David Schmidtchen

Integrity is difficult to define, but the lack of it is a serious failing that disqualifies a person from leadership.

Relying on functional measures can distract from what is expressed in vision and strategy. It discounts aspiration in favour of practicality.

Fixing leadership failings isn’t about weeding out the few bad apples. Are we actually getting the leaders we deserve?

In 1969 and 1970, one-sixth of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) firms disappeared through mergers or liquidations. Thousands lost their jobs in the first major economic shock since the Great Depression. The cause was not the ethical failings we often associate with such events but another common problem: business leaders’ failure to adapt to […]

Human behaviour in the modern workplace – think the quiet quitting phenomenon – is having an effect on cybersecurity risk.

The total Defence Enterprise workforce is the delicate system at the heart of Defence capability. If one fails, it all fails. 

There’s a persistent ‘all or nothing’ current that runs through every discussion of Australian public service workforce capacity and capability. It’s a bit like the rabbit-duck picture illusion. Some people look at the APS workforce and see a rabbit while others look at the same picture and see a duck. At one extreme, the APS […]

‘COVID showed what your employer really thought of you’, is a statement that captures the undercurrents of employee experience during the pandemic. The early rush to remote working was quickly accompanied by managers questioning employee productivity, the loss of workplace culture (oddly enough through the loss of ‘water cooler’ conversation that the same manager would […]

When the screens go dark in the office or the power goes off at home, we’re reminded of the unseen critical infrastructure we rely on every day. The APS is also dependent on hidden workforce infrastructure that is easily overlooked but critical to generating workforce capability and delivering organisational performance. The technologies that enable work […]

Despite the high barriers to market entry, craft brewers are proliferating and growing. The artisanal appeal isn’t just limited to beer, wine and gin. The ‘great resignation’ has prompted many employees and some businesses to think about how to strike the right balance between work and life through more varied and crafted careers. The drivers […]

The task of generating and sustaining a shipbuilding industry in Australia is not a challenge for the Navy or Defence or Industry, it is one part of a national challenge where a skilled workforce is an increasingly rare resource.

How effective is the relationship between Defence and defence industry in ensuring Defence and the national industry support base can mobilise to meet potential threats?