Page 57 - Australian Defence Magazine Feb-Mar 21

FEBRUARY – MARCH 2021 | WWW.AUSTRALIANDEFENCE.COM.AU
FROM THE SOURCE JONATHAN ARMSTRONG 57
that’s had an impact on us. Put simply it makes it harder for us to develop junior staff because in an MSP we’re asked to provide mostly experienced team members because that is viewed as the most effective way to solve the immediate problem. That removes the ability for us to provide blended teams for senior staff to develop our junior staff.
I have concerns that longer term MSP might create an experience gap. And that’s in marked contrast to our work in the rail sector, where we contract for outcomes, develop- ing new talent and capability to support some of Australia’s major infrastructure projects, which is another area where talent is in short supply.
Overall it’s probably fair to say it’s led us to look at al- ternative routes to market, so capability work directly to headquarters and below the line work for industry where we believe we can have the greatest impact.
ADM: 2020 was a big year for Defence policy updates, with the focus on Australian businesses coming to the fore even more; what does your business bring to the table in that context?
ARMSTRONG: I believe we have much to add around emerg- ing and disruptive technologies. We lead the technical as- sessments for the Defence Innovation Hub which is doing an outstanding job connecting innovative
we backed our staff so they could back our clients and in many ways it has moved us forward years in a matter of months.
With staff support we’ve moved forward in terms of flexible work arrangements and our business systems have been bril- liant supporting remote working and remote collaboration. As a bunch of engineers, we don’t tend to blow our own trumpets much but we’ve needed to increase our digital presence and dig- ital marketing during the period when the sort of normal ‘coffee and conferences’ way of developing trusted relationships hasn’t been available to us. And we’ve invested in wellbeing programs for our staff as some of the longer-term impacts of protracted periods of working from home became more evident.
And I’ll say this, we’ve great empathy for the many work- places that have had it tough but by any measure we’ve had our most successful year in 2020.
ADM: Last but not least, what does success look like in the coming five years? So if we had this conversation at the beginning of 2026, where would you like to be? ARMSTRONG: Fundamentally for me, it’s about having im- pact. So sure, we’d expect to be double in size in that time- frame but that’s a secondary feature. Primarily it’s about the impact we’re having for our clients and for society. I would expect our reputation and impact in systems engineering,
capacity in Australian industry with defence capability needs. That requires a whole range of highly specialist skillsets to assess innova- tion proposals. We continue to invest in our business to provide wide skills to support the Defence Innovation Hub pull through emerging and disruptive technology and put it to work for the ADF.
“I’D CHARACTERISE US UNDER MSP AS PROVIDING HIGH ADDED VALUE SERVICES WHERE IT MAKES SENSE
TO DO SO.”
systems assurance and engineering innovation related to complex digital, electrical, mechani- cal systems and facilities, would be rock solid, bridging the gap between overseas OEMs and Australian capability and regulation.
But it’s about more than that for me be- cause we live in an extraordinary time of change and, in particular, change to complex systems that many in society take for granted. Like our security systems, our energy and mo- bility systems, all of which are challenged by climate change and population growth.
We also need to bring, where relevant, our
UK expertise and make that available in the
Australian market. I use the phrase ‘bridging
the gap’ as a good example of a number of our
services. With a business presence in the UK and in Australia we are in a good place to bridge the gap between a technology purchase from an overseas OEM and a specific Australian ca- pability requirement in the local regulatory legislative environ- ment. Examples include the Hunter Class, Land 400 Phase 3.
Changing these complex systems takes good strategy and good engineering – an appeal to the heart and the head – requiring mutual respect and understanding be- tween our policy and technical communities. Whilst that needs work, perversely COVID has shown us it’s possible. We’ve seen examples where world political leaders share the stage with chief medical officers - the political and technical community working together. That’s renewed trust in society and allowed some bold interventions to take place. I would like us to see more of this. It’s a time to embrace co-depen-
dence and big, bold ideas targeted at societal challenges.
I think the key one for us in the UK and Australia is the net zero journey, and that’s obviously wider than defence, but it’s increasingly relevant to both the strategic context for defence – things like the ADF dealing with bushfires and cyclones and in the UK context, things like the melting ice sheets on the Arctic, with the UK MoD needing to operate more in the Arctic - but also on delivery. In the UK the MoD has already embarked on a 2050 net zero journey. That will have an impact on technology, equipment, infrastructure, processes and behaviours. Going back to my point about be- ing in the market for ideas, I would like on that timescale for us to make a real impact in terms of net zero in Australia. ■
In the UK we are part of a research framework called SERAPIS which helps Dstl achieve the best return on its investment in C4ISR technology. And that’s very relevant to the changing strategic context of defence in Australia. I think we are very well placed in that regard.
ADM: How has COVID affected the business? What mea- sures have you put in place to mitigate it?
ARMSTRONG: Like many of your readers, I suspect a signifi- cant part of the day-to-day job has been working around CO- VID. For us it has been values led: we care, we are trusted, we deliver success, we do things that matter despite the challeng- es COVID has brought us. Particularly how we care for our staff, our clients and our community. Very early on we made the decision we were absolutely going to back our staff, and if we wind the clock back to April 2020, there was a great deal of uncertainty in terms of what the business impact would be. So