Shifting in, shifting out, and having a growth mindset. The latest insights from our partner, Luminary.
IPAA Queensland is delighted to announce that Luminary have extended their support for IPAA Queensland as a major partner and Stewards on the Couch series partner.
We have no doubt that if you have attended one of our Stewards on the Couch events over the past little while, you may have met some of the Luminary team and seen Russell Fairbanks, their Managing Director lead in-depth conversations about leadership and stewardship with the likes of Mike Kaiser, Director-General, Department of State Development, Infrastructure, Local Government and Planning, and Samay Zhouand, Public Trustee of Queensland.
We are pleased to see our partnership with Luminary continue to grow and benefit our members. We can’t wait to bring you an even better Stewards on the Couch series over the year ahead.
As one of Queensland’s leading executive search, leadership and human capital advisory services, Luminary brings of wealth of expertise to IPAA Queensland’s thought leadership program.
We took five minutes with Russell Fairbanks to ask him for the latest trends and advice he is giving to both candidates and employers.
Read more and #keepinformed.
Firstly, IPAA Queensland is excited to be continuing and building upon our partnership with Luminary. Why do you support our mission?
Like IPAA Queensland, we believe in the impact of exceptional leadership on their people, their organisations and the community.
We would love to tap into your knowledge for our members. Many of whom will have heard for the last 12-24 months that it’s a “candidate’s market” in Queensland. Are you seeing any shifts or emerging trends that would be of interest to our members?
Undoubtedly, the post-COVID recovery has contributed to skills shortages in critical areas. Often, terms such as “candidates’ market” or “employer’s market” oversimplify more nuanced issues at play; these can vary significantly by categories such as profession, role level, location etc.
For example, we have seen increased demand for project management skills as organisations have upgraded their digital and technology capabilities, organisational transformation, and other business model changes.
Regardless of role level or discipline, candidates should adopt a learning mindset, investing in transferable and ‘soft’ skills.
There’s been a lot of conversation about intergenerational differences in employee values, overall shifts in what employees seek from their work, and from an employer perspective, changing value propositions (such as around flexible working). What do you observe? Is flexible working a new frontier or temporary fad? Is the concept of work-life balance changing?
There is little doubt that work-life attitudes have shifted significantly over the last few years.
The pandemic highlighted to many of us – those of us engaged in knowledge-based work – that we could move our work from the office to home with relative ease. With AI and technology advancing at pace, this isn’t going to change anytime soon, and even for roles or tasks that require us to interact in person today, this could change rapidly in years to come. Professions such as teaching and caregiving will adapt and evolve.
Surveys, globally and locally, consistently show that employees (of all demographics) are seeking flexibility, and leaders need to respond to this or risk losing out. Flexibility is consistently ranked in the top 3 of desired attributes in a new employer or reasons why people are looking to leave their current role (lack of).
We’ve adapted our business model to embrace this, but not without some challenges. We have flexible and work-from-anywhere policies for our employees, which means we have evolved the way we lead. We have a greater reliance on project management skills, process refinement, customer metrics and output measures of success vs more traditional forms of measuring performance. We also emphasise developing a values-driven and trust-based culture, where we all get to know each other beyond the person we are at work. Building an ‘egalitarian’ culture where you empower your team doesn’t happen overnight and requires constant attention and consistent refinement.
You have had candidates successfully shift between sectors (for example, private to public, or public to not-for-profit etc). What are the characteristics or experiences that best equip people for mobility?
It starts with mindset. Successful transitions require you adopt an open-minded view of the world around you and your skills. For candidates considering a change, I often advise them to start with a ‘transferable skills audit’, both their technical skills and their ‘soft’ skills. Equally, they need to think about their prior experiences and knowledge to assess how this will translate into a new operating environment.
Often, candidates considering a change will widely underestimate the scale of the change facing them. Moving from the public sector to private sector and vice versa comes with entirely different challenges, from the cabinet submission process, to engaging with stakeholders to driving commercial outcomes this can be tricky.
The best transitions are where leaders have taken the time to seek lots of information, through an environmental scan. They’ve remained curious, are humble and self-aware enough to ask for advice and seek input from a broad range of their colleagues. They are also willing to challenge any preconceived ideas they had on what the new move might be like – and admit when they got it wrong!
What advice would you give someone looking to shift in or out of the public sector over the next year or so?
Shift out: Don’t. I may be totally biased, but with so many significant challenges to solve and contribute to over the next decade, don’t you want to be part of positive change? As a public servant, you get to contribute directly.
Shift in: What a great time to join, with a recognition that we need to invest in and grow the capability of our public sector vs outsourcing all interesting work to others!
What advice do you do you give to young and emerging leaders who aspire to senior leadership down the track?
The hands down best thing I did as an aspiring and emerging leader was seek out mentors and then a coach to help me develop my leadership skills. My early mentors were executives a few years ahead of me I similar roles or those I aspired to move into. As my career advanced, I sought out a more diverse group of mentors as well as a leadership coach.
I still have a ‘board of mentors’ who I tap into and work with, but I also derive enormous value from being a mentor. I’m mentoring an executive at the moment and feel I’m shortchanging her as I’m sure I’m getting more out of the deal than she is.
Equally, for older workers I’d encourage you to reverse mentor, or seek younger colleagues to help out. With more generations working together side by side than ever before and workplace change happening at such a pace this can be a clever way to remain up-to-date and contemporary in your thinking and skills.
What are some top “do’s” and “don’ts” you could offer anyone seeking to take on bigger challenges in their public purpose career?
Keep a growth mindset, remain curious, keep learning, seek advice and never assume you are the smartest person in the room. Make sure you take people on the journey. Great leaders understand that they leave things better than before they started.
Don’t assume because you have the title that you are the leader. Never talk down or poorly of your colleagues. Don’t assume you have all the answers, or that you are the only person to fix all the problems on your own.
Finally, back to IPAA Queensland. What are you most looking forward to in working with us over the next year as our inaugural Stewards on the Couch series partner?
Learning from exceptional leaders who are so willing to put back and hearing their often-untold stories. The great thing about the Stewards on the Couch series is you get an intimate insight into leadership and an upfront and personal account from the Stewards themselves. You really get to know the person behind the leader, which for some can be surprising that a CEO or Director-General is so approachable.
IPAA Queensland thanks our major sponsor and Stewards on the Couch event partner
