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Introduction
Trent Smyth
2 min read
'It doesn't really matter which industry you come from, how large your organisation is, which part of the world you come from, we're all grappling with the same problems, we're all trying to get alignment. We're all dealing with the people problems, we're all working out how we do this lonely job and deal with the issues that we have without being able to share with other people.'
The Chief of Staff Executive Education at the University of Oxford programmes have been instrumental in prompting a wide range of discussions about chiefs of staff and organisations.
Each programme presents participants with a new set of differing perspectives, drawing on cutting-edge research and the reflections of expert practitioners. And then provides space for the participants to talk.
The result is always a series of rich conversations that bring the chief of staff role into greater definition. These build on the conversations in previous programmes and in our other events and reports, including our annual State of the Industry Report.
In the State of the Industry Report 2023 we asked survey respondents how they spent their time. We wanted to explore whether the role leant predominantly towards a specialism, such as strategy or culture, or whether it was indeed all about ‘the care and feeding of the principal’. It will surprise nobody to hear that, though we discovered six different ‘modalities’ in which chiefs of staff focused primarily on, for example, strategy, leadership, and project management, in total our respondents between them touched equally on every specialism: executive leadership, strategy, culture, operations, staff, communications, and project management.
We have used this Report from the Oxford Programme in November 2023, therefore, to delve deeper into what exactly chiefs of staff do when they are engaging with these specialist areas. What does ‘the ultimate generalist’ add to the work of focused experts? In other words, what is it that the chief of staff does in the organisation that no one else can do?
We are grateful, as always, to the programme director, Professor Jonathan Trevor, and his assembled team of academic and practitioner experts, as well as to the programme participants, whose thoughts, experiences, and ideas are captured in the anonymous quotes scattered throughout.
Author Bio
Trent Smyth AM
Chief Executive Officer
The Chief of Staff Association
Trent Smyth is an accomplished leader with a diverse professional portfolio. As the current CEO of The Chief of Staff Association (CSA), he oversees a leading organization linking chiefs of staff across the military, non-profits, government, and global corporations. Alongside his role at the CSA, Trent has been steering the growth of the Australian Football League (AFL) in Europe as the Chairman of AFL Europe since 2021. His leadership extends to the boardroom, where he supports rising UK decision-makers at OPUS.
Previously, Trent represented Malawi as its Honorary Consul, where he notably facilitated a significant donation of KN95 masks to combat Covid-19. His passion for motorsport was evident during his directorship at the Australian Grand Prix Corporation, where he held various committee roles and chaired the Sales and Marketing committee. For his substantial contributions across international relations, motorsport, and business, he was honoured with the Order of Australia in 2021.
