Lyn Lewis-Smith

Caitlin Morrissey

Lyn, in your mind, what is the DNA of Sydney?

Lyn Lewis-Smith

This is such a great question and one that not many can nail, I would say. I think it's multiplicity with Sydney. There's a depth and texture here that's really hard to define. We're a modern city in an ancient landscape with the oldest known culture in the world. So for me, it's around people and place, and it's where culture, creativity and commerce come together. Everyone knows Sydney aesthetically is absolutely beautiful, but it's its people, its multiculturalism-- and there's a confidence and competence about the people and the place that Sydney is. So I'd say a well-rounded metropolis with beauty and brains, and we use that often. She has heart, soul, intelligence, creativity and drive. And we're a little cheeky.

Caitlin Morrissey

And are there reasons why Sydney has these traits, do you think? Have there been triggers? Or what has caused it to accumulate these kind of strands of its DNA?

Lyn Lewis-Smith

Wow, that's another really great question. It comes back to the people and place again. Take the example of flying into Sydney, the aesthetic. So you've got beautiful blue sky. You're coming over the world's largest natural harbour; it's glistening blue. You can see the four national parks around us and the greenery weaved in between. And then you get off the plane, and you start emerging, immersing yourself in the lifestyle: outdoor alfresco dining, the nightlife, our world-class art institutions, the restaurants and cafes. And we do have the best coffee in the world. I'd have anyone debate that, but we do.

But I think it is that rich tapestry of diverse and multiculturalism that's come from our post-war immigrants. There are pockets of Sydney that you can go where you can get the best Vietnamese food or Italian or Chinese, and not many people in Sydney even know of that. So when you come on an international visit, how do we express this immersive culture that we have?

The other interesting thing with Sydney is its landmarks. If you look at the Harbour Bridge,; you have to go over the bridge to get to the north-west. People are living in their neighbourhoods. Very rarely do we come to meet except for the knowledge jobs in the central business district which is where the blend comes, where people come to work: they socialise, they come to festivals, activities and events.

Greg Clark

Lyn, let me ask a couple of follow-ups. Where does the cheekiness come from?

Lyn Lewis-Smith

We've got a bit of a larrikin culture here. We're big on sport; we like jeering each other on. I think that comes from the First Fleet. It comes from the Ten Pound Poms that came  here. There was a lot of two-up and gambling, and drinking rum. So I think if you go back 200 years, you'll find that larrikinism came through, and it just hasn't gone away; it lives with us today. We love to make fun of ourselves, and we don't take life too seriously.

Greg Clark

And if you think of pre-European settlement and the Aboriginal society, the Gadigal people, what is it that, in a sense, unites post-settlement Sydney with pre-settlement Sydney? Do you see aspects of Sydney's cultural character that communicate the ancient aspect of the city?

Lyn Lewis-Smith

I'd like to see more, and we are working really hard at that. When you think about the Aboriginal people living off the land, the waterways, the nomadic lifestyle, the food, their ingenuity to be innovative and survive off the land, I think, it’s blending. And that's why we've become quite creative and innovative in our own right. There's a lot of learnings the art, their storytelling, comes through in our culture today.

Greg Clark

You mentioned that Sydney is an outdoors city, and you won't be surprised to hear that lots of people say this to us. And to what extent and in what ways is Sydney an outdoor city from your point of view?

Lyn Lewis-Smith

It's the climate. So we do have four seasons, there's no doubt. But I'm sitting here in winter and it's 18 degrees so I can go for a run when I get home. The parks and the placemaking has been done really well in Sydney, so people do get out and about. Interesting, COVID has had us explore our own backyard. People are getting on bikes. And the alfresco dining, there's not many places in the world where the climate is right, where you can sit outside and have a beer or a glass of wine and a great meal. We are a sporting nation, people go to sporting events and they're outdoors, It's embedded in our culture. The beaches draw us every weekend whether it's winter or summer as do the picnic spots. I just think the placemaking has been done incredibly well, and it encourages and engages you.

Greg Clark

And anything to say about outdoor events? Because I know Sydney's a great kind of festival and event city. What would you reflect about that?

Lyn Lewis-Smith

 We have a recurrent calendar of amazing events. You could come here during any month of the year, and there would be something on, from the fireworks, Mardi Gras—one of the biggest Mardi Gras in the world-- then you've got the Vivid festival, the biggest in the southern hemisphere. You've got Sydney Fringe Festival which gets into the nooks and crannies of Sydney and brings out the artists that that we have here. And then the sporting calendar overlays that.

You have Sydney Festival in January as well. So there's always something to do, and there's indoor and outdoor options. A city that has great arts has innovation as well, and I think we've got the best cultural institutions and artists in the world and that draws us out.

Greg Clark

What do you think about business in Sydney, Lyn? Because you're the Chief Executive of Business Events Sydney, so you're always thinking about Sydney business. Is there a way in which the type of business or the kinds of entrepreneur or the sort of business strategies that you see indigenous to Sydney somehow reflects the character of the city? Is there a relationship between the character of the business community and the character of the city itself?

Lyn Lewis-Smith

I think there's a genuine feeling  that we want to add to Sydney's agenda. We want to drive it forward. What we get right and that hasn't come easily is our academic institutions engaging with our government and private sector. It's the combination of those three that come together in groups to influence outcomes. I think we do that really well and maybe that—back to the lifestyle that I just mentioned about being out and free and engaging and having conversations, it's those sidebar conversations that lead to something. It leads to a group coming together to collaborate, to get real outcomes and drive Sydney's social and economic prosperity. There's a real willingness and passion to do that.

Greg Clark

It's interesting, isn't it? I mean, when I'm asked internationally, in which cities do you find the most engaged business leadership, I often end up talking about Sydney, as well as talking about New York and Barcelona and a few other places. But it's very interesting that-- Lyn is a member of the board of the Committee for Sydney and it’s a very vibrant sort of civic-- there's a strong civic leadership ethic in the business community, I think. And I suppose that if there's a question, it's, why is that? Why more in Sydney than, say, in any other city?

Lyn Lewis-Smith

I think it comes back to the DNA. It's the people. It's that confidence; it's that competence to do well, to win. Yeah, I can't articulate that, but there's just a passion and a willingness to do better. One of the things that-- I came to Sydney for. I wanted to be the best version of myself, and I wasn't getting that where I was, and I knew I'd be challenged here. And we do challenge the status quo, whether it's an idea or an individual, and that makes you strive for better.

Greg Clark

When we were doing some work a year or so ago, Lyn, we did some work for the New South Wales government around sort of Sydney's identity and character, and we learned a lot from that. And one of the things that people said is that Sydney's role in Australia is to be the sort of global gateway for Australian talent, connecting Australian talent to the world and that people from all over Australia go to Sydney or move to Sydney in order to become the very best they can, in order to launch themselves into the global market. Now, I don't want to put words in your mouth, but you might want to give us some version of that as you see it, without assuming that what I've just said has been recorded because it won't be used in the podcast. So what is the role of Sydney in the development of Australian talent?

Lyn Lewis-Smith

I think in the first instance-- and we're doing a lot of work in transitioning our education system at the moment and transitioning our economy to the new-collar jobs.  You've got universities offering micro-credentialing and helping people upskill, reskill and be able to rehome them into those new jobs. You've got boards looking at the capability of their organisations.

And then there's the global talent piece. And I think from our research - and you may have heard this - the work that we've done with UTS, we surveyed a thousand international delegates that came into Sydney in a given year over five industries. And 41% percent said that they will come and work and study in Sydney, and 7% had applied. So we know the desirability for people to come and live and work here is there. And we know we're very successful at attracting talent. And what that talent does when it immerses in business in Sydney, it educates and trains our own to drive productivity and innovation.

So it's really important for us to attract mobile talent, particularly when we are looking at a very aggressive start-up community, particularly in this current environment, and scaling up. We don't have enough talent coming through the pipeline, as I described earlier, fast enough, so how do we get the combination of both? How do we upskill our people and get the education and the system right to bring the right workers to the right jobs at the right time? And then how do we bring talent in to immerse to achieve the combination that helps us create the jobs of the future and the industries of the future.

It comes back to our future focus and our innovation and the opportunity that is here. We are the biggest economy in Australia. There are more jobs available here and a lot more opportunity for career progression and that's an attraction in itself.

Caitlin Morrissey

And I want to pick up on a couple of points that you've raised there. So one that springs to mind is, with all of this innovation kind of buzzing around the city, are there key discoveries or inventions that come to mind, whether that's more recent discoveries or longer discoveries in the history that you think are proudly Sydney made?

Lyn Lewis-Smith

The two that  come to mind are Google Maps and Wi-Fi. And where would we be without them today? And even though I'm in tourism and I'm selling and marketing Sydney, I look at our two biggest icons as engineering feats. They are innovation in their own right, the Harbour Bridge and the Opera House. They're talked about as icons and beautiful places to visit, but when you, again, dive into the history of how they've come about and the engineering and architecture behind them, it's quite a fascinating story to listen to and very much part of Sydney's DNA.

One thing that we don't take seriously enough, I think, is the business that I'm in. So I lead an organisation that secures global meetings, that brings in the best and the brightest from around the world to discuss and debate some of the biggest problems the world is facing. We look at Sydney and Australia and what are the issues and challenges we're facing and where we can bring in that expertise. And from that has come amazing innovation.

So from a conference on cervical cancer came a vaccine which has saved millions of lives of young women around the world. We have the Charles Perkins Centre here which is a multidisciplinary research centre on obesity, cardiovascular disease and diabetes. It's the best in the world. We've got the best researchers here; therefore, we're working on prevention and cure. And I think those things fly under the radar.

And the importance of having people come-- you're the best in the world, but you're bringing the best and the brightest-- that networking leads to collaboration on a global scale, leads to innovation, new goods and services. You have exports and obviously, that leads to more economic and social prosperity.

The myths. There are a couple. I went on a study tour to Silicon Valley last year, and we took a plaque of the Opera House with a Wi-Fi symbol embedded in it as a gift to presenters. At the end of every presentation we asked, "What do you know about Sydney? What do you know and love?" All  I heard was koala and kangaroo, Opera House and bridge!. That said,  it was an opportunity to educate that there is so much more depth and texture to this city.

So we've done such a great job tourism-wise, but in terms of our business and innovation and that integration of our brand, people, I don't think, take us serious and know that we are a big player on the world stage. We've got a big job to do to bring up that level of understanding of the business and innovation side of what we do.

From Australia, Melbourne is known as the culture capital of the world - and again, we don't sell ourselves well - but I mentioned the festivals and events, and you'd have to say that Sydney would have to own that, but we don't. And we need to do a better job of the narrative around that in our own back yard with our own community as well as the Australian community.

Greg Clark

I have to say, just a quick comment, that I view this as a classic example of the problem of having such a strong visitor brand, a leisure visitor brand that it starts to dominate the whole character of the city. And you have to work double hard then to get the business brand and the culture brand really understood. And, in a way, it's a good problem to have, but it's quite tricky to shift because Miami, San Francisco, Barcelona have all had the same problem, right, that people think it's a great place to visit but not a place to invest or innovate or do business.

Caitlin Morrissey

Brilliant. And so I want to come back, well, to ask you this question about leaders in Sydney, and I think many must come to mind, but are there leaders that you can pick out that have really shaped the city? And that can really be from any sphere, whether that's cultural or city leadership, business leadership and also at any point in Sydney's history too.

Lyn Lewis-Smith

You can look at leaders as individuals and there are many, as you note I think it's groups of people that really have made the city. It's been a cohort of people that have done a lot of work together to move things forward. So I look at organisations like the Committee for Sydney a think tank, and the influence that they are having on government policy, their recommendations are really getting uplift from government.

And then I think of Business Events Sydney, and our cohort of 100 ambassadors, they are all champions of industry, of the industries that we want to grow. Our ambassadors are our soft power assets!

Greg Clark

I have a little question here, Lyn, which is that Caitlin and I are also developing these ideas about soft power and the relationship between soft power and DNA. And I suppose at a very simple level, we think that the exercise of soft power is somehow about tapping into your DNA and understanding it well and using it wisely. How do you see the relationship between the DNA of Sydney and the soft power of Sydney?

Lyn Lewis-Smith

Oh, gosh. I think it's our DNA. It's innate in us just to try harder and do better. And we're so far from the rest of the world. We've had to really think outside the square, challenge the status quo, be first at things but take the best of what the world's doing and make it better for ourselves. And I think it's that soft power. There's a million Australians living overseas, and they're all talking about Sydney, they're talking about Australia, but they're also feeding back information. And it's that global connectivity of our soft power that is really powerful, and we need to do more with it.

Greg Clark

I think that that's an interesting point. And also the point that so many students have got Sydney on their CV now because they've come to study in the city is very interesting, isn't it?

Lyn Lewis-Smith

The interesting part about international education is their families invest in real estate; they invest in industries when they go back home. We have a 40% uplift in exports, Australian goods and services. And they repeat visit; they can come back up to six times a year. But importantly, they might go back to their hometown, or they might go to Silicon Valley, but they've had that Sydney experience, and it is in their DNA wherever they go. You talk to anyone that's been educated here from around the world, and they will speak very fondly of their time here.

Caitlin Morrissey

So I have a question for you, Lyn, which is, what does the future hold for Sydney? What traits do you think will come to the fore as it really emerges from this shock that is this pandemic, and it emerges from the wildfires that were experienced earlier in the year? What traits do you feel are coming to the fore to help it get through this? Or alternatively, what is it learning?

Lyn Lewis-Smith

Yeah. You know, it's not just COVID for us. So we came out of summer in drought, and then we went into the biggest bushfire season that we've ever seen. And then we had rain and then came along COVID. So we've been profoundly disrupted and dealing with ambiguity and disorientation since, and it's been really unsettling.

But I think what has given us confidence is that we have managed this really well. We're being very compliant; we've done what we've been asked to do. Australia has managed the health and economic crisis better than most in the world. The uncertainty is still there, and where we go to from here is going to be really challenging.

From a people perspective, it's been really disruptive for individuals. If you think about Australians, we want to get on a plane and travel - we're so far from the world; we're just born with a passport - and we can't do that now. We actually can't even go into the office or go and see our loved one’s interstate. That's really restraining. So the notions of movement really hit us quite hard. You know, when's the next time I'll go to an airport and go to an international destination or even go and visit my mum in Adelaide?  COVID made us think about business and business models and how we need to change and adapt, and it's really testing our agility to be able to pivot.

And the interesting thing for me was supply chains. We now know where our toilet paper comes from!. So you would have heard that we're all quite frenetic about toilet paper and flour, but it's educated us. We now know what we make here and what we rely on from imports and even what we export, so it's been a real education for a lot of the community.

And in health and safety, obviously there's been protocols that we've had to adhere to: the sanitising, the physical distancing is here for quite some time and how we've had to mark our offices and put screens up. It's been profound, there's no doubt. But I think it comes back to the DNA of Sydney. We all know we'll get through this. And we're all moving at a rapid pace to make the hand sanitiser. The advanced manufacturing has been escalated tenfold. The PPE, the agility and the speed at which we've responded has been absolutely incredible.

Greg Clark

Lyn, in the last couple of minutes, you've said two things that I think are really important, and all I'm going to do is invite you to say them again just so that you've really said them in whatever way you want to say them. One of them is about this link between adversity and innovation. It seems to be what you're saying is, in Sydney, we're great at using adversity to spur innovation.

And the other thing you've said is that because Sydney is, relatively speaking, in a remote location from some other parts of the world, there's a very high propensity to trade, to travel, to develop businesses that are global from day one, that kind of thing.

Lyn Lewis-Smith

There's been quite a few things thrown at us and what is quite pertinent is we respond very quickly, we rally together and we problem solve, and we come up with a solution and we move pretty quickly. And whether that's into the PPE equipment or the sanitising that we need to live on a day-to-day basis, I think that Sydneysiders respond really quickly when it's thrown a curveball or something like COVID or a bushfire. We rally as a community, and we really get in there and solve the problem and move fast.

Greg Clark

What’s the relationship between Sydney's remote location and the propensity for travel and trade and everything else?

Lyn Lewis-Smith

I think it's our desirability to learn and understand. And for me, it comes back to our relationship with Asia and our proximity to Asia and the relationship and the trust that we've built. If you look at China alone, who are our biggest two-way trading partner, they're our biggest source of visitation, leisure visitation, they're our biggest source of international students, they invest in our agriculture and our infrastructure.

60% of the population is in the Asia-Pacific region, so we're in a wonderful position here. And I think that's built respect around the world in terms of how well we have been able to manage the political landscape, the cultural environmental side of that relationship. And I think for Australians, we love Asia, we love the culture. We love going there on holiday, and there's a mutual admiration for each other's culture, whether it be food, language, as well as the business side of things.

Caitlin Morrissey

Well, I have one final question. So, Lyn, if we'd have asked you the right question, was there anything else you would have wanted to say about the DNA of Sydney?

Lyn Lewis-Smith

Gosh, only that we are a city that-- we're not done yet; we're just not done. We're always striving for better for our liveability. We all love this city; everyone speaks so highly of it. And I think you're going to see rapid movement and a different city in a decade. I mean, just building a third city in Greater Sydney is going to change the landscape and the transport - the intermodal links will hopefully connect us up more and be more cohesive moving forward.

Caitlin Morrissey

Thank you so much, Lyn. That was so brilliant to be part of and to just absorb all of everything that you've been saying, and we're so grateful for your time and your insights.