What if, after years of being a rank and file member of an organisation, someone gave you an opportunity, a green field? They said “We want you to run this program. You have lots of experience in this field and you have ideas about how it should be run. You can do things your way”.

So I did.

I’m David Halfpenny and I ran the first undergraduate cyber security degree in Australia. It wasn’t my first taste of management, but it was the first time I was allowed to do things my way.

Along the journey I met and befriended Peter Thompson, who became my second in charge, and then took over from me when I left.

Together we managed people, and students, and we did it differently. Sometimes very differently.

We had some failures and learned some lessons. But mostly, we succeeded in creating an environment where people wanted to work and study.

We jokingly called our approach Subversive Management.

After we both left academia, we began to explore what we did together and why it succeeded. We reflected on and dissected our approach and started writing it down. And that’s what this publication is - our ideas about how people can be better managers and how they can create teams that people want to join.

Between us we have two PhD’s and more than 75 years of experience managing and being managed. Won’t you join us?

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