Professor Wolfgang Buehler

Banks and investment funds holding Greek debt must decide by today whether to cancel half of the money they are owed. This is a key component of a joint IMF and EU plan to keep Greece from defaulting.

Requests for the euro-zone to boost funds to fight the crisis have been loud and clear since the G20 meeting in Mexico, however little seems to have been achieved. Germany and other Northern European countries are still reluctant to increase the volume of the European Stability Mechanism, a permanent rescue fund to bailout members of the Euro zone.

This fund has a major signalling function that Europe is ready to fight possible contagion effects from Greece to other weak European countries. The German parliament vote last week to accept a bigger European bailout fund refers to Greece alone and has the purpose to buy again more time to give Greece a chance to recover. It will support European banks with a heavy exposure of Greek government bonds, and to ring fence the consequences of a Greek default. The European support of Greece comes with some unparalleled control measures impacting on the sovereignty of Greece, which the country has already found hard to accept. And yet Greece still has to accept further austerity measures.

Over the past two weeks, the European Central Bank, the Bank of England and the Bank of Japan have both increased their programs of expanding the money supply by buying their own governments’ bonds. Morgan Stanley has also forecast that the US Federal Reserve bank will be printing money again before the end of the year.

If the euro is to stay alive in the long run there have to be major changes. Easing liquidity and credit conditions are only short-term measures – there is no structural change in the banking system which is Europe requires. What we need is a plan to support real growth in the weak European countries, especially in Greece, Portugal, and Spain. If these countries decide to stay in the euro-zone, the Government sector has to shrink, and production costs have to decrease.

These austerity measures will have a huge impact on many people; the social and political consequences cannot be foreseen, and it presents a stark risk to political stability. It will be a major challenge to support these countries as they restructure their economy. It is similar to the way the USA had to revitalise Europe’s economy after the Second World War. There are still huge economic problems ahead – and for the Greek people that means more austerity, more wage cuts, and more unemployment.

Investors have until this afternoon to join an unprecedented debt swap worth up to 107 billion euro known as private sector involvement, which was agreed in February after months of tough negotiations. Concern that investors will not be willing to agree to the swap has caused sharp falls in stock markets around the world.

I feel it is crucial to avoid a disorderly default by Greece with a contagion effect that might spill over to the US and Australia. Mind you even Australia will probably feel the impact of the problems in the euro-zone. For example if exports to Europe as a whole go down by half that would decrease Australian exports by about 5% because Europe takes about 10% of Australian exports. Plus, we would then have what is called a ‘second order’ effect, whereby China would also see an impact because it exports a huge amount of goods to Europe. Consequently the demand for minerals to Australia would also drop.

Geographically we may be a long way from Europe, but there are close economic ties.

Rosemary Howard

Today is the 101^st anniversary of International Women’s Day, a day celebrated around the world to mark the legal, political, social and economic achievements of women.

The change in corporate governance gender reporting requirements for listed companies is to be applauded. The Australian Securities Exchange now makes it mandatory for top companies to report on how they are managing gender balance and gender diversity in their workplaces all the way from the board down.

The theme of International Women’s Day for 2012 is Connecting Girls, Inspiring Futures – meaning if we set the right example for our girls and young women now, they will be inspired to a brighter future for all. And yet the movement of women into top leadership roles in Australian organisations has been excruciatingly slow. It is now regarded as ‘big news’ when someone like Martin Parkinson makes an announcement that the Treasury will adopt a long-term target of making 35% of senior executives women by 2016 from 23% in 2011.

In Australia women have comprised the majority of university graduates in Commerce, Economics and Law – all those feeder disciplines into leadership roles – for over two decades now. There are 1.3 women to every one man in our university system – we are investing a lot of money in educating our women. So you may wonder why there are comparatively few women on the senior leadership career path.

Perhaps it is best to look at the example of one who has risen above the ranks, to become the first female Prime Minister of Australia. She appears to be able to win the support of her work colleagues convincingly but is unable to connect with voters. I fear what we see here are the challenges that senior executive women across Australia face every day being played out very publicly in federal politics.

Here is a leader who has successfully managed a complex minority government to achieve a remarkable amount of legislative change in a short period of time. However some of her public persona revolves around commentary and cartoons on her hair, voice, and marital status, rather than on achievements as the first female PM of this country. Even after thousands of years of history, women in leadership roles are still judged by different and often more superficial standards than their male peers.

Gillard has taught all executive women an important lesson: take a close look at your career-defining moments. 

The change to ask companies to report on how they are managing gender balance and gender diversity in their workplaces may be thought to relate just to board positions but it’s actually about the whole organisation and it became mandatory for listed companies just over a year ago. More recent changes to Federal Government legislation will now see reporting on gender diversity outcomes for employers of over 100 people. Some companies are doing quite well in regard to their reporting and the programs for for both women and men that they’re introducing to support gender balance in the workplaces. Not all though.

Some organisations are saying they want more time to compile the numbers, while others just think it is not relevant to their business. For example a lot of the more traditional companies – such as mining – still don’t have any women on their boards. And in terms of representation in their workplace, it’s not looking much better either. A particular career point of failure for women is the child rearing years where we need to do a much better job of providing part-time and remote flexible working arrangements for parents.

Indeed, the lack of women in middle to senior positions – in the corporate and not-for-profit sectors – contributes to Australia’s growing talent shortage. We’re essentially wiping out half of our working population. It’s not only a loss of potential talent, but it’s an economically poor way of doing business.

It’s not enough for some women on corporate boards to be getting ahead; we should be campaigning for women at all levels.

Australian companies may well ask what is in it for them. Well, the ambition of women can be rewarding to women themselves as well as the company they work for. It increases global competitiveness, and gives a boost to Australian GDP.

Research from US not-for-profit organisation Catalyst and other global studies point to the fact that all aspects of organisational performance – customer experience, operational excellence, community engagement and the bottom line – are much stronger when there is diverse representation on the board, with up to 35% higher return on shareholder equity.

Major listed companies are catching up with gender balance.  ASX and Federal Government initiatives that require companies to be transparent and list gender outcomes are a positive step forward. The wheels of change are in motion, and we need to maintain the passion and momentum as we’re not there yet. When we reach our goal with gender, we can address our other diversity challenges including ethnicity and age.

Rosemary Howard is the Executive Director and Conjoint Professor of Executive Education at the Australian Graduate School of Management.

Peter Shergold | CSI blog

I was lucky enough last month to visit Canada as a guest of Human Resources and Skills Development Canada although, unfortunately, not quite lucky enough to go skiing.  So, instead of Whistler, Big White and Lake Louise, my itinerary incorporated Vancouver, Victoria, Toronto and Ottawa.

The trip was centred around the promotion of social innovation.  It turned out to be a genuine ‘thought holiday’.  I have returned energised.  A full account can be found at “Postcard from Canada”.

In Vancouver, British Colombia (BC) I had the opportunity to deliver a public lecture to a well-informed and engaged audience, on the potential of cross-sectoral collaboration to catalyse creative approaches to the production of public good.

I took as my text for the evening one of the key thematic motifs from the discussion paper, Together:  Respecting our Future.  The document has been developed by the BC Advisory Council on Social Entrepreneurship.   It reflects on the scale of the task at hand: 

“The social, economic and environmental challenges that we face are shared problems that require shared solutions … we know all this, but working together is still difficult.  Our sectors and systems are not currently organised to support collaboration and collective action.  Our three main sectors – public, private and not-for-profit – often function in isolation and operate with different sets of rules and practices.”

In Canada as in Australia.  Why, I reflected, is it so difficult?  What is needed for change?  How, in particular, can professional public services and community-based organisations work together in pursuit of public and social innovation?

In both countries the traditional methodology of government, based on consultation and submission, is clearly proving inadequate.  So, very often, is the advocacy of community organisations.  Both founder on the rocks of asymmetric political power.  Too often political outcomes are debated and negotiated between those on the ‘inside’ and the ‘outside’ of democratic governance.  Opportunities to work together as equals on solving the wicked problems of society remain rare.

In structuring my ideas for the evening I came to the conclusion that there were five new ways in which greater connectedness could be built.  These seem to me the essential ingredients of ‘partnership’.

First, the delivery of government programs (particularly human services) needs to empower the community organisations that are contracted to deliver them.  Bureaucratic red-tape needs to be reduced to the minimum required for public accountability purposes.  Reporting needs to focus on performance not compliance.   There should be no risk-averse micro-management of outsourced providers.  Rather organisations need to be appropriately funded for the services they deliver and actively encouraged to be innovative in taking new approaches to the implementation of government policies.

Second, the design of government programs needs to incorporate the front-line experience of community organisations.  Tendering is important.  Public services generally do it with integrity and probity.  Even more important, however, is engaging outsourced deliverers in framing the administrative guidelines under which they will deliver the program. 

Similarly, citizens should be encouraged to take responsibility for the budget management of the government support that they require.   A number of jurisdictions, led by Western Australia, are enabling people with a disability to organise and purchase the ‘self-directed’ services they need to live a full life.  Such opportunities to ‘co-produce’ government can be extended to other individuals (e.g. those struggling with mental ill-health) and tailored to the needs of communities (e.g. remote Aboriginal settlements).

Third, the funding of social innovation needs to be facilitated by government.  Public funding and philanthropy will never be sufficient.  Government can play a major role in helping to harness private capital for social impact and, by doing so, drive public innovation.  Recent moves by Australian governments to provide capital start-up funding to mission-driven social enterprises, to support community development financial institutions as intermediaries and to encourage social benefit bonds based on public policy outcomes suggest a willingness to trail new approaches.

Fourth, the full benefits of public policy and social enterprise need to be audited and measured.  Too often government evaluations of programs is narrowly conceived.  If governments are to be persuaded that public funding is investment rather than expenditure, the benefits of intervention need to be articulated and assessed.

Fifth, and underpinning these criteria, governments and public services need to take a new approach to doing.  A focus on ‘customer service’ needs to be accompanied by a commitment to citizen engagement.  Collaboration needs to be more than a statement of principles.  The world of wiki and crowd-sourcing can harness social media to engage civil society in framing policy and rewriting legislation.  Cross-sectoral ‘design laboratories’ can drive innovation from the ‘outside’ but it is equally important to develop collaborative mechanisms on the ‘inside’ of the public service.  I think the Partnership Forum that I chair in Western Australia represents one effective approach:  but so, too, is the establishment of the Not-for-Profit Reform Council at the Commonwealth level.

The podcast of my speech will soon be available on line, courtesy of ISIS at the Sauder School of Business at the University of British Columbia. A blog on the lecture by one attendee, Susan Brinton, is now available.

In the meantime I welcome your views on how to improve and sustain collaboration between the public, private and community sectors.  I’m pretty sure I understand the problems but far from satisfied that I know the answers.  I’d appreciate your views.

Peter Shergold is the Macquarie Group Foundation Professor at the Centre for Social Impact (CSI) at UNSW. This blog post first appeared on the CSI blog.

Michael Peters

The ACCC is to allow Telstra’s structural separation – which splits its wholesale and retails arms – during the roll out of the NBN. However the question is are they creating another duopoly?

After many months of work, including revisions to Telstra’s original proposals, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (the ACCC ) has given the SSU the green light and accepted Telstra will split into two, via its Structural Separation Undertaking (SSU) which will be implemented as it migrates services to the National Broadband Network. Certainly I feel we need ongoing surveillance of the National Broadband Network (NBN), in the wake of the announcement.

The announcement is back to the future for the Telco sector. It will be a great challenge for both competition policy and the regulator, and without close scrutiny NBN Co and Telstra will become what Telstra was less than a decade ago. A large monopoly owned by the state. Only this time there will be two of them, and they won’t be allowed to compete for customers – it is a duopoly.

Although it is to be welcomed that Telstra has undertaken to deliver price equivalence to all its copper-based access services and exchanges through new wholesale contracts, it needs to be ensured that – at least as a fallback position – the charges set out in ACCC access determinations will apply. However Telstra was always the ‘bad boy on the block’ and the new split for the NBN looks set to take the same route, with high if equivalent pricing. The failure of competition law to ensure access to the network allowing others to compete is to be deplored. It has yet to be tested as to whether the NBN will encourage new providers to flourish to compete between this new duopoly.

The ACCC has announced new measures which include specific commitments to ensure the quality of Telstra’s supply of regulated services, and the security of wholesale customer information. The undertaking also includes a raft of compliance measures and a dispute resolution processes, including an independent telecommunications adjudicator scheme.

The deal needs to be keenly observed by the regulators – and remember no corporate governance charter for the NBN has been presented to the public as yet. The compliance measures announced by the ACCC are to be welcomed, but there needs to be ongoing surveillance of Telstra and the NBN, and its impact on the productivity of all Australian companies.

The separation of Telstra is perhaps second only to the NBN in significance. Past ACCC experience says that we need an ongoing examination of the Telstra split up, and there remain many questions unanswered by the ACCC announcement. Will they unleash the highway or set up tollways? Will all the promises be kept – or is more regulation needed?

The SSU is a bonanza for lawyers and bankers – but few if any customers will see the benefit.

Michael Peters is a Lecturer in Business Law and Taxation at the Australian School of Business.

Professor Chris Styles

Now that the party’s votes are in, Prime Minister Julia Gillard has to make up ground with the voters. The polls are indicating the Labor Government is in deep trouble. Kevin Rudd was nothing if not analytical and blunt about their prospects at the next election. And everyone knows it.

As leader, what does Gillard do now? Perhaps the leadership drama is a gift in disguise. Some leaders would love a crisis to give them an excuse to instigate change and rally the troops around a cause.

In this case, Gillard has been handed a real crisis where there is nothing to lose and everything to gain. It’s clear that business as usual is not an option.

In her speech after winning the leadership battle she said as much. She admitted things have to change otherwise defeat is a sure thing. Perhaps what is needed is a genuine paradigm shift across a number of policy fronts.

The Business Council of Australia (BCA) among others are calling for the government to look away from in-party fighting and focus on the big issues the country faces with renewed vigour.

BCA President, Tony Shepherd, said the leadership ballot should be a catalyst for “more focused government and a renewed commitment to make Australia more competitive and productive”, reiterating its stance on a need for a more competitive tax system, a more flexible, mobile and skilled workforce to improve competitiveness, and a regulatory environment that encouraged business to invest.

The question for Gillard now is how she goes about instigating this change. The government could do worse than start with a clean piece of paper and devising some paradigm shifting approaches. Some would say this is a risky strategy, but perhaps it is not.

The most daring approach for any organisation on the decline – such as this government – is continuing on as they have been. We often see this in business when organisations take a safety first approach and employ what see “sensible” (conventional) strategies to the detriment of innovation. Strategic convergence may feel good at the time but it can’t win in the long run.

Let’s consider the wise words of a great philosopher: “My life is the opposite of everything I want it to be. Every instinct I have, in every part of life, be it something to wear, something to eat … It’s all been wrong.” The great philosopher was George Costanza and advice came from his good friend Jerry Seinfeld. “If every instinct you have is wrong, then the opposite would have to be right.”

The weekend papers highlighted perceived flaws in the instincts of the Prime Minister – such as agreeing to appear on the ABC’s recent Four Corners program, leaving out references to the achievements of Kevin Rudd during last year’s Annual Conference, and so on. It has been suggested that she would be in a better place if she had done the opposite.

This isn’t a bad starting point for any leader facing dire straits. What are the sacred cows? What do we consider conventional wisdom? Is it right? Was it ever? Perhaps it once was but now is no longer?

The role of a leader is to ask the big questions and encourage those working with them to be brutally honest and rigorous in their answers. Being brave enough to suggest “the opposite” is more likely to illicit innovative and creative ideas than the same old, same old. That’s leadership.

One of the criticisms of the Prime Minister’s leadership style is that she is very managerial. This is great for “getting things done”, but perhaps not great for generating “big ideas”.

There is no doubt she has ground to make up with her party and Australian voters; but if she truly wants to win over the business community, then she needs to be open to more radical ideas. Perhaps she should think beyond the “business as usual” approach, particularly given she has nothing to lose by approaching her Prime ministership with an entirely new perspective. Being brave enough to consider the opposite view of everything she’s done before maybe a good start and signal to the electorate.

After all, it worked for George. He ended up getting the girl and job of his dreams with the New York Yankees.

If the Prime Minister adopts this approach perhaps she has some chance of turning a positive into a negative and salvaging something from this crisis.

There is a lot to be said for rigorous thinking and daring to think the unthinkable. It’s what we expect of our leaders.

Professor Chris Styles is Deputy Dean and Director Australian Graduate School of Management (AGSM). This article first appeared in The Conversation, 28th February 2012 http://theconversation.edu.au/how-gillard-should-think-the-unthinkable-and-look-like-a-leader-5600

Tim Harcourt

When I went to the University of Adelaide, I received a stroke of luck. Under the Colombo plan which enabled South East Asian students to get scholarships to Australian Universities, the grand old man of Singapore, Lee Kuan Yew, sent a number of very bright Singaporean students, who were meant to go to Oxford to study nuclear physics, to Adelaide to do economics with me! As a result, through having very smart class mates I got good grades in Mathematical Economics and Econometrics, I helped them with their Honours essays, and we had noodles every night (this was before Poh of Master chef fame had come to fame in Adelaide).

Of course, we know how well students from South East Asia and the rest of the region have done at University and how much life and vitality they have added to our campuses in Australia. But now we have a new wave of overseas students from a new frontier, South America with Brazil at the forefront.

This is one reason I was recently recruited to the University of New South Wales to teach international business strategy in the Australian School of Business. As part of the UNSW’s Australian Graduate School of Management’s MBA programmes, I will develop an international business strategy course for South America similar to the one designed for China and India.  This follows on from the book on Brazil and Australia I am co-authoring with Mark Thirlwell from the Lowy Institute and a distinguished Brazilian economist and past adviser to the government in Brasilia, Professor Fernando Carvalho from the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ) that was foreshadowed in the inaugural edition of Brazil Talk. The book will focus on Brazilian – Australian economic opportunity and will be published to take advantage of Brazil’s ‘double header’ hosting of the FIFA World Cup and the Rio Olympics. So Brazil can expect to see a lot more of me over the next 5 years or whether Brazil likes it or not! This will also provide great research for my future book The Airport Economist Goes to Rio.

So why all the interest in Brazil and South America from the UNSW and all Australia universities in general?

Firstly, the numbers are growing. Brazil’s growing middle class and its citizens who are being pulled out of poverty are hungry for education. Brazil’s human capital needs are Australia’s opportunity. Accordingly, our universities are doing more together particularly as many Brazilians now study in Australia. For Australia, Latin America now makes up just over 5 per cent of total enrolments, with Brazil ahead of the pack with just over 16,000 enrolments (followed by Colombia on 10,000, Peru on 2,200, Chile 1700 and Mexico 1500). And with Brazil leading the pack much vitality is added to our universities particularly in the schools of economics and business, the environment (e.g. marine biology), architecture and design which makes the typical Australian campus a much more attractive place to be nowadays.

Secondly, economically, South America is coming of age, with Brazil leading the pack. In 2002, on my first trip to Brazil, times were tough (see my previous article Blame it on Rio). Neighbouring Argentina was in the midst of economic crisis, (see the article Don’t buy from me, Argentina) and Brazil was concerned about contagion from her neighbour. In fact, Brazil had just got over a significant crisis in 1998 and didn’t want a repeat of those events. In 2002, Brazil was also facing a presidential election, with the perennial candidate, Lula from the Workers Party (PT) running for the fourth time. Whilst I noticed Lula had great support in Porto Alegre at the World Social Forum where I was a guest speaker, the business people and journalists I spoke to in Sao Paulo were apprehensive, and in any case, pessimistic about his chances of winning.

What a difference eight years makes. Lula did win in 2002, won re-election in 2006 and left office at the end of 2010 with a massive 80 plus percent plus approval rating which is an amazing result for a democratically elected politician at the end of their term anywhere. Even his successor, Dilma Rouseff, who has just entered the Presidential palace in Brasilia, has an equally healthy approval rate of 73 per cent.

So why the popularity of Lula and now Dilma? To use the old Clinton campaign line: It’s the economy stupid. Brazil avoided a major recession during the global financial crisis (GFC) and chalked up an impressive 7.5 per cent economic growth rate in 2010, which is expected to be followed by a solid 4.5 per cent in 2011 which should continue this year should inflation risks be contained. In short, the Brazil of 2012 is a different place to the Brazil of 2002. The country is more confident, it is playing a significant role on the world stage, (Lula opened 53 new Brazilian embassies in his term including 30 in Africa) its economy is now talked about as an emerging economic superpower along with China and India (now it is part of both the BRICs (Brazil, Russia, India and China) and the big emerging economies, the BEEs).  Historically we used to think of Brazil and other South American countries as causing a crisis themselves or being a victim of one. It’s very rare for them therefore to get through a major global economic crisis unscathed. And whilst they say Brazil is emerging, by the time of the Rio Olympics in 2016, will we be able to say that it has emerged? After all, it is the world’s 7th largest economy and after Rio 2016 it could well be in the Top 5. It’s no surprise that on my most recent trip to Brazil, one of my hostess’s in Rio de Janeiro commented that “even her maid took her holidays in Buenos Aires because it was now so cheap!”

In fact, education is a key reason for Lula’s success in Brazil. The success of the macroeconomic and fiscal performance of the Lula administration has been accompanied by a commitment to improving social conditions and human capital – mainly through education. According to Professor Fernando Carvalho, there has been “ a once in a generation increase in education participation – particularly amongst the lower classes. Around 32 million people have been added to the middle class, and education is a key reason.”

To be fair, Carvalho adds, these education measures were part of an expansion of social programmes , essentially an extension of the comunidade solidaria, started by Lula’s predecessor President Fernando Cardoso a famous Brazilian sociologist who later entered politics. According to Professor Carvalho: “Lula extended the programme and made it effective. Also by-passed local and state government and made more use community organizations and churches for delivery. This policy effectively has doubled the income of the very poor and at the same time has expanded the Brazilian middle class adding to the power of Brazilian consumers at the same time. As a result, education retention levels are higher, and the overall standard of living of the average Brazilian has increased.”

Thirdly, education is a key foundation for building stronger economic ties between Brazil and Australia in the future. People ties matter as today’s students are tomorrow political, business and community leaders and will be important as Australia forges stronger relationships with Brazil and South America. For example, in Singapore many of my classmates from the University of Adelaide are now cabinet Ministers (even the new President of Singapore Tony Tan went to Adelaide), and this pattern has been extensive across South East Asia as trade and investment ties have followed business and political relationships built at University. Hopefully, we will similar patterns with South America as more Brazilians and their neighbours study in Australia or participate in MBA courses across Asia, Australia and South America. But there’s work to be done at the Australian end. For as Brazil plays a stronger role in the world economy, and the 2014-2016 World Cup-Olympics double approaches, we will have to do more than just woo the girl from Ipanema, we’ll have to woo the hearts and minds of a globally very strong and popular Brazil.

In conclusion, I am sure many Australian students will now get the positive experience of studying with many students from South America, just as I did from South East Asia. And with all due respect, there is  better dancing in Rio and Sao Paulo than there is in Singapore but I am sure the intellectual and social benefits will be on par!

Tim Harcourt is the JW Nevile Fellow in Economics at the Australian School of Business and the author of The Airport Economist and The Airport Economist goes to Rio!

Professor Chris Styles

Today is a big day.

Yes, it’s the day that the Allan Border Medal for Australia’s premier cricketer will be awarded. Allan Border, or ‘AB’, is known for a lot of things, including a number of cricketing records.  But perhaps the biggest thing he is known for is being the reluctant captain that took over in a time of crisis in the mid 1980s.

For those of us around at the time, the tearful resignation of the then captain, Kim Hughes, that lead to AB’s appointment, will be remembered as a pivotal point in Australian cricket.  The turnaround that followed took time, but it was pronounced and long lasting.  

Given the captain of the Australian cricket team is supposedly the second most important job in the country, perhaps there are some lessons to be learned by the current Labor Government.

When AB took over as captain Australian cricket was at a low point.   The team had experienced many deep defeats. A rebel tour of South Africa was about to happen and the mighty West Indies had inflicted wounds that were hard to heal.  But over the next decade Australian cricket experienced a turnaround that set it up for a decade of dominance.  AB’s leadership was a critical component.

Irrespective of who wins the Labor party’s challenge today the focus will be on how the floundering organisation – that is not unlike the Australian cricket team of the 1980s – can begin the road to recovery. What lessons can ABs leadership provide them and others in a similar situation?

There are perhaps three key ingredients to what AB achieved. The first was having a clear goal.  It is well known that AB’s obsession was winning the Ashes. Of all cricket’s conquests, this is the one that meant most to him.  Wining the one-day World Cup in 1987 was nice (and unexpected), but it was a step on the way to the prize that really mattered.  Once he won 4-0 in the six test series in 1989, he did not lose a test against England until he retired. For political parties the goals are clear – election victory.

The second key ingredient was focus.  Everyone in the team knew what was required. Everything else was a distraction. Knowing why you are there and what needs to be achieved provides clear direction for decisions. Players were dropped, and plans were hatched. Everyone knew why. For the Governments its about a clear legislative program and societal outcomes. Ministers who perform stay, those who don’t, don’t.

The third ingredient was discipline.  During the 1989 Ashes tour AB gained the title ‘Captain Grumpy’.  He decided that the team had to shun their English opponents and be totally dedicated to their defeat.  He even put his own close relationship with Ian Botham to one side. No idle chatter, no coming together after games with the opposition, and the level of aggression on the field set the standard for the sledging we see today.  Most would agree that the last 12 months has not been the most disciplined performance of the parliamentary Labor party.  John Howard was a  leader that understood discipline and the results followed.

Once the dust settles after Monday’s leadership battle, the focus will need to be on how to dig the Federal Labor party out of its deep hole.  It’s hard to argue that it will be at a low point and will be in need of organisational renewal and turnaround, a situation not unlike that faced by AB.

The big question is how to move forward. Despite both leaders assurances that they’ll encourage the party to unite around the chosen leader, the destructive comments about both leadership contenders over the last week will make it very difficult for whoever wins Monday’s vote to achieve the turnaround that is needed. Like Australian cricket witnessed in the 1980s, perhaps Monday will bring a tearful end to leadership ambitions and then at some stage perhaps a ‘reluctant captain’ will emerge. Although in politics, there are probably few leaders who are truly reluctant.

Chris Styles is the Deputy Dean and Director of the Australian Graduate School of Management.

Jeffrey Knapp

The way the Australian Securities and Investments Commission has failed to disclose relevant files on its policy making activities in its 2010 and 2011 six-month file lists  is extraordinary.

Disclosure is falling off a cliff. ASIC file lists include no references to the files that should exist for the development of numerous ASIC policies including market integrity rules, over-the-counter contracts for difference, or substantial holding disclosures. I can’t help but suspect the thinning of ASIC’s file lists may be an attempt by the agency to deny the public its right to request access to documents on agency policy-making under the Freedom of Information Act.

At the ASIC summer school at the Hilton in Sydney last week, the topic of disclosure was one of many being discussed. It is certainly important for these issues to be aired in public, however the discrepancies and omissions in ASIC’s published file lists sets a poor example to the entities it regulates. Indeed ASIC needs to demonstrate leadership in disclosure practices.

This drop off in the file numbers corresponds to a Senate inquiry into liquidators and administrators in 2010. At the time I found that ASIC had removed documents that relate to administrators running collapsed public companies, from its database of those who have been granted exemption from financial reporting.

This was an extraordinary thing for ASIC to do when its governing legislation includes the object of making information publicly available. You’d have thought they would want to keep this information public. They don’t – and I can’t think of a valid reason for ASIC modifying their public database in this way. The regulator is effectively burying information about its policy making.

Mind you, it is hard to find files. If you don’t know an ASIC file exists, then you are hardly in a position of being able to request access to documents from that file.

ASIC’s failures to disclose and be transparent about its files and its accounting exemption orders sets a regrettable example for the rest of the market place.

Jeffrey Knapp is a lecturer in financial accounting at the Australian School of Business.

Professor Chris Styles

As a Monday showdown looms, one of the big questions being asked by members of the Labor caucus is whether Kevin Rudd in 2012 can be a different kind of the leader to the Kevin Rudd of 2010.

Even as Rudd held yet another press conference after arriving in Brisbane this morning, former colleagues were speaking out against him.

This morning Health Minister Nicola Roxon described the way he ran the government as “ludicrous”.

“I doubt I would be asked but I absolutely wouldn’t accept if I was,” she said. “If Kevin succeeds I won’t want to serve in his ministry but I will absolutely wish him and the government the best of luck.

“I will hope that he has changed and I will be there campaigning for Labor.”

Wayne Swan earlier this week also hit out at Rudd’s leadership style in a scathing attack. Prime Minister Julia Gillard described him as “dysfunctional”, resulting in “chaos and paralysis”. Yet others have pledged their support.

So the big question for the caucus is a question also facing many businesses – are leaders capable of really changing?

The answer is yes, although it’s hard to find examples.

Significant change to a managerial style depends on a number of things. First, like any area of personal change, the individual has to accept that they have a problem. Without this, no real progress can be made.

In Mr Rudd’s case, he must be willing to genuinely believe there are aspects of his leadership style that don’t work and need to be changed. Mr Rudd has been variously accused of being a micro-manager, overly-controlling and chaotic.

Many management education programs help participants identify strengths and weaknesses in their management styles and provide strategies for dealing with this. While this is a very confronting process, enormous results can be seen once these issues are identified.

Secondly, Mr Rudd must have in the past, or be willing to now, engage in self-reflection and seek feedback from others. Currently there is certainly no shortage of people pointing out his failings.

The ability to reflect is not an easy skill to develop, nor is it easy to gain the trust of others so they will give honest feedback. We are often too busy “doing” to take time to think about what we did and identify ways to improve next time.

Thirdly a self awareness of his natural leadership style is important. We all tend to adopt a management style that we are more comfortable with. Bob Hawke was the consensus builder while Mr Rudd’s colleagues seem to suggest he displays more “command and control” tendencies.

Command and control may be okay in the heat of battle, but it isn’t the greatest way to motivate people and foster creativity. Even the armed forces are changing.

Being aware of the type of leader you are is a critical step in any effort to modify that style. Mr Rudd may never be the easygoing boss other individuals can be, but being conscious of what style he is predisposed to will help him moderate that style if it clearly doesn’t work.

Finally, others have to believe he wants to change and has changed. He has four days to convince others, and judging by comments over the last few days, this won’t be easy. And it won’t be about words but deeds.

Without tangible proof he is unlikely to get the opportunity and mandate to bring about real change.

Of course, not everything needs to change. It is equally important for any leader to understand what they do well, develop it further, and have the confidence to make it clear that there are areas of their leadership that are here to stay. We need to remember he does have support from a number of colleagues who have been pointing out his strengths in communicating with the public.

Whatever your opinion of the two leaders, it is clear their styles are in stark contrast to each other and this suits both to a point. However, if Rudd chooses to take the advice of his colleagues it will not serve well him to morph his leadership style into Ms Gillard’s, which is reportedly more managerial and focused on problem solving.

What is interesting about the current situation in the Labor party is that unlike a commercial operation, the managers (caucus) are voting for their boss. The opinion polls tell us that the majority of “customers” (in this case the voters) rate him better than the alternatives. But the management team is not so keen on him, and they ultimately are the ones who decide.

In business it is often said that the customer is always right, but in this case their vote doesn’t count. This week’s soap opera has therefore become more about organisational leadership style than the ability to lead the country.

Chris Styles is the Deputy Dean and Director of the Australian Graduate School of Management.

This article first appeared on The Conversation.

Tim Harcourt

The Labor leadership tussle is focussing the minds of local political pundits but at the end of the day, whoever leads the Australian Labor Party (ALP) and the current Government will have to woo the Australian electorate at large come Election Day due in 2013 or maybe even this year. Over coming months you will hear a lot about opinion polls, focus groups, voter demographics from professional pollsters and the like. But in amidst of this analysis by paralysis (although as an election junkie I love all this stuff) it occurred to me that there is a relatively simple way of looking at the task before the Labor Prime Minister and the Coalition Opposition leader to win over the Australian people.

As a self confessed ‘airport economist’ I travel a lot and see lots of economies and election systems at play. I think I must have been to 56 countries over the last 5 years and have seen the unique political economy of many lands as far apart economically, geographically and politically as Mexico and Mongolia, Malta and Mozambique. But is occurs to me, that I can understand the electorate in my own country, without even departing my home airport of Sydney.

Just think of the traffic of passengers that goes through the three terminals of Sydney Airport.

In Terminal 1, the international terminal, you have a mix of regular business travellers from corporate Australia. They are a mix of high income mainly Liberal voters but with some professional class Labor voters and Greens as well. However, there are also young voters (back packers and students who are traditionally Labor and now increasingly green) and increasingly Australians from all over the income spectrum that can now travel overseas for holidays thanks to a high Australian dollar and increasing Airline competition – particularly in Asia. The high dollar is causing a once in a generation structural change in the Australian economy, where Australia businesses export to Asia, Australian consumers buy retail online from the USA, and Australian tourists take their holidays in Tuscany or Thailand rather than Tully or Tweed Heads.

But at Terminal 1, there’s another major segment of the Australian electorate that always matters – immigrants. Not only do immigrants go to this terminal to fly back to see their relatives (or come to the airport to welcome new family members, like Italian and Greek migrants used to in the 1950s and 1960s at the docks), but take a look around at the airport. Who does all the work there? Who cleans the airport, serves in the shops, or handles your baggage, drives your taxi or airport bus or checks you into your hotel? Immigrants. And many are newly arrived. It’s not a surprise. ABS data shows that, one in four Aussies were born overseas, Sensis data shows that one in two of our exporters are born overseas. On average, immigrants do the work, create the jobs, make excellent employers and exporters and their kids and grandkids will probably go to Uni and be highly skilled workers. Low and middle income, immigrants also have traditionally voted Labor, but any comments about “not believing in big Australia” should be carefully interpreted as they are one group who has remained loyal to the ALP (and the ACTU) despite recent debates.

Next is Terminal 2, the terminal for Virgin and Jetstar and the terminal that services regional Australia. A lot of National party voters use this terminal (to go to Taree and Coffs Harbour, Dubbo and Wagga Wagga) but again some holiday makers use it for cheap flights to Byron Bay Ballina or the Gold Coast. With the rise in income self employed voters (blue collar tradies, contractors and other small business operators) a new constituency is up for grabs. Many of these voters (as employees and union members) would have definitely voted for Bob Hawke and for Paul Keating, but Tony Abbott and John Howard before him have had some success in wooing them. Many of them would have voted for Kevin Rudd in 2007 as the Howard Government’s work choices legislation was just too radical and employer-centric for a moderate, practical Australian electorate. For an incumbent Labor Prime Minister winning Terminal 2 back is crucial for the 2013 campaign.

Finally, Terminal 3, this is Qantas domestic, which attracts mainly Corporate Australia. Electorally it would be similar to the Qantas Club in the International Terminal – professional, middle to high income, busy and split between Coalition, Labor and Green but tending to Coalition (but of a Malcolm Turnbull style, small ‘L’ liberal variety).

So there’s my advice to a Labor Prime Minister for the next election: consolidate Terminal 3, maintain a winning margin in Terminal 1, but make up lost ground in Terminal 2, where the Coalition are campaigning very effectively with Tony Abbott’s cut through style.

Tim Harcourt is the JW Nevile Fellow in Economics, Australian School of Business, UNSW and author of The Airport Economist.