By the Support Economy Reform Unit at the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet and the Analytic Centre of Excellence, Department of Employment and Workplace Relations.
This purpose of this project is to improve the APS’ capability to integrate First Nations approaches in our policy and program design.
The Productivity Commission identified enhancing this capability as a priority in its review of the National Agreement on Closing the Gap and it is a central tenant of the third and fourth pillars of the National Agreement on Closing the Gap: Transforming Government Organisations and Shared Access to Data and Information at a Regional level.
Data-related capability, built in a culturally informed and appropriate way, is also a key determinant for the success of the Framework for Governance of Indigenous Data. The core of the project will involve developing a series of workshops and learning materials available to APS data and policy officers. The project will primarily use case studies, data, and materials from the veterans’ care, aged care, disability care, and early childhood education and care sectors, which face challenges that can impact access to essential services, especially in remote and First Nations communities. Although the materials and workshops will primarily focus on the care and support sectors, the principles and methods they explore will be relevant to the work of policy and data officers across the entire APS.
By building our capability to engage with First Nations data and evidence, this project supports the priority areas of the APS Reform Agenda: to build an APS that ‘puts people and business at the centre of policy and services and has the capability to do its job well.’
To that end, the project uses co-design as a foundation for its success. We have engaged a majority First-Nations owned consultancy, Indigenous Professional Services Management Consultants (IPS), to develop the learning materials using the codesign method with two consultative groups.
First, IPS will develop the draft learning materials on the basis of co-design sessions with the First Nations Data SES Working Group (the Working Group). The Working Group comprises Chief Data Officers and Assistant Secretaries from care and support agencies, the National Indigenous Australians Agency, the Department of Employment and Workplace Relations, Australian Bureau of Statistics, and the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare.
In these sessions, the Working Group will discuss literature reviews presented by IPS, and provide relevant case studies, data, and work currently underway across government. Working Group members will also bring along subject matter experts from their agencies to contribute to the co-design session.
To ensure the co-design process brings together lived experience and professional experience, an external First Nations Reference Group (the Reference Group) will contribute its expertise by reviewing and advising on the draft learning materials at three co-design sessions led by IPS. IPS will incorporate the outcomes of these co-design sessions in the final version of the learning materials. The Reference Group brings together five organisations representing a diverse array of First Nations perspectives in the care and support economy context and beyond. Our intent in having IPS, a majority First Nations-owned organisation, leading the Reference Group co-design sessions is to increase cultural safety in the co-design sessions.
By centring our efforts on co-design we endeavour to improve policy and programs affecting Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. Our hope is that by building the capability to use data in ways that align with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people’s world views, policies are more likely to result in positive outcomes, because this embeds concepts and logic that make most sense to those affected by the policies.
We look forward to inviting data and policy officers across the APS to the workshops, and to use the self-study learning materials via the APS Academy.
