Current role: Independent Audit Committee and Board Member
Current organisations: Icon Water, AFSA, Services Australia, Prime Minister & Cabinet, ACT Government and Castlepoint
Last role at PwC: Partner
Time at PwC: 1997 - 2011
Information current as of 10 May 2022.
What’s the one career achievement you’re most proud of?
Making Partner at PwC was definitely a highlight. It was something I had aspired to since starting as a graduate at Arthur Andersen and worked hard to achieve it. More recently, I’ve been really surprised at how much I have enjoyed my move into Director and Audit Committee roles. It’s a great use of my previous experience, my networks and also been a real challenge with lots of new skills to learn.
What’s been your biggest career challenge and how have you overcome it?
My biggest challenge was trying to balance family and work. This is such a focus for workplaces now and was the area that I found most difficult combining young children and a busy role at PwC as a Director and then Partner. After my first discussions about these challenges I realised that it was up to me to come up with solutions that would work best for my family. Over my time with PwC I had all sorts of different working patterns - part time, working from home, buying extra leave, and so on. These options are much more common now and obviously with COVID, much more accepted.
With my new responsibilities on Boards and Audit Committees, and the fact that my kids are now teenagers, the challenges have morphed and are now focussed on not overcommitting myself.
What’s the most valuable lesson you learnt during your career at PwC and how has that helped you get to where you are today?
Starting as a financial statement auditor, and later internal auditor, I learnt early on about the importance of getting a good understanding of the business. As a grad, going out to do year end stocktakes was about understanding what the stock balances were, what the controls were, what the likely issues and risks were going to be, and meeting the people involved.
Now in approaching new Board or Audit Committee roles, it’s very similar and the fundamental thing is being curious about the business, the operations and the risks. Reading packs of papers can be quite dry, and take hours, and it’s often thinking about how it all fits together with your understanding of the business and what is missing from the papers that keeps it fresh and interesting.
What was your dream job ‘growing up’ and why?
I wanted to be a fashion designer. I loved art and being creative but chose accounting over art in year 11 and 12. Good decision career wise, but I still love art. I took up oil painting ten years ago and attend an art class each Thursday night.
If you could have an hour lunch with anyone - dead or alive - who would it be and why?
I would love to meet with Ash Barty and just chat to her about her outlook on life. She seems so determined and focused, but I love how humble and real she is. Such an amazing decision to retire at her peak, but certainly one that I can admire. I would also invite my mum and dad as I miss them and would love to catch up and chat again.
How are you and your business making a difference for your customers, employees and society?
I am involved in lots of different businesses now through my Board and Audit Committee roles. For my government audit committees there is a clear linkage with the work that they deliver and the difference this makes to communities, their customers, staff and other stakeholders. When I moved from Perth back in the late 90’s and my work changed from mining and property management audits in Perth to predominantly government in Canberra, it took a little bit to adjust. But I have found that government is fascinating and so relevant given it touches all parts of our lives.
Based on your experience, what do you believe will be the most important skills and expertise that Boards will require over the next five years?
Clearly there is a big focus on cyber risk, which is understandable with the rate of change in technology and with us being surrounded by digital delivery. Climate change is also an area which is impacting businesses and government entities, and we need to be thinking about what our risks are and how we can be more sustainable. It does feel like there will be many more emerging areas of risk that we cannot foresee right now and so Boards need to be open to looking constantly at the skill sets they need, adjusting and bringing in specialist advice where they find gaps.
As an owner of multiple tech start-ups what advice would you give to aspiring entrepreneurs?
I have been involved, along with my husband, in owning Stratsec, which was a startup security consulting company and sold to BAE Systems after being built from the ground up.
We also then started another company, Instaclustr, which NetApp recently announced their intention to acquire. Instaclustr’s first board meeting was around a table in our games room and I chaired the board for the first 5 years. It is now a company of over 300 people across Australia, US and Europe.
Being active in the start up scene in Canberra, we’re involved in a number of tech start ups and I’m on the Board of Castlepoint, an information management software company.
From these experiences, my main advice is to be grateful to your investors. They have put their faith in you, and put their money on the line. It’s good to learn on the go, but better to soak up the lessons and experience that these investors or other advisors and people around you can provide. There are many new and sometimes scary times in a startup. It’s important to share your concerns with your Board and work through things together.
How have you applied your experience in the tech field to your independent Audit Committee roles in government?
I’ve certainly found that all experiences, from whatever role it may be, are helpful in building your cumulative knowledge about how to deal with new and different situations.
Similar to having a number of experiences with start ups, I’ve also found it really helpful to have roles with similar entities, e.g based on size or nature of operations, so that you can apply learnings from one entity to another. This adds a lot of value from a Board or Audit Committee perspective.
