AREAS OF EXPERTISE

Dr Vicki Herrington is a leading expert in systems leadership, drawing on her knowledge of complex organisational dynamics, wicked problems, and human behaviour to identify opportunities to create positive change. She excels in identifying interdependencies across actors and sectors, and thinking creatively about shared opportunities, responsibilities, and outcomes. She works to empower leaders and organisations to navigate these systems with innovation, a learner's mindset, resilience, in service of creating a more equitable and just world.  

Vicki has spent decades innovating and driving change in large bureaucratic organisations, including universities and the public sector, and now teaches others to do the same. Public and private sector organisations share the same pressure to evolve in the face of new competition, or changed operating environments. Vicki has a passion for helping those inside organisations recognise the opportunities - and navigate the challenges - inherent in shifting established structures, cultures, and capabilities. 

Vicki has deep experience and expertise crafting and delivering leadership development pipelines. Organisations face increasing challenges and expense recruiting and retaining talented staff, reinforcing the importance of being able to 'grow your own'. Vicki's appreciation of leadership pathways, developmental strategies, and the nature of formal and informal organisational rewards allow her to develop effective organisational interventions to support leadership development aims. 

Research estimates that only 10% of organisational strategies are ever fully implemented (Olson 2022). This is because while a great deal of effort is expended in designing effective strategies, often by consultants external to the organisation, comparatively less effort is dedicated to fully appreciating how that strategy will meet the organisation and its staff. Vicki's academic blend across social science, her professional research activities, and her breadth of experience in large organisations means she is expert at getting things done. She partners with leaders to help them implement strategies, with a deep appreciation of complex organisational and inter-personal dynamics. 

Dr Vicki Herrington has spent decades undertaking program evaluation and monitoring research on behalf of private and public funders and governments around the world. Ranging in scope from evaluating public safety strategies for prisoners, offenders, and ex offenders; evaluating education and training programs for leaders and new staff across the public sector; and assessing the effectiveness of control mechanisms in the public sector such as complaints and their resolution. Vicki has deep expertise in qualitative and quantitative methods, participatory research methods and action research, and is a skilled communicator of complex findings to practitioner audiences.   

With deep expertise in criminology and criminal justice, and a decades long research and publication record, Vicki is a global expert in policing, public safety, allied emergency services. Vicki has worked alongside public safety organisations as a trusted voice and critical friend. She is committed to leveraging her expertise to create a safe, equitable and just world by pushing the boundaries of how we think about safety and security, institutional architecture, and responsibility. With curiosity and empathy for the work of frontline services, research expertise and facilitation skills, she has advised governments and international organisations on strategies that enhance preparedness, collaboration, and trust.