Communities and Forums

The Forge is pleased to announce the release of the Community menu and the forum capability on the Forge site.

To better serve the multiple communities and special interest groups on the Forge, we have created a new top-level Community menu. This menu replaces the Alumni menu, but alumni need not fear – your community remains accessible under the new community menu. Currently, we have only two additions: the Open Forum and the Author Forum. Note that, unlike comments, the forum is not pre-moderated. Your posts go live immediately.

The Open Forum is for everyone to engage on any JPME topic. The Forge will not necessarily prune off-topic discussions, unless they start to breach our terms and conditions. Currently, you can view these on the Submission pages, but they will be made more widely available soon.

The Author Forum is only accessible to logged-in users who have author accounts. The author forum is a place to learn more about authoring for the Forge, discover the types of articles we are currently seeking, and connect with fellow authors to discuss topics of interest. Eventually, I will also populate the Author resources with reviews of writing products and guides on writing specific types of articles, such as book reviews. If you are not currently an author on the Forge, but would like access to this forum, contact the Forge on the.forge@defence.gov.au with your details, and we will arrange access for you.

We have produced a video to assist you in learning more about the forums:

Podcasts

The Military Professional Mastery (MPM) Branch has been very busy over the last few months preparing a podcast series called Lives in Leadership.

Lives in Leadership explores leadership in demanding environments, featuring insights from experienced practitioners drawn across Defence, government, industry, and academia.  Through sharing compelling stories and perspectives, the podcast explores military leadership, ethics, culture, and service in the Profession of Arms. The podcast focuses on insights in joint and integrated appointments at the operational and strategic level. It complements existing single-service professional military development platforms.

The first episode of Lives in Leadership episode will premiere on October 14, 2025. It will feature Rear Admiral Lee Goddard (retd) in conversation with Dr Lucas Marie from MPM. New episodes will be released weekly thereafter.

You can download Lives in Leadership via the Forge and the podcast apps Apple Podcasts and Spotify. You are encouraged to subscribe to Lives in Leadership to join these enriching conversations and take advantage of the valuable opportunity for professional development. Further announcements regarding upcoming episodes will be shared via internal communication channels.

This post will be editted on the 14th of October to add the links to the the Podcast series.