Hi, I'm Adam.

I'm super keen to be Hireup's newest Strategic Project Lead.

Summary

Thanks for taking the time to read my submission!

With a passion for innovation, facilitation and problem solving, I love to create the conditions for my teams to do awesome work.

I've had the opportunity to work in a broad range of roles and industries; the consistent themes in my work are:

Delivery leadership - taking accountability for ensuring clarity of outcomes and delivery to achieve these outcomes
Culture and engagement - building meaningful connections with the client and my colleagues as we have fun and trust each other to deliver
Technical excellence - with a majority of projects relating to digital delivery, ensuring a clear focus on quality and willingness to try new solutions
Contemporary ways of working - over a decade of experience in agile delivery, which has been augmented with complementary capabilities in design thinking and related disciplines.
Commercial discipline and entrepreneurial mindset - I typically manage the finances of my engagements end-to-end, and constantly seek out new ways to add value for all parties involved.

Why am I applying for the Strategic Projects Lead role?

I've enjoyed a rewarding career across financial services and consulting, and am desperately keen to focus my 'business hours' energy on making a meaningful impact in our society. This role - and becoming part of the Hireup team - presents a remarkable opportunity to do just that.

A key aspect of the next role I am seeking is to engage myself fully into a team - become part of a family. There's a clear indication that this role will provide that sort of working environment.

I am also excited at the chance to combine a range of experiences I have across facilitation, strategic innovation, consulting and delivery leadership to take on this unique role.

Finally - when my kids are asked by their friends what their daddy does for a job, I want them to be able to answer simply and clearly, and beam with pride when they say it.

Values Alignment

Be kind always | Unleash your full potential | Believe in what we do | Help each other be great | Share the story

I can confidently claim a very strong alignment to Hireup's values, and would warmly welcome the opportunity to bring those values to life every day as part of the Hireup team.

Skills Exploration

I was truly excited to explore the detailed description provided of the skills required for this role. The broad range of skills and experience I've accrued in my career across technology, innovation, insurance, consulting and management allows me to confidently submit my application for your consideration.

You are invited to explore further below - I've added some commentary against each of the listed skills areas to help describe the relevant skills and experience I would be excited to bring to the Hireup team.

Able to structure complex problems and define the plans to solve them, injecting strategic and innovative thinking into issues that hireup faces.

I'm excited to draw on my design thinking, innovation and problem solving skills to demonstrate these capabilities.

The key ingredients that would ensure success in this space:

Clarity of communication - focus on the details in framing and messaging. This is a core skill for my role as a Senior Manager in PwC's Experience Consulting team.
User research and active listening to enable a broad perspective on key issues
A broad innovation toolkit which I've enjoyed tapping in to throughout my career.

Solid experience leading projects (preferably in a technology-first environment), prioritising work, planning, facilitating workshops and delivering on-time

As a Senior Manager at PwC, delivery leadership is a key component of my role, where I've been able to draw on years of experience in delivery leadership in Suncorp prior. Nearly all delivery is for (or related to) digital solutions.

This style of work has included new projects, enhancements, BAU changes and production support across a broad range of technologies and product types.

Lead, manage and mentor team members to their full potential

Whilst this is a strong passion of mine, it is also one of the more widely varied parts of my career. Key experiences that equip me well for this component of the role are:

a broad range of leadership experience; having up to 16 direct reports (plus managing contractors)
leading the Experience Consulting capability in Sydney for PwC, managing team engagement and local activities
deep Agile and ways of working Coaching experience, which has helped me build my coaching and mentoring skills

Strong quantitative skills, know how to use excel or other advanced tools, to get insight from data and inform action

I have a software engineering background and related skills in SQL and advanced excel / google sheets formulas, and a passion for visualisation to make data more accessible and actionable.

As a simple example - this very website has google analytics activated to allow me to track the success of this alternative style of job application. 😉

Experience in a top tier strategy consultancy, investment bank or corporate strategy team is highly desirable.

I've enjoyed a mix of strategy and delivery engagements in my time at PwC, and was able to build on a range of experiences at Suncorp, working with and in strategy and strategic innovation teams.

This experience has allowed me to build a broad toolkit to help engage and persuade decision makers, as well as form a strong position on key issues and articulate them clearly. Brevity and clarity is a recurring theme, whether creating SOAP (Statement On A Page) business cases for Suncorp, or helping PwC clients explore and communicate concepts with a Lean or Business Model Canvas.

Possess high emotional intelligence and an ability to navigate complex situations with empathy and humility.

Empathy and humility are traits that I place great value on, and I am constantly striving to be a better listener in all situations. I would welcome the chance to hone these skills in an area where truly human values are non-negotiable.

In the following section on facilitation, I refer to an amazing experience I had on the constellation project - the opportunity to work with government officials, social workers, academics, and people with lived experience of abuse and homelessness was truly formative in helping me value these skills.

You are a confident and authentic facilitator, comfortable working with all levels of the organisation; are able to build trust with a range of stakeholders.

Faciliation is an absolute passion of mine, and I've relished every opportunity to facilitate in my career.

I've enjoyed so many opportunities to design and deliver meaningful experiences for colleagues, clients and customers, including:

Providing customised "Agile 101" training to PwC's Digital Accelerator Program - and adapting the material for an on-line training experience during COVID restrictions. It was consistently rated as the strongest component of a multi-faceted internal training program
Coaching and facilitating an incredibly diverse team of volunteers in one of the social impact labs of the constellation project, where we explored creating the conditions for policy change to allow for Mandatory Inclusionary Zoning - one of several actions through which we seek to end homelessness within a generation.
Coaching and training thousands of Telstra employees on Agile ways of working and how to embed customer focus and continuous improvement into how they do their job
Designing and facilitating numerous sessions across Suncorp at various levels - including a teamwork session for the IT Executive Leadership Team; exploring gamification for an insurance brand; and encouraging the insurance team to explore the impact of autonomous vehicles to their business model.

Understand the value and know how to clearly evaluate outcomes and impact.

With many years of experience in agile ways of working, I'm always drawn to the core concepts of transparency, inspection and adaptation.

Through these we can:

agree, communicate and get endorsement for our goals
have clear outcomes and goals to track against
discern as quickly as possible if we are achieving our goals
change our approach accordingly

The other key part of this is a clearly defined purpose - which helps us ensure that these tracked outcomes are achieving the desired impact.

Experience working with product/engineering teams or a technology-first environment highly desirable

I have had many years working in, leading and working with product & engineering teams in Suncorp, and this still remains a key part of my role in PwC as we are often helping deliver digital solutions for our clients.

I have many years of experience as a software engineer and technical lead, and a strong appreciation for the craft of the role.

Passionate about making the support worker experience as accessible, fulfilling and progressive as possible.

I am deeply interested in pursuing this outcome - to see the impact this has on our community and economy, and especially the impact this has on the people that the support workers serve.

Highly collaborative and like working with fast-paced teams in complex environments.

This is the type of environment that I have been in and consistently seek to nurture in my work.

Have a strong connection to, or interest, in building an understanding of the Australian disability sector and community.

My current connection to this community is currently quite ad-hoc, and one step removed. My desire to make an impact in this critical part of our community is what is driving this application.

Get in touch at adam@reitsma.net.au or 0459 847 203

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