The Pulse Check Culture Review comes nearly five years since the AOC undertook to implement all 17 recommendations of a previous review conducted by the Ethics Centre. 

Those recommendations, implemented in a timely and effective way, included developing a cultural plan, increasing transparency in decision-making and developing a more robust ethics framework. 

The results of this latest review indicated that the AOC has “significantly improved across the overwhelming majority of measures.”

The key findings included significant improvements in the level of agreement:

• Positive Games experience for Federations – from 33% to 91% 
• Workplace relations constructive and respectful – from 31% to 83% 
• Mutual trust and respect between staff  – from 44% to 77% 
• Recognition & collaboration between staff – from 44% to 77% 
• AOC’s values modelled by executive team – from 31% to 75% 
• AOC communicates well with Federations – from 53% to 91%

AOC Chief Executive Officer Matt Carroll says the Ethics Centre Review demonstrates that change is possible with a genuine commitment to improvement.

“We are all extremely proud of what we have achieved and the new values that are now embedded in our organisation. The review some five years ago made for uncomfortable reading, but we were transparent about the task we faced and committed to turning things around. 

“When you have staff and our member sports describing us as a completely different place and a new organisation, that is gratifying,” Mr Carroll said.

Chair of the AOC Culture, Remuneration and Nominations Committee Craig Carracher welcomed the report, highlighting the organisation’s determination to embrace the high-performance standards asked of its Teams.

“Five years ago, we embraced the challenge of cultural review, aligned with our ambitions of professionalising our executive leadership team following the global search then appointment of our CEO, Matt Carroll. His leadership and the recruitment and retention of our Senior Leadership Team has enabled these encouraging results. 

“I am convinced our off-field performance has enabled our on-field team ambitions and provided a platform for our athletes to achieve their goals. We are committed to continuous improvement and the coming Paris quad offers us the opportunity now to consolidate on the dramatic steps taken since Rio,” Mr Carracher concluded.

The Ethics Centre Director of Innovation John Neil says the level of transformation achieved by the AOC is quite rare and demonstrates what’s possible if an organisation is prepared to reflect and then act.  

“The AOC faced squarely into those aspects of its culture that needed addressing. They acted decisively but only after taking a systemic view, which enabled them to focus in on the root causes. This is what makes culture change so difficult for many organisations. 

“Often approaches to culture change barely scratch the surface. The AOC, in undertaking a deep review and by acting on the recommendations with strong leadership they were able to face courageously into the mirror that our findings presented,” Mr Neil said.

The AOC has agreed it will implement all further recommendations including:

• Enhancements to internal communication with catch-ups across groups, forums and sharing stories about values
• A change-leadership approach including a mentoring program and leadership coaching model
• Staff development including secondments to build skills
• Formal rewards and recognition programs
• A culture and wellbeing council
• Ongoing pulse checks

Mr Carroll said this latest review is not an end point. 

“There’s no such thing as perfection and we will continue to work hard to build on what we have done. 

“The AOC presents an attractive destination for talented people, but we are conscious of the need to provide pathways for our staff to develop and advance their careers. 

“We now have a transparent process of performance review to ensure people are appropriately rewarded and have those development opportunities. Given the relatively small size of our organisation, there are some inherent constraints, but it’s up to us to work through how we manage this. 

“The restoration of trust with staff and member sports is such a crucial thing. 

The Ethics Centre Pulse Check included interviews with AOC staff, AOC Executive and member sports who have key responsibilities in the areas relevant to each recommendation, as well as surveys to capture perceptions of staff and Federation members.