The Australian Government Department of Defence skip navigation links |

Minister | Navy | Army | Air Force | Department

Defending Australia and its National Interests

Coordination and Public Affairs

Streamlining critical issues management

Improvements in situational awareness and in the effectiveness of issues management processes are expected to flow from changes in Defence to be implemented this year.

By Janine Hall

'Apart from its higher level management benefits, this should enable much-improved management and coordination of urgent issues.'

Air Chief Marshal Angus Houston
Chief of the Defence Force

By June 2006, Defence will have a new centre to provide a 'one-stop shop' for issues management.

The Secretary and Chief of the Defence Force (CDF) announced in February that the headquarters functions would be consolidated into a new entity—the Australian Defence Headquarters (ADHQ).

To support the new ADHQ, which is due to be put into place on 1 July 2006, a Defence Coordination Centre is being created.

Brian Agnew, Director of Coordination, who heads up the implementation team for the new centre, explains the change.

'The Secretary and the CDF want to build on the existing strengths of Defence by improving our speed of response to issues. That is why a new ADHQ is being created.

'In turn, we are creating the Defence Coordination Centre to enhance support to the offices of our Ministers, the Secretary and CDF, and the new ADHQ.

'It will also give us all in Defence a greater situational awareness.'

The Defence Coordination Centre will improve the flow of information and responsiveness to other areas of Defence.

'Groups will be able to work with the Defence Coordination Centre to ensure that their critical issues going to the Minister and senior officials will be addressed in an integrated and timely manner,' Brian says.

The Defence Coordination Centre will be responsible for:

  • supporting the daily work routine of ADHQ by providing a single, assured point for day-to-day issues management, as well as supporting surge-and-crisis management;
  • improving the flow of information and responsiveness;
  • drawing on information from a variety of sources (media, intelligence, Parliament, Defence and whole-of-government) to provide clearer awareness and a common understanding of critical issues, and disseminating that information to Defence leadership;
  • improving the critical issues management machinery;
  • identifying issues that require proactive and reactive management;
  • identifying key issues management stakeholders in Defence; and
  • coordinating ADHQ and Defence-wide responses and acting as the conduit for agreed and authorised Defence responses to government and the public.

'It is important to note that operations will continue to be directed by Headquarters Joint Operations Command, with the Defence Coordination Centre providing support to these issues.'

Part of the process of establishing the Defence Coordination Centre involves collocating a number of existing branches.

'Military Strategic Affairs Branch and key elements of the Public Affairs and Ministerial and Executive Support branches will be collocated adjacent to the senior executives.

'We expect these changes will generate close and effective interaction between these branches and senior executives with this collocation,' Brian says.

For more information:

The new Defence Coordination Centre and the changes to Defence in general are explained on the Changes in Defence website on the Defence Restricted Network.

The website can be found at: http://intranet.defence.gov.au/changes/

Change Update for Defence

The March issue of Defence provided a summary of planned changes to strengthen accountability and responsibility for results in Defence. In support of these changes, the Defence Business Improvement Board and the Defence Coordination Centre are to be in place before 1 July 2006.

Some elements of the new organisation structure are still to be finalised.

Defence will consist of ten groups, following a recent decision to retain the Chief Information Officer (CIO) Group and Joint Logistics Command (JLC) as distinct groups in the new structure. This decision reflects the high priority that the Secretary and CDF put on achieving key policy outcomes in the CIO and JLC organisations.

[ top of page ]