Lauren co-leads Nous’ regulation practice and specialises in supporting government clients with statutory functions.
She brings a pragmatic and outcomes-focused approach to help agencies deliver on their legislative objectives in ways that build trust with the Australian community. Leveraging her experience as a former public servant, Lauren works across the spectrum of regulation, including designing policy and legislation; developing regulatory strategies; and ensuring agencies’ governance, decision-making and structures align with good practice. Her experience also spans broader policy development, systems thinking and multi-agency collaboration.
Influential work
- Worked with a State Department of Education to design a new risk-based regulatory scheme for non-state schools and develop options for a new regulator, including options for its legal form, governance, decision-making arrangements, employment arrangement and relationship with Government
- Confirmed the regulators posture and priorities and redesigned the operating model to foster stronger regulatory decision-making, improved communication within the regulator and out to the sector, and improve efficiencies
- Reviewed how the regulator executed its statutory remit relating to complaints handling with a focus on transparent, consistent and defensible decision making, recommending transformational change around how dispute resolution is approached and advising on the capability and capacity needed to implement this
- Undertook independent review of a Commonwealth Inspector-General, developing principles of good practice and exploring how the entity’s legal form and decision-making arrangements enabled or held back independence in their regulatory and integrity functions
- Led independent evaluations of the Queensland State- and Local-Government elections, making findings about the degree to which elections are fair and accessible and the Commission is trusted by the community
Outside of Nous
Lauren is passionate about healthcare and patient rights and sat on the Human Research Ethics Committee at the Royal Women’s Hospital for six years. She holds a Master of Public Health, a Bachelor of Science (psychology) and a Bachelor of Arts (French) from the University of NSW. She also holds a Certificate of English Language Teaching to Adults from Cambridge University.
In her spare time...
Lauren can be found salsa dancing and painting (quite badly) and building pillow forts (quite well) with her two young children.