Deputy Director, Workforce Strategy & Policy

As the Functional Leader for Science, Technology and Engineering (STE) in the Public Service, S&TPPO shapes Whole-of-Government (WOG) strategies to build a strong and future-ready STE workforce. This includes understanding how the STE workforce needs to evolve, strengthening critical and emerging capabilities, developing career pathways, and building a strong pipeline of technical and enterprise leaders across the Public Service. The Deputy Director supports the Director in shaping and implementing these strategies at the system level. The role combines strategic workforce planning and analytics, policy development, talent and leadership development, capability and career development, and cross-agency implementation. Working closely with PSD, ministries and public agencies, the incumbent will identify systemic workforce challenges and opportunities, develop WOG-level strategies and interventions, and translate these into practical mechanisms that strengthen the STE workforce across the Public Service. Responsibilities Strategic Workforce Planning & Intelligence • Lead WOG strategic workforce planning for the Public Service STE workforce, working with agencies to understand current workforce strengths and gaps and anticipate future manpower and capability needs. • Analyse workforce, labour-market and organisational data to identify emerging workforce trends, systemic risks and areas requiring intervention. • Develop workforce scenarios, segmentation and analytical approaches to understand the future size, skills and shape of the STE workforce and inform policy and workforce decisions. • Develop management insights and measures to provide S&TPPO and senior leadership with an ongoing view of workforce and leadership pipeline health. • Translate workforce evidence and insights into practical policy recommendations and interventions at the sectoral or WOG level. STE Talent & Leadership Strategy • Shape WOG strategies to build a strong pipeline of STE technical leaders, including talent identification, succession planning, leadership development, mobility and career development. • Maintain system-level oversight of succession health and emerging talent for critical STE leadership positions, working with agencies to identify pipeline gaps and development needs early. • Work with PSD and agencies to strengthen how technical leadership and potential are identified, developed and recognised within the broader Public Service leadership system. • Design and implement development interventions that provide emerging STE leaders with the experiences, exposure and capabilities required for senior technical and enterprise leadership roles. • Strengthen connections between leadership development, succession planning, career pathways and deployment opportunities across agencies. STE Capability & Career Development • Develop and steward WOG frameworks for STE capabilities and competencies, ensuring that these remain relevant to evolving technology, workforce and national needs. • Identify critical and emerging capabilities across the STE workforce and work with agencies to address capability gaps through coordinated WOG interventions where appropriate. • Shape career development frameworks and pathways that support the development of deep technical expertise while enabling mobility and a range of career and leadership pathways. • Work with relevant partners to strengthen professional development approaches, including programmes, professional networks, accreditation or other mechanisms where these can contribute to capability development. • Ensure that capability, competency and career-development initiatives form a coherent workforce architecture rather than a collection of standalone programmes. Functional Leadership & Cross-Agency Implementation • Strengthen the mechanisms through which S&TPPO exercises its role as STE Functional Leader and works with agencies towards common WOG workforce outcomes. • Work across ministries and agencies to translate WOG workforce strategies into coordinated actions, while recognising differences in agencies' missions, workforce needs and operating contexts. • Review and strengthen cross-agency mechanisms for building shared capabilities, including Centres of Excellence, capability clusters, workforce groups and other appropriate governance arrangements. • Convene and work with HR leaders, STE leaders, central agencies and other stakeholders to develop common approaches and address workforce issues that cannot be effectively resolved by individual agencies acting alone. • Lead cross-functional and cross-agency teams to take strategic initiatives from problem definition and policy development through to implementation and review. Requirements We are looking for an experienced leader with strong strategic, analytical and stakeholder-management capabilities, and experience in one or more areas such as strategic workforce planning, workforce strategy, talent and leadership development, HR policy, organisational development or related fields. The successful candidate should: • Have strong strategic and analytical abilities, with the ability to structure complex and ambiguous workforce issues and translate evidence into actionable strategies and policies. • Be comfortable working with quantitative and qualitative workforce data and drawing insights to support senior-management decision-making. • Understand how different workforce levers, including workforce planning, capability development, talent, careers, mobility and organisational mechanisms, interact as a system. • Be able to move effectively between strategy, policy development and implementation. • Possess strong influencing and collaboration skills, with the ability to build alignment and deliver outcomes across multiple organisations and stakeholders without relying on direct authority. • Be comfortable engaging senior stakeholders and working on issues that cut across organisational boundaries. • Have a broad perspective and be able to balance WOG objectives with the differing operational contexts and workforce needs of individual agencies. • Experience working on cross-organisational or system-level issues, and familiarity with science, technology or engineering workforces, would be advantageous.