There is another way, one of Canberra's newest secretaries explains, and it seems a bit too simple to be true.

Department of Jobs and Small Business secretary Kerri Hartland ascended to the role in September last year, part of the class of 2017, when nine new secretaries were appointed across the 18 departments. Ms Hartland is among four who are in their first year at their first gig at the top of a department.

Even among this cohort of new-age secretaries, Kerri Hartland has an unusual CV. She first came to Canberra from Queensland as a journalist in the press gallery, and among the many senior roles she has filled in different departments, she was deputy director-general of ASIO - one of few employees at the spy agency to ever be named.

With experience as second-in-charge at ASIO, and as a deputy secretary at the Finance and Human Services departments, the former journalist said the learning curve in a top role was all about listening, and knowing the weight of one's words.

"The buck stops with you, and there is that real sense, if you're in briefing ministers and those ministers are going into cabinet and making big decisions, that you're often the last person that they're speaking to. So there is that sense of importance in terms of knowing your stuff and giving good advice," she said.

Just nine months in, Ms Hartland points to the success of a new model of working with her counterpart in the Department of Industry, Innovation and Science, Heather Smith, where both secretaries jointly brief Minister for Jobs and Innovation Michaelia Cash. It's what Dr Smith called a "super portfolio" during a speech in March this year.

"It gives us a lot more latitude to look at a continuum of programs. To say 'Industry is about the job creation bit, we're about the frameworks and getting people into jobs, how does that all fit together?' It's a different way of working but it's great that we're exploring different ways of working in the public service," Ms Hartland said.

As well as giving more streamlined advice to the minister, it has allowed each secretary to peer over their neighbour's fence to look at ways to innovate.

"What that has meant for us is we're able to look across our total workforce of the two departments and look at what's working best so we can have a look at best practice across those two organisations."

The model is not the same as the mega-department Home Affairs, which was created over 2017 and 2018 bringing in staff from the Attorney-General's, Infrastructure, Social Services, Prime Minister and Cabinet, as well as Immigration departments.

"There are two different models that you've got in terms of the Department of Home Affairs, the end result is probably a similar one," Ms Hartland said.

"One of the things in terms of this new arrangement with Industry is that we have been able to do that without having a big machinery of government change, so that's interesting to see how that's working."

Ms Hartland is at the coalface of changes to the way people work, and not just in the public service. Her department is responsible for getting people into work in an environment with increasing casualisation and a growing reliance on technology. She says the public service across the board has changed significantly in the way it reacts to such challenges since she first arrived in Canberra in the 1980s.

"When I first joined the public service we wouldn't have been talking about stakeholders every day and putting stakeholders at the centre. We certainly wouldn't be talking about user-centred design," Ms Hartland said.

"We wouldn't have been doing any of those things, so that's great that we're doing that. We just need to keep reminding ourselves that we are public servants serving the public and public good and to really put the community and stakeholders at the centre of what we're doing."

The example of two departments working together may be one that the newly-announced APS review takes a closer look at, taking innovation and increasing productivity into its broad terms of reference. According to Ms Hartland, the model is "certainly worth continuing to look at".