Government and public sector

Alex has served in a range of Deputy Secretary and senior executive positions across multiple portfolios, including Education, Human Services, Precincts, Justice and Health, and led the establishment of the Melbourne Arts Precinct entity and capital delivery program as A/CEO.

In these roles, Alex has steered large-scale transformations, navigated politically charged environments, and delivered outcomes at the intersection of policy, strategy and operations. He has earned a reputation for bringing clarity to complexity, designing innovative and sustainable organisational models, and winning the confidence of boards, CEOs and ministers.

In his career to date, Alex has:

• Supported a range of community sector organisations and government entities in designing and delivering organisational and service transformation, and developing culture and change management approaches.
• Restructured corporate and service delivery operations at a major government department, covering 13,000 staff across 50 locations. This included establishing a new regional and area-based service delivery model and transformed central and corporate functions, including significant staff realignment supported by a department-wide change program.
• Directly managed and transformed a range of complex and high-profile service delivery, operational and corporate functions across government, ranging from 100 to 500 staff and including a series of rapid and successful start-up and scale-up operations.
• Established a new government portfolio, including policy leadership through cabinet, strategic planning and economic modelling, sector engagement and establishment of a new operating model and cross government governance arrangements.
• Led a series of large-scale Machinery of Government changes, including the amalgamation and separation of various government departments.

Provided 15 years of individual coaching and mentoring, particularly supporting aspiring executives into senior leadership roles.

Additional highlights by role

• As the establishment lead and acting CEO of the Melbourne Arts Precinct Transformation in 2021/2022, he was accountable for $1.5 billion of capital delivery planning, managing statutory planning controls and establishing a new government delivery agency (MAP Co.).
• As Deputy Secretary, Precincts and Suburban Development from 2018 to 2020, he established and led a new government portfolio, bringing together 130 policy and delivery staff, overseeing $100 million of operations and projects.
• As Deputy Secretary, Industry Coordination and Recovery in Victoria’s industry department in 2020, Alex led rapid start up and expansion of a number of high-profile Covid-19 government initiatives, building multiple agile teams of 50 to 100 staff to support implementation of over $500 million of government initiatives.
• As Director of People and Culture at the then Department of Human Services from 2013 to 2015, he led a team of 150 staff delivering all aspects of people services to a workforce of over 14,000 staff.
• As the Director of Youth Justice from 2007 to 2009, he managed Victoria’s custodial centres for young people across three locations, with a workforce of 500 staff and a budget of $50 million.

Alex has an Executive Master of Public Administration from ANZSOG/University of Melbourne. He has also completed the Australian Institute of Company Directors (AICD) course.

Alice’s recent experience has included:

• Developing a series of practical, meaningful strategic planning and measurement documents to cascade strategy to business functions and enable ongoing monitoring of progress for a Victorian public authority and purpose-driven organisations.
• Working with a leading Early Years Management (EYM) organisation to review its portfolio performance and potential, building on their strategic approach and portfolio optimisation frameworks and models to present relevant insights on portfolio performance and potential to the executive and board.
• Working with the executive team from a Victorian public authority to define their CEO-2 and full structure of key functions to maximise impact and deliver on strategic ambition. Alice has also supported a global biotechnology company to define its global risk and compliance structure, design new processes and develop interaction and customer experience models.
• Working with the CEO and executive team of an industry superannuation fund to develop a compelling value proposition and service model for its financial help and guidance offering. This included consultation with end users and development of journey maps, personas and mock prototypes.
• Conducting several ways of working focus groups with staff, gathering perspectives required to support the establishment of the new merged division. Alice developed a report for senior leaders with a summary of collective themes heard from staff and proposed next steps to support a successful transition to the new division.
• Reviewing the governance and institutional arrangements for a Victorian government owned corporation and development of an enterprise-wide governance and decision-making framework for a global biotechnology company that was endorsed by the CEO.

Prior to joining Right Lane Consulting, Alice worked as an Associate Manager in Strategy and Consulting at Accenture. She holds a Bachelor of Commerce/Laws (Honours) from Monash University and studied abroad at Maastricht University in the Netherlands.

In his career to date, Richard has:

• Led multiple independent organisation design reviews and operating model reform projects across the Victorian Government, including as project lead for the VCAA Independent Root and Branch Review and Independent Monitor’s VCE Assurance process (2025).
• Designed and implemented Target Operating Models for Victorian Government entities, including GOTAFE and a proposed joint Human Services/Justice Operations portfolio, using both Agile sprint and Waterfall methodologies.
• Served as Executive Director across multiple Victorian Government departments — including the Department of Education, DJPR, DHHS and DPC — leading teams of up to 35 staff and overseeing complex delivery portfolios, governance reform and strategic planning.
• Transformed enterprise PMO functions, risk frameworks and governance structures at the Department of Education, delivering the 2024–28 Strategic Plan, PMO365 platform reform and a comprehensive overhaul of the Department’s risk management approach.
• Led establishment and operational scale-up of Breakthrough Victoria — a $2bn state-owned investment firm — building operations, IT, HR, compliance and finance functions from ABN inception to 50+ staff.

Richard holds PRINCE2 Practitioner, MSP Practitioner and Managing Successful Risk (Practitioner) certifications. He also holds a Diploma of Media Arts (Thames Valley University) and a Diploma of Engineering (Birmingham City University).