Revolving Doors – April 2022

March was a very interesting month. Unemployment now stands at 4.0% and is predicted to drop to 3.75% during the year. These numbers are impressive – especially when you consider back in March 2020, amid Covid, unemployment was predicted to reach 8%.

Unfortunately, the battle for Ukraine continues, and I think we are seeing some impact of that in recruitment with the uncertainty of the situation impacting some investment decisions which is impacting recruitment at the senior end of the market.

The market for roles below $200,000 continues to be very buoyant – finding quality contractors at this level is proving very challenging. With such a buoyant permanent market, limited skilled migration, and not as many people coming into the interim market due to redundancy, there are not many surplus candidates looking for contracting opportunities.

Above $200,000 it is a little different and still candidate heavy. I feel this will change and expect the market above $200,000 to become just as buoyant in the second half of the year – especially once the General Election has passed.

In CFO land, there was a reasonable amount of activity. NSW was again the state with the most activity with some plum roles being filled and other ones coming onto the market.

CFO Appointments – ASX Listed

I think the highlight of the month is the move at Telstra. Vicki Brady, the current CFO will move into the CEO role, following the retirement of long-standing CEO Andy Penn. Interestingly Vicki will be based in Sydney – perhaps this will make the CFO role a Sydney based role. I will watch closely to see who moves into Vicki’s role.

•             oOh!Media will be searching for a new CFO following the announcement that after 4 years in the CFO role, Sheila Lines will leave the business. Sheila will depart later this year to assist with the transition to a new CFO. Not sure who is running this search.

•             Last month we mentioned Paul Lewis was leaving Qube. It has been announced this month that his replacement will be Mark Wratten. Mark was consulting to Aristocrat, but before that had CFO roles with Vocus, Recall and Hastie.

•             Seasoned CFO Peter Myers has picked up a new CFO role to steer Noumi (previously known as Freedom Foods), through the next phase of its finance transformation. Peter takes over from Josee Lemoine, who executed the “reset” phase of their transformation.

•             Andrew Morgan moves across to Bendigo and Adelaide Bank as their new CFO, replacing Travis Crouch, who is moving to the Deputy CFO role. Andrew is coming from Colonial First State, who are now in the market for a new CFO.

•             Guy Debelle, the Deputy Governor of the Reserve Bank of Australia, has resigned and is moving into the CFO role of Fortescue Future Industries. Attempting to turn a mining giant into a green energy powerhouse – we all hope he succeeds. 

Other CFO Appointments

•             After 7.5 years with Future Super, Luke Gensler is taking a break before looking for his next opportunity. Future Super has the CFO role advertised on Linkedin.

•             Following a change of CEO (Cameron Judson) and CFO (Martin Cleaver) at the employment service provider, Angus Knight, Jane Hou has been prompted into the CFO role. Jane has been with the business for over 13 years. I believe a new CEO has also been hired, but this has not been announced yet.

•             George McMillan, who spent 16 years at WSP – across 3 continents, has joined NPM as their new CFO. NPM offers design, maintenance, and construction services. 

•             Andrew Virgona has announced his new CFO role. After seven years with Merlin Entertainment, Andrew has joined the Adecco Group as CFO ANZ.

•             The Standards Australia CFO role has been filled on a temporary basis with Ex Angus Knight CFO, Peter Homan moving into the interim CFO role. 

•             I might have to remove Nathan Thomas from my distribution list. Nathan has left the CFO role at Splend to move into recruitment, and I don’t want to give him too many leads  : )

Companies in the Market for Permanent CFOs:

•             Barnardos Australia – Still no update on this CFO position.

•             Symbio – Kate Denton is the interim CFO. Previous CFO Chris Last is now relaxing in the UK and will be back in six months.

•             ICare – Shailendra Singh is the interim CFO.

•             3PL – the search underway following Dimitri Aroney’s resignation.

 •            Energy Action – no announcement as yet on the new CFO.

 •            Scentre Group – search underway given Elliott Rusanow’s promotion to CEO – effective 1st October.