Responsible for management of a 97 bed residential facility including oversight of care, cleaning, catering, rostering, occupancy and infection control.

Senior executive responsible for managing the creation and operation of retirement communities around Australia for a new entrant to the sector. Knowles Group once operated Australian Retirement Communities and returned to the industry under the name Sencia. The first community was in Point Lonsdale, Victoria. Sencia focuses on delivering quality accommodation and amenities in locations Australians want to live, building cohesive communities of like-minded people, offering a clear and simple fee structure and flexibly providing services residents need. Sencia communities are enhanced by neighbouring Arcare sites (also owned by Knowles Group as Australia’s largest family owned aged care provider).The role included overall direction of the retirement living division as well as structuring and obtaining finance, marketing and sales and product development including input into built form design. Devising fee structures and budgets, directing the creation of easy to use resident agreements and procurement of IT, security and emergency and data and electrical networks is also integral to the creation of the communities.

As General Manager - Legal, Risk and Quality for the Independent and Assisted Living (IAL) division of Australian Unity, Jacqueline was responsible for managing legal, compliance, risk and quality issues associated with group’s >$1 billion portfolio of 17 retirement communities, 6 residential aged care facilities and a home and disability service offering that covered most of Australia’s East coast, employed over 4,000 staff and provided services to senior Australians and people with a disability as well as having a distinct Aboriginal service offering. Jacqueline managed a team of over 30 members and was a member of the IAL Executive Committee. She regularly briefed colleagues and boards about governance matters and projects including complex development funds and acquisitions. The role included: Legal: establishing structures for third party equity and debt funding for the development of new retirement village and aged care facilities, dispute resolution and litigation management, acquisitions of land and businesses, creation of and advice on construction and development contracts and issues arising from these, processing of resident documents in both freehold and leasehold villages as well as aged care resident documents, advising on Aged Care Act and retirement village law compliance. The legal component also included compliance activities which covered staff compliance training and probity checks, compliance calendar maintenance and notifications, legislative updates and liaison with Departments of Health and other authorities. Risk: setting risk management direction for IAL including a 5 year plan for risk management activities, overseeing risk management meetings and collation of risk registers, creation and testing of emergency response and business continuity plans.Quality: setting, maintenance of and auditing of clinical and non-clinical standards, responses to authorities, complaints reporting and assisting with accreditation.

A risk management function was formally added in late 2015 given the increasing size and complexity of the business. Australian Unity was also seeking to improve the level of risk reporting with a focus too on emergency and business continuity management.

During this time, Jacqueline commenced managing the compliance function and created a compliance calendar and framework to direct activities over the coming years. Resident documents for NSW and Victoria were also standardised and the processing of these brought in-house which included creating systems and processes for taking deposits and creating, negotiating and executing documents.

First dedicated legal resource to the Retirement Living division of Australian Unity. Supported a newly created development and acquisitions team and created new procedures for basic legal functions such as reviews of marketing materials and processing of procurement contracts and resident documents.

Retail leasing and freehold acquisitions in all Australian states and across multiple brands and with an emphasis on liquor licensed premises including hotels and small and large format liquor stores. Also worked on the sale of the Coles group to Wesfarmers Ltd in late 2007 as well as being responsible for the exercise of all options for further lease terms for stores across all brands.

Solicitor in the Property and Development team working on acquisitions and dispositions of major property holdings (office buildings, aged care facilities, industrial parks, child care centres) and co-ordinating the property aspects (freehold and leasehold) of national mergers and and acquisitions. Also led the property work for the exit of Australian operations for a major international retailer involving over 140 stores.

Solicitor in the Property and Development team with a focus on office and retail leasing, conveyancing, property due diligence for large acquisitions and upon insolvency events.