Executive Director, Corporate Services

Guiding the future of NSW education

Position details

• Ongoing role, Public Service Senior Executive (PSSE) Band 2
• Close to Wynyard station with hybrid work available (3 office days per week as standard)
• Drive service delivery transformation to support operational and strategic performance

About us

At the NSW Education Standards Authority (NESA), we're dedicated to carrying out meaningful work that drives improvements and elevates student achievement across NSW, now and into the future.

We accomplish this by supporting all school sectors with high-quality syllabuses, assessment (including managing the HSC and NAPLAN), teaching standards (e.g., accrediting teachers) and school environments (including setting and monitoring school standards).

NESA is a unique organisation in NSW (of around 780 FTE staff) with significant state-wide impact, visit our website to learn more about the important work we do.

About the role

Reporting to the Chief Executive Officer, the Executive Director, Corporate Services leads NESA's executive and corporate functions, supporting the work of NESA's divisions to achieve organisational outcomes and government priorities.

The Executive Director leads a team of 5 direct reports (including Directors and one Senior Manager) across the diverse areas of ministerial, board and executive services, finance, media and communications, people and culture and enterprise programs (which is a centralised project and program management directorate). These teams have significant internal impact and high external visibility, particularly in relation to media and communications and ministerial, board and executive services.

The Executive Director will oversee significant transformation across the organisation (which has commenced) focusing on systems and business models of the division, including to support NESA's workforce capability and engagement aligned to optimising performance.

About you

To enable success in this role, we are looking for an established senior executive who:

• Has a proven record of leading and change-managing multi-disciplinary strategic and operational directorates across a diverse, complex organisation, with demonstrated ability to deliver within budget.
  
  Brings experience of government requirements and processes, particularly in reforming delivery.
• Is a people-focused leader who can inspire strategic and operational teams to connect with purpose, pursue excellence, and prioritise initiatives that deliver value to NESA and our stakeholders.
• Holds a relevant tertiary qualification.
• Demonstrates strong organisational capability and has experience delivering high-quality advice to peers and senior stakeholders in a high-volume and multi-functional environment.

We invite you to download the role description for full details.

Ready to join us?

Select apply and attach an up-to-date résumé (maximum 6 pages) and a cover letter (maximum 2 pages). Also address the 2 targeted questions below in your online application (maximum 400 words each):

1. Please provide an example where you have led changes to work practice and culture of an area. Please briefly explain why the change was necessary, how you led the changes and the results achieved.
2. Please provide an example where you managed a major compliance issue aligned to a key policy or legislative provision. What was the issue and what did you do to manage it?

Close date: 28 September 2025 (at 11.59pm AEST)

Advice on applying for NSW Public Sector roles

If you need reasonable adjustments for the recruitment process and workplace, please reach out to the contact person above.

Thank you for your interest, we look forward to receiving your application.

Important information

We particularly welcome applications from Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, people with a disability, people of all ages, genders, cultural and linguistic backgrounds, the LGBTQIA+ community, veterans and refugees.

Visa sponsorship is not available for this position. For ongoing roles, you must be an Australian or New Zealand citizen or an Australian Permanent Resident.

A Talent Pool (valid for 18 months) may be created for future ongoing and temporary roles.