Princess Alexandra Hospital at the forefront of innovation

The Princess Alexandra Hospital is at the forefront of healthcare innovation and better quality of care for patients, having become Australia’s first large-scale digital hospital in November 2015. But the hospital is also at the forefront of their budget. Extra functionality including clinical device integration, the delivery of digital records and wireless upgrades were some of the reasons why Princess Alexandra Hospital (PAH) and Cairns Hospital ran over budget, Queensland Health says. A report by Queensland's Auditor-General released last week into the financial performance...

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How Walt Disney drives innovation through diversity

The Walt Disney Company has adopted a unique approach to engaging a multi-generational workforce with a view to boosting innovation, fostering employee engagement and improving talent management, according to the company’s local head of HR. Walt Disney has a number of programs in place globally, such as internships and reverse mentoring, which assist in catering to the needs of a multi-generational workforce, said Toby List, head of HR, Australia & New Zealand for The Walt Disney Company. Locally, he said the company offers programs, forums and opportunities that encourage a diversity...

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Close the Gap targets not on track

Last week marked ten years since the first Close the Gap report was initiated. “The Close the Gap campaign's goal is to close the health and life expectancy gap between Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples and non-Indigenous Australians within a generation.”1 As leaders from across the country gathered in Canberra to discuss and evaluate outcomes, it became clear that the progress is slow. In some areas, it even appears to be going backwards. “Governments at all levels continue to fail Australia’s First Peoples. Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull’s most recent Close the Gap...

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How technology is changing the retail supply chain

Consumers have more power than ever before and rising expectations mean that later order cut-off times and faster delivery options are constantly changing. With technology such as automation playing an increasing role in the supply chain, many believe this is only going to become more apparent. At the heart of this shift has been the rise of multichannel, which means whichever channel a customer uses they can reasonably expect a consistent quality of experience; whether shopping in-store or via mobile, tablet or laptop. This also means more consumer savviness, with online price comparison...

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Challenging the taboo of mental health issues

Mental health issues are now so widely common around Australia that almost half of Australia’s population will at some point in their life experience a mental health-related condition. One in five will experience a mental illness in any given year. This has made mental health issues one of Australia’s most common illnesses. For long, mental health issues have been considered taboo, and to some extent, still are. They have not been recognised as proper illnesses, but rather, a personality trait.                                                                                                                                                            ...

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Hospital CIO ranked 2nd most influential Government CIO in Australia

Alastair Sharman has been named one of Australia’s Australia’s four most influential Government CIOs as part of CeBIT’s top 50 Australian CIOs of 2016. Sharman heads the ICT division at Children’s Health Queensland Hospital and Health Service where he and his team have recently introduced Tobii technology. The new developments allow immobilised patients to navigate apps using only their eyes, improving their quality of life. “It’s about a young boy who this time last year was walking around, swimming – just a normal kid and in the space of a very short period of time, all he could...

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Snapchat - still a big thing to engage students

Snapchat is Australia’s 5th social media channel with 4,000,000 daily active users, 1 in every 6 Australians, and with its largest audience aged 18-24 (31%), followed by 25-34-year-olds (28%), 13-17 (23%) and 35+ (18%). As statistics show, millennials have fully adapted to using Snapchat on a daily basis and others shouldn’t be afraid to do the same as there can be significant benefits. Even though Facebook is Australia’s (and a global) favourite, and despite being compared to Facebook back in 2004 as a new platform still waiting to see engagement from non-early adopters, Snapchat...

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Taskforce launched to shake-up IT procurement

The Turnbull government is looking to shake-up public sector tech procurement with a push to get smaller players involved in bidding for government ICT contracts. The procurement space has traditionally been dominated by a handful of major global IT heavyweights but it’s a paradigm that the federal government is aiming to change with the launch of an ICT Procurement Taskforce. Assistant minister for digital transformation Angus Taylor said that the opportunity to widen the scope of how government agencies procure new technology solutions is too good to ignore. “We’ve got to let the outside...

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I’m an immigrant and this is why I’m an asset

It’s called cultural diversity and because of the current political climate, it’s at the forefront of many people’s minds. As US President Donald Trump pushes for less immigration and tries to showcase the “dangers” of immigration, the nation and employers are pushing back. Why? Because immigration is beneficial. And organisations are the ones who see it first-hand.   Apple, Google and Facebook , are just some of the big companies who fought (and possibly will have to fight again) Trump’s widely criticised travel ban. These are companies who understand the value a diverse workforce brings...

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Sydney announces new (not so) digital plan

The City of Sydney has been known for a left-of-centre approach to digital transformation and, true to form, it was announced this week they will introduce paperless lodgement for development applications- but the documents have to arrive on a USB. Whilst the process is indeed paperless, it requires the delivery of the USB in person or through the mail. Their paperless lodgement system doesn’t have an online facility to accept the application. In the City’s Draft Digital Strategy (hyperlink: http://sydneyyoursay.com.au/digital-strategy), which is available for public comment until...

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Australians lost $521m to card fraud in 2016 financial year

Australians lost $521 million to card fraud in the 2016 financial year, figures from the Australian Payments Clearing Association (APCA) have shown. Australians spent a total of $703 billion over that period, meaning 0.07 per cent of the total, or 74.2 cents per $1,000 spent was fraudulent. That was a rise from 60.4 cents per $1,000 spent in the year prior. The APCA said the rise in card fraud was driven by card-not-present (CNP) fraud, when card details are stolen and then used to make payments without the card, usually online. "Increasing CNP fraud reflects the growth in e-commerce...

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