Insider insights

5 min read
5 min read

Before Chief Policy Offer (and Deputy CEO) Glen McCrea joined ASFA over eight years ago, he was an economist in the Federal Treasury working across issues including excise, the introduction of the GST, health policy, coordinating the Federal Budget and superannuation.

He also worked as a tax advisor to two assistant treasurers which gave him a good understanding of the decision-making processes. Plus, he ran in the 2012 ACT elections himself.

Glen in ASFA Conference

McCrea made the move to ASFA upon a friend’s recommendation he apply for the role, given his skillset and passion for super. After meeting with the CEO at the time, Pauline Vamos, and going through all the recruitment processes, McCrea made the big decision to move his family from Canberra to Sydney which, he says, he has never regretted.

Advantages of working ‘on the hill’

McCrea’s years working in Treasury have given him an insider’s view which he says helps with being more influential when ASFA is framing advocacy and communicating with decision-makers. And of course, his understanding of economics and superannuation policy doesn’t hurt either.

The role of ASFA’s policy team, he says, is to think about the superannuation system, how they can make the system stronger and how consumers and fund members will benefit.

And this, he says, requires ASFA to be clear about what is achievable in terms of policy development and then work constructively with a variety of partners, from the public service through to the Government, the Opposition, and the crossbench.

This can invariably involve standing up for issues that are not always supported by people in positions of responsibility. One such example is ASFA’s push for the Superannuation Guarantee (SG) increase to 12 per cent, which the Retirement Income Review and various others didn’t necessarily support and required ASFA to constructively communicate the benefits.

Standing up for what AFSA believes to be in members’ best long-term interests is what McCrea sees as ASFA’s most important role, and what he is most passionate about.

Navigating the current political climate

ASFA is looking forward to working with the new Government which McCrea describes as “one of the most diverse Parliaments in history” in terms of its variety of backgrounds and gender balance.

However, he says the Government faces significant economic challenges around global geopolitics, inflation, supply chains and labour force. And with the ongoing pandemic, he says more needs to be done to ensure Australians are not disadvantaged, both economically and socially.

While a difficult task for whichever government is in power, McCrea notes, “I really think this new Parliament is going to have to step up and tackle some of those challenges”.

Ensuring super keeps delivering for members

Looking ahead for the next few years, McCrea says it’s important that superannuation continues to deliver for members so they can see the benefits as they get older and in retirement.

In terms of policy, McCrea says more work is needed around advice, to ensure it is fit for purpose, accessible and affordable.

He also sees the Retirement Income Covenant, which came into effect 1 July 2022, as both a priority and an opportunity to create meaningful discussions with members and explore how they are best placed to meet some of the challenges in retirement.

He views this time as a chance to reflect—to look at the system and at how it can operate more efficiently—and also a time to look more closely at some of the regulation and ask if it is still fit for purpose, and if it benefits consumers.

“I think we sometimes miss that there is a cost for regulation and a cost to members. And if members are going to bear that cost, they’ve clearly got to benefit from it.”

“I think we sometimes miss that there is a cost for regulation and a cost to members. And if members are going to bear that cost, they’ve clearly got to benefit from it.”

VIC State forum

What will the new Government mean for super?

At ASFA’s Victorian State Forum last week, McCrea led a session titled An Insider’s view of Canberra.  Drawing on his Parliamentary experience he provided delegates with context around the seismic shift that occurred politically in the May elections, which saw a new Labor majority government and the rise of the new female ‘teal’ independents.

McCrea explained the new Parliament configurations in both the Lower House and Senate, and the likely implications for the new Government. He also identified significant Parliamentary committees for superannuation and their powers, as well as the key political figures and decision-makers that the superannuation industry can expect to hear from over the coming years.

He said the issue of equity, SG on paid parental leave, taxes, risk regulators, cyber, Last Resort compensation and SG compliance continue to be important.

McCrea also sees productivity as a crucial issue and one which superannuation can play a productive role.

“We have a massive pool of capital, and we have to act in the best financial interests of our members. Are there strategic economic things that super can do to encourage productivity across the economy but also benefit members?”

“We have a massive pool of capital, and we have to act in the best financial interests of our members. Are there strategic economic things that super can do to encourage productivity across the economy but also benefit members?”

And with $3.5 trillion dollars in the super pot, which is more than the GDP of $2 trillion, everyone has an opinion about super and how it should be managed. Thus, he fears the ‘super wars’ are likely to continue.

McCrea said the industry needs to keep working to persuade and ensure that the average Australian values and defends their super.

“Remember that governments come and go, but how can we safeguard the superannuation system moving forward?”

ASFA, he said, will be spending a lot of time getting Parliament to look at the bigger picture.

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Amy C. Edmondson

Novartis Professor of Leadership and Management, Harvard Business School

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Keynote 8 – Navigating the energy transition: opportunities, investor strategies and policy needs

Amy C. Edmondson is the Novartis Professor of Leadership and Management at the Harvard Business School, a chair established to support the study of human interactions that lead to the creation of successful enterprises that contribute to the betterment of society.

Edmondson has been recognized by the biannual Thinkers50 global ranking of management thinkers since 2011, and most recently was ranked #1 in 2021 and 2023; she also received that organization’s Breakthrough Idea Award in 2019, and Talent Award in 2017.  She studies teaming, psychological safety, and organisational learning, and her articles have been published in numerous academic and management outlets, including Administrative Science Quarterly, Academy of Management Journal, Harvard Business Review and California Management Review. Her 2019 book, The Fearless Organization: Creating Psychological Safety in the Workplace for Learning, Innovation and Growth (Wiley), has been translated into 15 languages. Her prior books – Teaming: How organizations learn, innovate and compete in the knowledge economy (Jossey-Bass, 2012), Teaming to Innovate (Jossey-Bass, 2013) and Extreme Teaming (Emerald, 2017) – explore teamwork in dynamic organisational environments. In Building the future: Big teaming for audacious innovation (Berrett-Koehler, 2016), she examines the challenges and opportunities of teaming across industries to build smart cities. 

Edmondson’s latest book, Right Kind of Wrong (Atria), builds on her prior work on psychological safety and teaming to provide a framework for thinking about, discussing, and practicing the science of failing well. First published in the US and the UK in September, 2023, the book is due to be translated into 24 additional languages, and was selected for the Financial Times and Schroders Best Business Book of the Year award.

Before her academic career, she was Director of Research at Pecos River Learning Centers, where she worked on transformational change in large companies. In the early 1980s, she worked as Chief Engineer for architect/inventor Buckminster Fuller, and her book A Fuller Explanation: The Synergetic Geometry of R. Buckminster Fuller (Birkauser Boston, 1987) clarifies Fuller’s mathematical contributions for a non-technical audience. Edmondson received her PhD in organisational behavior, AM in psychology, and AB in engineering and design from Harvard University.

 

Daniel Mulino MP

Assistant Treasurer and Minister for Financial Services

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Keynote 8 – Navigating the energy transition: opportunities, investor strategies and policy needs

Born in Brindisi, Italy, Daniel was a young child when he moved with his family to Australia. He grew up in Canberra and completed his first degrees – arts and law – at the ANU. He then completed a Master of Economics (University of Sydney) and a PhD in economics from Yale.

He lectured at Monash University, was an economic adviser in the Gillard government and was a Victorian MP from 2014 to 2018. As Parliamentary Secretary to the Treasurer of Victoria, Daniel helped deliver major infrastructure projects and developed innovative financing structures for community projects.

In 2018 he was preselected for the new federal seat of Fraser and became its first MP at the 2019 election, re-elected in 2022 and 2025. From 2022 to 2025, Daniel was chair of the House of Representatives’ Standing Economics Committee in which he chaired inquiries; economic dynamism, competition and business formation and insurers’ responses to 2022 major floods claims.

In 2025, he became the Assistant Treasurer and Minister for Financial Services.

In August 2022, Daniel published ‘Safety Net: The Future of Welfare in Australia’, which aims to explore the ways in which an insurance approach can improve the effectiveness of government service delivery.