In August, LGP’s network meetings were a tale of two stories, weather and location wise. LGP ended the procurement and engineering networking meetings by hosting events in Goulburn and Port Macquarie.
Goulburn
On a cold morning in Goulburn the 16 Councils in attendance were greeted with a warm welcome by Luke Kenny, CEO of LGP. The local case study was an early highlight of the day and agenda. Linus Nesbitt-Hawes, Senior Grants Officer and Peter Caldwell, Senior Project Manager, both of Goulburn Mulwaree Council, presented on the grant funded North Park Pavilion, a facility that will be of benefit to the local sporting community.
This year LGP has been fortunate to be joined by the Office of the NSW Anti-Slavery Commissioner to talk to councils about the Modern Slavery Legislation. Victoria Gordon, Senior Legal Policy Officer who has been on the journey around NSW again joined us to update Councils on the latest developments in this space.
The afternoon session contained a thought-provoking presentation on Best Practices in Supplier Relationship provided by Michelle Burgess, Supplier Relationships Manager at LGP. Victoria Yang, Contracts and Legal Officer at LGP and Lou Stojanovski, Director Lawyer, Keystone Lawyers rounded off the day.
With the microphone secured the successful day gave the opportunity for Council staff to ask many questions about the topics presented, the key theme and takeaway of the day was managing risk.
John Pennock – Business Development Manager – Southern Region
Port Macquarie
Our final regional networking meeting for the year was held at Port Macquarie on 24th August. The conference room at Rydges Port Macquarie overlooked the beautiful Hastings River. It was a lovely sunny day, and we were even lucky enough to see a pod of dolphins frolicking in the river.
Over forty delegates from every Council in the region attended, with a number of different roles represented including procurement, project managers, contract administrators and many types of engineers. Dr Clare Allen, CEO at Port Macquarie-Hastings Council opened the meeting with a story that set exactly the right tone for the day.
Our agenda was similar to our other networking meetings this year, which has been well received at all locations. The attendees at Port Macquarie were treated to two Council case studies: the first being the Rawdon Island Bridge Project presented by Inez Young, Group Manager Procurement and Stephen Wood, Bridge and Structures Engineer at, Port Macquarie-Hastings Council. We were also very fortunate to have Michael O’Leary, Manager Civil Operations at Sutherland Shire Council travel all the way from Sydney to present his case study on the Bate Bay Coastal Management Program and Emergency Protection Works at North Cronulla Beach. As all the Councils at the networking meeting were coastal Councils, Michael’s case study was highly relevant to the audience.
Two more LGP events are scheduled for this year, the LGP IT Technology Day is on the 2nd November and the LGP Conference which will be held in Sydney on 17th and 18th October. The conference theme this year is Connect, Leverage and Achieve and this theme is interwoven throughout the agenda, making it relevant to a wide variety of local government roles. Conference delegates will benefit by expanding their knowledge across a range of soft skills that are critical to success no matter what their job title.
Bronwyn Challis Head of Business Development & Business Development Manager – Norther Region
More information including the agenda and registration can be found on our website:
Annual Conference 17th – 18th October Annual Conference – Local Government Procurement (lgp.org.au)
LGP IT Technology IT Day – 2nd November Networking Events – Local Government Procurement (lgp.org.au)
We’d like to thank all our external speakers, many of whom travelled with us throughout NSW.
A big shout out to LGP staff, including Maria Kyriacou, Victoria Yang and Michelle Burgess who presented at all the Regional and Sydney Network events, it’s time to put away the business travel bag.
And a special thank you to our sponsor Origin, it would not be possible to provide these events to councils without the support of Origin.
Thank you,
Bronwyn Challis – Head of Business Development and John Pennock, Business Development Manager – South @ Local Government Procurement