As public servants we must constantly understand the changing dynamics, challenges and expectations of the democracies we serve. How public sector bodies undertake the innovation needed to explore, understand and adapt to this changing context is a fascinating and unique challenge.
Join Sean Audain and Pia Andrews as they share some of their experiences building and sustaining an innovation culture, and how some of the tools and techniques applied can help us meet the challenges of the next decade.
About Our Speaker
Sean is the City Innovation Lead at Wellington City Council. His career has focussed on Innovation, Smart Cities and the strategic transformation of Local Government. Sean has lead leads the development of Wellington’s smart city, exploring how Open Data, the Internet of Things, Artificial Intelligence, Data Visualisation, GIS and Virtual Reality can help Council understand the city, better talk with citizens and make better decisions.
Sean has an Urban Planning Degree from the University of Auckland and serves on a number of Partnership Bodies including the Open Government Partnership Expert Advisory Panel, Digital Twin Taskforce, the World Economic Forum’s G20 Smart Cities Advisory Group and the Global Futures Council. Sean’s work has seen Wellington recognised as New Zealand’s leading smart city and has been recognised by a number of National and International Awards.
Pia Andrews is an open government and data ninja who has been working in making the world a better place for 20 years. She currently works within the (public sector) machine to transform public services through greater transparency, democratic engagement, citizen-centric design, open data, emerging technologies and real, pragmatic actual innovation in the public sector and beyond. She believes that tech culture has a huge role to play in achieving better policy planning, outcomes, public engagement and a better public service all round. She is also trying to do her part in establishing greater public benefit from publicly funded data, software and research.
Pia was recognised in 2018 and 2019 as one of the global top 20 most Influential in Digital Government and was awarded as one of the Top 100 Most Influential Women in Australia for 2014.