What does it say?

Basically, it says if you look over the last, uh, decade or so, our economic dynamism has gone down.

We're stagnating a whole bunch of, uh, different indicators, and up to twenty percent of that malaise is due to the growth in red tape.

Um, and, um, what it also does, which might be interesting to your listeners, is it points to a whole lot of other places overseas that are doing something about this.

In the UK, twenty-five percent administration burden reduction plan, even the EU, twenty-five percent for all companies, thirty-five percent for small and medium enterprises, um, and various other places in the States.

So it's, um, not only an Australian thing, but what's different is we seem to be admiring the problem rather than doing something about it.

What are you recommending we need to achieve that?

Yeah, a couple of things.

What does it say?

Basically, it says if you look over the last, uh, decade or so, our economic dynamism's gone down.

We're stagnating a whole bunch of, uh, different indicators, and up to twenty percent of that malaise is due to the growth in red tape.

Um, and, um, what it also does which might be interest- To your listeners, is it points to a whole lot of other places overseas that are doing something about this.

In the UK, twenty-five percent administration burden reduction plan.

Even the EU, twenty-five percent for all companies, thirty-five percent for small and medium enterprises, um, and various other places in the States.

So it's, um, not only an Australian thing, but what's different is we seem to be admiring the problem rather than doing something about it.

What are you recommending we need to achieve that?

I just wanted to start by asking, from what you're hearing, what are the most material forces that are reshaping the government's environment right now? And also, I'm interested in what are boards most at risk of missing if they don't lift their gaze?

Hmm.

That's a great point.

In fact, a lot of boards are learning their way through this and there's a bit of a voice for what do we do in the future? What we did in the past mightn't set us up for what we need to do in the future.

So the guide tries to pull a few threads together.

And the way I'm thinking about it and seeing it manifest itself If we went back three years in time and we did what we call a direct incentive index and we looked at the top 10 issues that were there and then we came forward to today, they are different today to what they were three years ago.

And where are the differences? The differences are in geopolitical events.

So I'm just interested in hearing from you about how you see the board's role in setting a culture in the context of AI that gets the balance right between its promise and its risks.

I just wanted to start by asking, from what you're hearing, what are the most material forces that are reshaping the government's environment right now? And also, I'm interested in what are boards most at risk of missing if they don't lift their gaze?

that's a great point in fact um a lot of boards are learning their way through this and there's a there's a bit of a voice for what do we do in the future what we did in the past mightn't set us up for what we need to do in the future so the guide tries to pull a few threads together and the way i i'm thinking about it and seeing it manifest itself If we went back three years in time and we did what we call a direct incentive index and we looked at the top 10 issues that were there and then we came forward to today, they are different today to what they were three years ago.

And where are the differences? The differences around geopolitical events.

Boards are thinking much more about those.

And I'll come back to that.

They're thinking much more about productivity.

Three years ago, a post-COVID kind of mojo bounce, I guess, it was easy to be profitable.

So I'm just interested in hearing from you about how you see the board's role in setting a culture in the context of AI that gets the balance right between its promise and its risks.

What really struck you in that index?

It's called the Director's Sentiment Index.

It's done independently twice a year, and it's been going for several years.

And there's a couple of things I get out of that.

One is what's on directors' minds, what's keeping them awake at night.

And secondly, the trends over time.

And it's been interesting.

How are Australian directors thinking about that?