Monday, August 06, 2018

No More Havoc: Mastering the art of the narrative - Michael O'Neill

The essential role of leadership is to serve as a safe store of hope and wisdom. Everyday we learn more about Havel's ickiness and how cream rises to the top ...


Movers and Shakers: Michael O'Neill - Secretary (CEO) of Tax Practitioners Board


TPB announces shakeup to structure and leadership by Katarina Taurian

 (katarina.taurian@momentummedia.com.au)


New CEO joins TPB

 ATO executive appointed as TPB CEO

TPB shifts top jobs, names ATO officer as CEO | Accountants Daily


Chair of the Tax Practitioners Board welcomes new Secretary/CEO 

The Tax Practitioners Board is welcoming a new chief executive, joining from the Australian Taxation Office.
Michael O'Neill has been appointed to lead the TPB, bringing more than 30 years' experience in public service.
O'Neill was most recently assistant commissioner and chief risk officer at the ATO. He is also a lawyer who has worked with the Australian Federal Police and Australian Crime Commission.
TPB chair Ian Taylor said he is delighted to welcome O'Neill to the role on behalf of the board.
"Michael brings a wealth of relevant experience to the role, including a background in private practice as a lawyer as well as nearly three decades in senior management with a strong focus on ATO legal and compliance issues," he said.
"We look forward to working with Michael to advance the interests of both tax practitioners and the consumers of tax services."
TPB names new chief executive

 

Chair of the Tax Practitioners Board welcomes new Secretary/CEO 

 

"I have had a wonderful career in the public sector, as a lawyer, investigator and leader. My extensive experience includes working in state and federal agencies, in Australia and overseas, including with international organisations.
Michael O’Neill
Linkedin accessed on 6 Aug 2018

My leadership roles include complex, civil and criminal investigations involving the ATO and major law enforcement partners. I’m passionate about good public policy that serves the community and sustains our economy.Currently I’m focused on delivering an improved client experience for businesses who seek ATO advice and guidance. This includes sharing our concerns about risks and issues, improving our public guidance, and addressing community confidence through proactive and contemporary communication products and activities.

I enjoyed private practice in an accounting then law firm in my formative professional years. As a lawyer, my experience includes driving strategic litigation, coordinating complex multi-party dispute resolution, and providing policy and law reform advice to the highest levels of government.

Successful projects I’ve been accountable for include:
- the ATO’s management of offshore tax evasion (the $2 billion Project Wickenby)
- recreating international engagement strategies in the ATO, including:
- a new compliance and assurance program
- the OECD/G20 Base Erosion Profit Shifting strategy with a focus on collaboration in the digital economy
- the ATO’s support for foreign investment/FIRB (corporate investments, agricultural assets, real property, and coordination across the states/territories).
Personally, I’m enriched by my family and friends, and volunteer involvement in the NFP sector.

5 ways storytelling can be used to improve communication - Inside HR

 

Michael O'Neill - LinkedIn...

 

TPB RELEASES ITS CORPORATE PLAN 2018-19
The Tax Practitioners Board (TPB) has released its Corporate Plan 2018-19 [TPB RELEASES ITS CORPORATE PLAN 2018-19] . The Plan reflects the Board's objectives and functions as contained in the Tax Agent Services Act 2009 (TASA) and sets out the TPB's strategic direction for the period 2018-19 and future years.
Over the next 4 years, the Board will focus on the following strategic objectives:

1. Protect all consumers of tax practitioner services - by ensuring every entity that should be registered under the TASA is registered;
2. Maintain, protect and enhance the integrity of the registered tax practitioner profession - by assisting registered tax practitioners to understand their obligations under the TASA; and
3. Promote the TPB as an independent, efficient and effective regulator - by demonstrating the TPB is an effective, best-practice regulator of tax practitioners. TPB will also improve its technology platforms to ensure they meet the needs and expectations of the profession.

TPB Media Releases 

 

*Tax crackdown targets wealthy cheats

 

Tax Matters 

A tax authority wants to take actions it knows will foster the greatest degree of voluntary taxpayer compliance to reduce the "tax gap." This paper suggests that even if a tax authority could attain a state of complete knowledge, there are constraints on whether and to what extent such actions would result in reducing the macro-level tax gap. These limits are not merely a consequence of finite agency resources. They are inherent in the system itself.

 

The Power of Diverse Voices: Mastering the art of the narrative: using stories to shape public policy
People believe narratives are important and that crafting or influencing them likely shapes public policy. But how does one actually do this?


Taking the risk out of large-scale upgrades
There is no blanket solution. Patterns that describe an organisation’s behaviours, perceptions and biases can heavily influence the strategy chosen to modernise its systems. 



From blame culture to learning culture
How can public organisations strike the right balance between individual culpability and organisational responsibility?


Michael D'Ascenzo "recalls the days after he began as a graduate in the Tax Office’s tax avoidance branch in 1977 chasing the “mass-marketed paper schemes", the most notorious of which were the bottom of the harbour schemes that were “attacking the system on all fronts".In 1988, the ATO raided the Sydney premises of Citibank, seizing hundreds of documents relating to a suspected tax-avoidance scheme. One of the officers was Michael O'Neill, a 23-year-old still finishing his law degree who, a decade later, would join the taskforce formed to investigate tax scheme promoters" Tax Haven Saga in Australia

Secret Aussie life of a global tax spy


Anti-avoidance powers to hunt multinationals 'ineffective': ATO



Allison Christians (McGill), Wolfgang Schoen (Max Planck) & Stephen E. Shay (Harvard), Foreword: International Tax Policy in a Disruptive Environment:
In this foreword to International Tax Policy in a Disruptive Environment: A Special Issue, the authors provide an overview of the two-day interdisciplinary conference that took place in Munich on 14-15 December 2017, and offer a synopsis of the articles in this special edition of the Bulletin for International Taxation. The authors offer preliminary observations based on the conference and papers, including that despite its successes the BEPS Project has left unfinished business.

 

Take your team on the journey: Communicate, earn the buy-in and upskill tax team members most affected by these changes. Without their support, any transformative projects merely sit on foundations of sand.

Beyond the bandwagon effect

 

CODA: Tyson Fawsett | Chief Data & Analytics Officer Public Sector

 

Tyson Fawcett - ATO's Most Important Asset – Data - SlideShare

 

Three Technologies Transforming the Legal Field 

Law Technology Today: “Is your staff using analytics, blockchain and OCR yet? Corporations are ever-focused on their legal spend and demand more value from their outside counsel. Further disrupting the legal field are alternative legal service providers fueling the competitive landscape to become more crowded and innovative. As a result, Thomson Reuters’ 2018 Report on the State of the Legal Market surmised that declining profit margins, weakening collections, falling productivity, and loss of market share to alternative legal service providers are chipping away at the foundations of firm profitability. To counteract these market pressures and to differentiate themselves from competitors, law firms are embracing technology to improve operational efficiencies and transform the way attorneys and their firms interact with clients, answer their questions, and tackle their legal challenges. The law firms that embrace technology as a means to provide more cost-effective services to their clients will have a competitive advantage. For example, digitization and automation technologies have emerged that streamline internal processes and reduce workloads, so lawyers can spend more time advising clients and less time with administrative work…

 

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