The Australian National University's director of human resources took the stand at a tribunal hearing on Wednesday, where she faced questions about staff shortages and said she could not say who was behind an academic job "mistakenly" advertised.
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The job was for a senior professorial role at the ANU's School of Music and was published in May 2015.
Dr Nadine White said the job was "mistakenly" advertised by a junior clerk after an administrative error.
But she was unable to say who was behind the ad.
"Who would have drafted it?" Administrative Appeals Tribunal deputy president Greg Melick asked.
"These documents don't just appear out of nowhere."
Dr White was unable to say, and agreed that noone seemed to know who had drafted, or who was behind the creation of the advertisement.
She said it was an administrative oversight, and denied suggestions by Professor Peter Tregear's barrister Allan Anforth that she knew that was not true.
"There's no conspiracy here," she said.
She said the final approval was in the end done by the acting dean of the school, who Dr White agreed had accepted responsibility for what happened.
But she said that did not necessarily mean he was the one behind the advertisement, just that he was taking responsibility as a senior staff member.
"I can't tell you who asked a junior clark to initiate the process," she said.
Dr White denied a suggestion by Mr Anforth that she was being evasive.
The advertisement was published in mid-May 2015, a couple of weeks before the then-head of the School of Music, Professor Tregear, returned from leave.
Professor Tregear, who separated fom the school in August that year, alleges that he had "no choice but to resign" and suffered a workplace mental injury.
Commonwealth insurer Comcare denied Professor Tregear's claim for incapacity benefits.
But Professor Tregear has challenged that decision, and his case is being heard this week in the Administrative Appeals Tribunal in Canberra.
Dr White was also quizzed about staff shortages.
Before he left, Professor Tregear raised his concerns in an email to the university about the level of safety in the workplace, namely a staffing shortage.
Dr White said she did not remember the email.
But she told the tribunal she felt "confident the school was staffed sufficiently".
Mr Melick said it was a situation in which Professor Tregear was saying one thing and her saying another, but that he only had Professor Tregear's email as hard copy evidence before him.
Dr White said she based her assessment on data from the university systems, and agreed to pull the information for the tribunal.
The tribunal also heard that a staff member working below Dr White had received a medical report regarding Professor Tregear, but asked another staff member not to pass it onto anyone.
Professor Tregear's barrister asked why her staff would have not passed on the report, and Dr White replied that she did not know.
She said she would normally expect those kinds of reports to be passed on to Comcare.
Dr White denied seeing the email or report, and said it was rare that she would have in her role.
The hearing continues on Thursday.
