“The lesson is people out back are just as important in electoral success as those out front. They don’t just keep the show on the road, they ensure theirs is the one you want to watch,” writes political columnist ANDREW HUGHES.

In the modern era, a switched-on party should have a very, very close team of four to five key individuals who form the strategic and organisational core of the party.

These are the ones who have as much and if not more power than the senior elected officials. 

For Labor, this team would be, for most levels, the leader, the leader’s chief of staff, the deputy (sometimes), the secretary, then heads of campaign/strategy and research. 

I’m looking at Labor first because they are simply the benchmark right now in Australian politics. National secretary Paul Erickson is perhaps one of the best in Labor’s history. His campaign of 2025 was not just about victory, it was aimed at a mandate. 

That you can only do after the painful lessons of defeats, but also knowing your party structure is well oiled and dissent is only heard when it can be constructive. It is a huge contrast from the Coalition and even some of the minors. 

That contrast is important – you need only look (if you are online) at the 2025 Labor Review and the 2025 Liberal one. 

These reviews highlight many things, but perhaps chief amongst them is just how well Labor run themselves at the party machine level. Finding a candidate isn’t that hard for most parties, but what is much more difficult is someone who can run a party and then execute strategy in a campaign. 

That is an incredibly rare talent. 

Which is why parties are doing a lot of hard work on what we so often don’t see: that tight band of four or five who run the actual party. 

Labor’s team has undergone some changes around some of those outside that inner circle, but that inner circle itself has barely nudged because Labor knows one of its nightmares is not an Angus Taylor on a bounce, but losing Paul Erickson to a corporate gig. 

I’d have a guess that he could easily triple his pay from Labor in corporate land if he were to decide to go. That is a massive foregone pay packet. That is sacrifice. 

It is this type of person that other parties need to get. Lynton Crosby and Mark Textor served the Coalition for so long in that role, and local lad Andrew Carswell more recently. But there’s a gap and while there are some emerging and very sharp talents, I hear the Coalition are slow to secure them. 

I also hear rumours from down south of taps on certain individual shoulders to head up a digital and brand team. But they would still be outsiders. 

To truly take on Labor they need to find those four or five brand-breathing but realistic operators with knowledge of politics and marketing to fight Labor on the party machine front. 

One Nation knows how important that is and the announcement, albeit quiet, of Chris Taylor as chief of staff for Pauline Hanson, and James Ashby as national director, signal they recognise the importance of getting this right, especially after negative stories out of Victoria of organisational hiccups and hurdles involving campaign methods and candidate support in the lead up to the November state election. 

I also hear rumours again about outsiders being purchased to assist because they can’t complete that team in time for campaign 2028, which has just started. 

Even locally, you can see that difference. Ash van Dijk, 2024 campaign director, stepped down because he took a nice consulting gig but a good reason why Labor win here consistently is because of people like him. 

So readers, the lesson is people out back are just as important in electoral success as those out front. They don’t just keep the show on the road, they ensure theirs is the one you want to watch. 

Before we get to the massive election year that will be 2028, pay attention to the names of those running campaigns because that will tell you who is aiming for just a chance, a seat, or government.

Dr Andrew Hughes lectures at the ANU Research School of Management, where he specialises in political marketing. 

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