Area of expertise:

Pat Turner Scholarship (Research) Prize winner

Dr Steve Munns is currently the Assistant Commissioner, for the Diversity & Inclusion (D&I) Branch at the Australian Public Service Commission (APSC). He is a proud Gumbaynggirr/Bundjalung man currently living on Jagera country in Meanjin (Brisbane). His mob are from Grafton in the Northern Rivers area of NSW.

In his role, he is responsible for the First Nations Unit, the Diversity & Inclusion Strategies Team, Inclusion Policy Team and the Mental Health & Suicide Prevention Unit. Some of the current projects and initiatives being developed and managed in the D&I Branch are the SES100 initiative aimed at boosting First Nations employment across the APS; the Culturally and Linguistically Diverse (CALD) Employment Strategy; the APS Disability Employment Strategy; and the ADDRESS model for responding to psychosocial hazards.

Steve is a psychologist with his previous postgraduate studies having been in the areas of Cognitive Neuroscience, Forensic Psychology and Public Administration. His PhD research aimed to understand the nature, prevalence and severity of service user violence and aggression perpetrated against frontline Australian Public Service staff. He explored the issues associated with the risk of violence and aggression through understanding pre-incident factors, including staff and service user behaviour, as well as operational and physical environments. Steve’s research used a multi-phased mixed methods approach. He hopes the evidence-based outcomes of this research will provide insights that will lead to greater proactive risk mitigation policies, a reduction of service user violence and aggression but more importantly a decrease in physical and psychological injuries incurred by frontline public servants.

Supervisor: Professor Roderic Broadhurst

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