Queensland AO3, AO4, AO5, AO6 selection criteria examples.

I act with integrity in my professional conduct, including in situations where doing so creates short-term operational difficulty (restate the criterion). In my current AO5 role with Queensland Health, I am responsible for managing the rostering and timesheet approval for a unit of around 35 clinical and administrative staff (situation). During a recent reporting period I identified a pattern of timesheet adjustments by a senior team member that did not appear to align with the unit's established rostering practice (task).

I documented what I had observed clearly — the specific timesheets, the pattern, the unit's established practice, and what I had ruled out as routine explanations. I reviewed the unit's relevant procedures and the broader Queensland Health policy on timesheet management before forming a view, so that I was raising the matter against the relevant standard rather than my own assumption. I escalated the matter formally to my Director, with the documented summary, rather than raising it informally or letting it accumulate. I did not raise the matter with the staff member directly because the seniority differential and the nature of the concern made that inappropriate. I made sure my escalation was framed neutrally — not as an allegation, but as a procedural matter that required management attention (actions).

The Director investigated the matter formally and addressed it through appropriate management channels. The unit's rostering procedures were subsequently clarified to remove the ambiguity that had allowed the pattern to develop. The Director referenced the handling of the matter in my annual review as the kind of professional judgement she expected of her senior administrators (result).

I build and maintain effective working relationships across multidisciplinary teams, including in clinical environments where administrative and clinical priorities can conflict (restate the criterion). In my current role I support a multidisciplinary team across a Queensland Health regional service, including senior medical officers, allied health professionals, nursing leadership, and administrative staff (situation). When I took on the role, administrative and clinical staff in the unit communicated through formal channels only, which had created delays and occasional friction over routine matters (task).

I started by sitting in on the unit's weekly clinical handover for the first six weeks, with permission, rather than asking clinical staff to attend additional administrative meetings. This let me understand the clinical priorities in their own terms and identify the moments in the week where administrative input could remove friction rather than add it. I introduced a 15-minute Monday morning administrative briefing for the clinical leads — tightly structured, ending on time, focused on the small number of matters where the leads' input would unblock the week. I established a single point of contact for administrative queries from clinical staff so they didn't have to navigate the administrative team's roles to find the right person. I made a point of acknowledging clinical staff's time pressures explicitly in communications rather than treating administrative deadlines as the binding constraint (actions).

The relationship between administrative and clinical staff in the unit improved measurably over the following six months. The unit's quarterly engagement scores rose 18 percentage points. The Monday morning briefing approach has been adopted by two other regional services in the cluster (result).

I deliver high-quality services within agreed timeframes, including in operational environments where volume and pace are both substantial (restate the criterion). In my current role I manage the patient administration process for a clinical service that handles around 280 outpatient appointments per week, supported by an administrative team of four AO3s (situation). During a recent peak period, the service was running 12% above forecast demand for six consecutive weeks (task).

I worked through the team's daily workflow at the start of the peak to identify which tasks could be deferred without operational impact and which were time-critical for clinical activity. I redistributed the deferrable work to the lower-pressure periods of each day, which freed capacity at the peak hours for time-critical work. I held a 10-minute team huddle each morning to clarify priorities for the day and check in on capacity issues before they accumulated. I escalated to my Director early when I projected the peak would extend beyond four weeks, with a specific proposal for short-term casual support rather than just a request for help. I supported the team personally during the highest-volume periods by stepping into front-line work alongside coordinating, rather than only managing from above. I documented the patterns I observed for the operational performance review at the end of the period (actions).

Service quality metrics did not drop during the peak — appointment processing accuracy remained at 99.2% against a benchmark of 98%. The team's annual engagement scores were the highest in the service. The workforce planning team incorporated the patterns I documented into the following year's resourcing model (result).

I identify operational improvements and contribute to implementing changes that produce measurably better outcomes (restate the criterion). In my current AO6 role I observed that our service's discharge planning process was producing inconsistent outcomes — some patients discharged with comprehensive follow-up plans, others with thin documentation that produced downstream issues at the community service end (situation). The variation was traced to inconsistent application of the discharge planning template across different clinicians (task).

I worked with the clinical lead to map the variation rather than assuming the template itself was the problem. The mapping revealed that the variation was driven less by clinician preference and more by time pressure — when the clinic was running on time, the template was applied fully; when it was running late, the template was abbreviated. The structural answer was not changing the template but changing how the discharge planning sat in the clinical workflow. I worked with the clinical lead and the nurse unit manager to propose a revised workflow that brought discharge planning forward in the appointment rather than leaving it to the end. We piloted the change with two clinicians over six weeks, with structured feedback collection at the end of each fortnight. I produced a summary paper for the service's clinical governance committee with the pilot results and a proposed broader rollout (actions).

Discharge documentation completeness improved from 71% to 94% across the pilot period. The clinical governance committee approved the broader rollout, which has now been adopted across all clinical services in the cluster. The community service organisations receiving discharge documentation provided unsolicited positive feedback within three months of the broader rollout (result).

I provide sound advice that supports decision-making at the appropriate level, including by framing issues in terms decision-makers can act on (restate the criterion). In my current role I provide advice on procurement matters to the service's Executive Director on contracts above $250,000 (situation). Last financial year I provided advice on a contested procurement decision involving an existing provider whose performance had declined but who had institutional knowledge that would be costly to replace (task).

I structured my advice around the decision the Executive Director actually had to make rather than the broader policy environment. I identified the three options open to her — extending the existing contract, going to market, or pursuing a hybrid arrangement — and set out the costs, benefits, and risks of each with comparable structure. I named the dimensions where my view was firm and the dimensions where the decision required judgement only she could exercise (political sensitivity, broader strategic direction). I included the relevant Queensland procurement policy requirements without burying the substantive analysis under procedural detail. I gave the Executive Director a clear recommendation while acknowledging the reasons she might legitimately decide differently. I sent the advice as a two-page briefing with the procurement policy detail attached for reference rather than read — her time was the binding constraint, not mine (actions).

The Executive Director accepted my recommendation and proceeded with the hybrid arrangement, which produced both continuity benefits and a defensible improvement in contract terms. She referenced the structure of the advice in her subsequent feedback as the framing she wanted for similar matters (result).

I supervise staff with a focus on building capability and managing performance directly when issues arise (restate the criterion). In my current AO6 role I manage four direct reports across AO3 and AO4 levels in a Queensland Government regional office (situation). When I took on the role the team had high engagement but had not produced a promotion to higher classification in 26 months, which the Director had flagged as a capability development concern (task).

I established a development plan for each direct report in the first six weeks of supervising them, mapped to the Queensland CLF capabilities at the level above their current classification. For each, I identified one stretch assignment and one development goal. I held fortnightly one-on-ones structured around their work rather than mine. I made a point of identifying acting opportunities at higher classifications for team members ready for them, even where it meant losing capacity temporarily. I addressed one underperforming team member through a structured discussion within four weeks of identifying the gap, with a written summary, a clear performance commitment, and a four-week check-in — rather than letting the issue accumulate to annual performance review. I made the team's collective capability visible to my Director by including team members in stakeholder meetings appropriate to their development, rather than always representing the team myself (actions).

Two direct reports were promoted to AO5 across the development cycle, and one is currently acting at AO5 with the substantive position expected to be filled within three months. The underperforming team member responded constructively to the formal process and is now meeting role expectations. Annual engagement scores remained the highest in the regional office (result).