I am writing to advise you of some important changes at CEDA that were announced to our staff earlier today.   
 
In response to member feedback and a review of strategic focus, CEDA has over the past two years been transitioning to deliver greater impact through our research and stronger communication and collaboration with our members and other stakeholders. 
 
The COVID-19 crisis has resulted in a need and opportunity to accelerate our transition.  As a result, CEDA is moving to reshape its operations. While we have already moved to digital events and expanded content delivery in response to the crisis, more substantial changes to our organisation are required.   
 
We are moving to realign responsibilities across the organisation to maintain financial resilience and enable us to engage more effectively with members across the country and better manage the programming of events and content. 
 
While reducing headcount overall, a number of new senior policy and research roles are being created to increase our capacity in this area.  We will be moving quickly to fill these roles across key states to ensure we are capturing economic and policy insights and trends from across the country and our members, to feed into a ramped-up program of work at this important time of policy debate and development in Australia.    
 
The overriding objective of these changes is to retain CEDA’s financial resilience and to continue to build on our foundations of membership and independent research to positively shape economic and social development in Australia.  
 
While we are reducing the overall size of our organisation, we will be retaining teams in each of the states where we currently operate.   
 
As economic and social activity continues to normalise, you can expect to see the return of CEDA’s high quality face-to-face program including both public and member only events around the country.   
 
You will also be able to continue to access and enjoy our expanded digital program including our livestream events and virtual roundtables, which have proven to be very successful, attracting nearly 25,000 participants since late March.  
 
In other words, we are maintaining our commitment to delivering high-quality events, blogs and podcasts, tackling national and state and territory specific issues.  
 
I am confident the changes being implemented will position CEDA well for the future. However, change comes at a cost and we are sad to lose CEDA colleagues who we have worked closely with over months and years, and we wish them well at this difficult time. We will of course be providing support for them during this period. 
 
CEDA members will be kept well informed as these and other changes are implemented but, in the meantime, should you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact the team. 

You can watch a short video message here, outlining the changes.

The CEDA team will also be touching base directly with members in the coming weeks.  
 
Thank you for your ongoing support of CEDA and I look forward to working with you as we ensure that CEDA continues to be Australia’s leading member-driven think tank. 
 
Melinda Cilento  
Chief Executive 
CEDA