Assistant Director, Serious Incident Response Scheme

Executive Level 1

$114,247 - $130,300 + 15.4% superannuation

Non-Ongoing/Ongoing

Hobart - TAS, Sydney - NSW, Brisbane - QLD, Melbourne - VIC, Darwin - NT, Perth – WA and Canberra - ACT 

About the Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission

The Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission (the Commission) was formed on 1 January 2019. The role of the Commission is to protect and enhance the safety, health, wellbeing, and quality of life of people receiving aged care. 

The Commission is the national end-to-end regulator of aged care services and the primary point of contact for consumers and providers in relation to quality and safety. Our vision is to support a world-class aged care system driven by empowered consumers who enjoy the best possible quality of life. 

We aim to build confidence and trust in aged care, empower consumers, promote best practice service provision, promote quality standards, and hold providers to account for their performance against the expected standards of care. We seek to promote an aged care system that develops safer systems of care, inculcates a culture of safety and quality, and learns from mistakes, while providing the oversight that can assure the community that aged care services are operating as they should, including working on continuous improvement.

Meet some of our people and learn more about the Commission and our Regulatory Strategy on our website www.agedcarequality.gov.au

About the Team

The SIRS is an initiative to help prevent and reduce the risk and occurrence of incidents of abuse and neglect of older Australians receiving Commonwealth-subsidised aged care and services. It commenced in residential aged care on 1 April 2021 and was extended to home services on 1 December 2022.

The SIRS has 2 key components:

• incident management responsibilities
• reportable incident obligations.

The 8 types of reportable incidents that must be reported to the Commission include:

• Unreasonable use of force 
• Unlawful sexual contact or inappropriate sexual conduct 
• Psychological or emotional abuse 
• Stealing or financial coercion by a staff member 
• Neglect 
• Inappropriate use of restrictive practices
• Unexplained absence from care / missing consumers 
• Unexpected death.

The aim of SIRS is to:

• build the capability of providers to prevent or reduce the occurrence of serious incidents and improve quality and safety
• require providers to review incident information to drive improvements in quality and safety
• enable the Commission to better detect, triage and respond to risk across all its functions by utilising SIRS notifications alongside the range of intelligence held by the Commission. 

SIRS team delivers on the aim by:

• assessing the actual or potential risk to the safety, health, wellbeing and quality of life of a consumer and provider capacity and capability to address the risk.
• acting in a timely, proportionate and coordinated manner if a provider is not demonstrating capability.
• educating providers using the intelligence gathered from notifications.
• ensuring notifications are recorded accurately into the business systems to produce meaningful intelligence. 
• For more information on the SIRA program go to www.agedcarequality.gov.au/sirs.

About the Role

Reporting to the Director of Operations, Serious Incident Response Scheme, you will be responsible for:

• Implement and deliver the SIRS regulatory program and ensure outcomes align with performance indicators, policies and procedures.
• Lead and manage the daily operations of a team in a high-paced environment.
• Make positive ongoing contribution to the achievement of the Commission’s strategic goals.
• Responsible for driving quality assurance and continuous improvement.
• Cultivates productive working relationships with internal and external stakeholders.
• Exemplifies resilience, personal drive and integrity.
• Ensure appropriate management and use of data and intelligence to inform risk-based decision making, resourcing and strategic outcomes.
• Achieve results through building organizational capability, implementing risk mitigation strategies and supporting change.
• Manage complex case coordination including writing case reports and coordinating information sharing across the Commission.

Position Eligibility Requirements (Selection Criteria): 

To be successful in this role you will need to demonstrate the following: 

• Extensive experience managing and leading teams remotely through periods of change.Track record of delivery by building confidence and capability; and addressing barriers to succeed. 
• Expert knowledge and understanding of complex case coordination matters or ability to quickly acquire.
• Extensive experience in implementing, driving and measuring quality assurance and continuous improvement initiatives.
• Ability to analyse complex information including interpretation and application of legislation.
• Excellent communication skills including demonstrated experience working collaboratively with a diverse range of internal and external stakeholders for results.
• Ability to manage sensitive and sometimes confronting information.
• The successful applicant is required to be fully influenza and Covid-19 vaccinated.

Other considerations when applying: 

• Capacity to travel when business needs require.
• Willingness to be flexible with your working hours to accommodate for varying time zones. 

Position Notes:

• Salary offered will be between $114,247 - $130,300 per annum depending on skills and experience. In addition, 15.4% superannuation will be paid.
• Only candidates who hold Australian citizenship can apply. Appointment is conditional on successfully completing a national police check. For more information, please visit www.apsc.gov.au/citizenship-aps
• Non-ongoing opportunity will be offered for an irregular/intermittent term. Opportunities will be offered for varying periods up to 12 months with the option to extend to a total of 24 months. 
• Merit Pool established through this selection process may be used to fill this or future ongoing or non-ongoing vacancies.

In your application, please provide a statement of claims against the position eligibility requirements (selection criteria) in no more than 1000-words, including what strengths you would bring to the role, and a copy of your CV.

Please complete the application and submit by Wednesday 8th May 2024, 11:59PM AEST

Please contact our recruitment team on (02) 9633 3262 or recruitment@agedcarequality.gov.au for assistance with accessing our website or with lodging your application. 

Specific questions about the roles can be directed to Giovanna Stonehouse by emailing Giovanna.stonehouse@agedcarequality.gov.au with Position title in the subject line.

Diversity and Inclusion

The Commission is committed to fostering a workplace with flexible work arrangements to support a diverse, respectful, and inclusive culture for all staff. 

The Commission recognises the richness of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures and is committed to the implementation of our Reconciliation Action Plan. The Commission values the unique knowledge and experience of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees which strengthens and supports our focus on protecting and enhancing the safety, health, wellbeing, and quality of life of aged care consumers. 

Further information

For further information about the Quality Commission, office locations and other related resources, please visit https://www.agedcarequality.gov.au

For more information on the Australian Public Service, please visit http://www.apsc.gov.au/publications-and-media/current-publications/cracking-the-code/factsheet-4 and http://www.apsc.gov.au/publications-and-media/current-publications/cracking-the-code