IPAA Victoria Leadership in the Public Sector Awards: Retrospectives Innovation Network

“I didn’t really expect us to be up here.” So said Fiona Grinwald, Director of Public Sector Innovation at the Department of Premier and Cabinet, upon accepting the Communications Excellence Award at the IPAA Victoria Leadership in the Public Sector Awards 2019 for DPC’s Innovation Network. Such modesty is characteristic of those working across the VPS; projects at the vanguard of public sector thinking are initiated and implemented without fanfare, the benefits to the Victorian community being the primary consideration.

In this case, that benefit is derived from Innovation Network supporting all those who work in the public purpose sector. It is the only Victorian cross-government digital space dedicated to driving innovation activity and collaboration. The platform is accessible by all government employees regardless of departmental internal IT systems, which in the past have often created barriers to collaboration. Membership is optional, however since launching in December 2017 has grown to over 12,000 from across every Victorian government department.

With a focus on new ways of working and change that adds value, Innovation Network supports diversity of thinking and representation of the varied perspectives as an enabler of innovation. It encourages members to develop new content, start discussions and contact fellow members directly, and curates this so it reaches the widest possible audience. Content is focused on ways to embed and support practical innovation in government, and it has evolved into a resource-rich platform, the tone of which is deliberately conversational and free of jargon.

With such a large and diverse workforce, clear and incisive communication is essential to the smooth functioning of the Victorian public purpose sector, and Innovation Network is critical to that process. It’s exactly this kind of exciting initiative that IPAA Victoria is proud to support and acknowledge.