Further, my team and I developed robust methodology to the financial models,
which helped the department to minimise Final Budget Outcome variances.
As demonstrated during my tenure with the Department of Finance, I verified my commitment to
the delivery of desired outcomes for the Department’s Budget Group through the preparation of
program analysis reports that monitored underspends and overspends of whole-of-Government
programs. The monthly analysis and subsequent reports allowed the Group to work toward
minimising Final Budget Outcome (FBO) variances by identifying changes at an early stage. This in
turn allowed agencies to revise estimates and provide options for extrapolating figures through
further analysis of end-of-year underspends or overspends for a particular program. Consequently,
they were in a position to provide whole-of-Government advice on expenditure and program
issues, and the financial implications of new program proposals, thus contributing to the outcome
of “sustainable Government finances”. My ability to undertake budget related analysis for the
Department through the effective extrapolating of figures demonstrates my high-level insight and
creativity in using the best forecast methodology in order to obtain the most accurate end-of-year
figures.
