,Foreword
About the Authors
Acknowledgements
Introduction
Chapter 1: Selecting the Master CEOs
Chapter 2: Tough Medicine
Chapter 3: David to Goliath
Chapter 4: The Best Mistake I Ever Made
Chapter 5: Making the World Little
Chapter 6: The Hills are Alive with the Sound of Music
Chapter 7: SuperSonic
Chapter 8: Building a Kingdom
Chapter 9: Banks, Boats and Bundy
Chapter 10: Soaring High
Chapter 11: A Bloody Miracle
Chapter 12: Out of Africa
Chapter 13: Mining for Values
Chapter 14: Go Gerry, Go, Go, Go
Conclusion
Index
,pter 1
Selecting the Master CEOs
The selection process for the Master CEOs was kept quite simple. There were four key criteria:
The CEO or managing director must have been in charge of the company for a
minimum of ten years. The minimum tenure was based on a desire to, as best as possible,
eliminate the benefit or detriment of an economic cycle —that is, we wanted the CEOs to
have performed through good and bad times. The average term of CEOs in listed
companies is closer to five years.
The CEO had to be still actively running the company at the time we invited them
to participate in the book.
The company must have been listed on the Australian Securities Exchange for at
least the ten years the CEO was in charge. There were many companies whose CEO had
been there for many years before listing, but these companies could not be considered
because they had been listed for less than ten years.
The company’s total return to its shareholders must have outperformed the All
Ordinaries Accumulation Index over the period the CEO was in charge. The All Ordinaries
Accumulation Index measures the overall performance of the Australian sharemarket,
including dividends, so we thought it was the best benchmark to work from.
We applied the criteria to the companies in the All Ordinaries Accumulation Index and more than
twenty CEOs qualified. Letters were sent to these people and thirteen accepted. This was a
tremendous response, given the time constraints and obligations of the people involved. We accept
that the list of CEOs is not exhaustive; however, it contains a variety of people from different
industries and backgrounds, and all have inspiring stories to tell. Selection processes are often
contentious, whether they are for the best teams in sport or the top musicians of an era, and our
selection process will not suit everyone.
Three of the CEOs retired after being interviewed — David Simmons of Hills Industries, Pat Grier
of Ramsay Health Care and Owen Hegarty of Oxiana. It was decided that all three should stay in
the book, given they had a lot to offer and that they had already been involved in the process.
Each of the thirteen CEOs was interviewed directly by the authors. The intention was to have them
tell their life story and at the same time explain why they have been such outstanding leaders in
corporate life. Most of the interviews begin with the CEO’s childhood and rise to the top, before
switching to the subject of leadership and management.
These leaders are from a range of sectors, with health care the dominant industry (providing four
of the thirteen people). The remainder are from industries including banking, retail, construction,
grocery wholesaling, transport, mining, mining services and diversified industry. Interestingly,
they also come from a good cross-section of the country, with six from New South Wales, three
from Victoria, two from Queensland, one from South Australia and one from Western Australia.
Nine grew up in Australia, two in South Africa, one in Zimbabwe and one in Italy.
, Of significance was that only one of the CEOs was brought in from overseas to run a company.
That person was Andrew Reitzer, who was placed in the top job at food and liquor wholesaler
Metcash after his South African employer made a takeover bid for the company. The rest had
learned their management skills in Australia — a fact not wasted on Leighton Holdings CEO Wal
King, who had some strong comments about the conduct of Australian boards and the selection of
management.
Unfortunately, no female CEOs passed the selection criteria. The one exception was Katie Page,
who along with her husband, Gerry Harvey, has run the highly successful Harvey Norman retail
group for twenty-five years. We were hopeful that Katie and Gerry could be interviewed together,
but she preferred not to be involved, leaving Gerry to do the talking.
There were a number of objectives in writing this book. Firstly, we were keen to look beyond the
numbers and investigate how some leaders manage to continually perform highly. All too often
analysts and funds managers are only concerned with the end result, rather than with why some
managers have the ability to deliver outstanding results over long periods. Sustainable businesses
are difficult to find, and when we do come across them it is incumbent on investors, managers and
employees to study why they have delivered great outcomes.
Secondly, the subject of leadership has been much researched in other western markets, such as
the United States and United Kingdom, and is a much-debated topic in other fields, such as politics
and sport. However, leadership in Australian companies has been explored very little.
Finally, as students of business and life we are excited by the subject of success. The thirteen CEOs
we interviewed for this book have enjoyed outstanding success in their chosen careers. Tapping
into their thoughts was an exercise worth doing even if we had not been writing a book.
Table 1.1 overleaf sets out the returns the thirteen Master CEOs have presided over at their
companies. While the returns vary greatly, we believe each leader has done an outstanding job for
their investors, given the time frame and the industry they are in. The returns are based on when
the individuals became CEO until we started interviewing them in February 2008.
Table 1.1: company returns
About the Authors
Acknowledgements
Introduction
Chapter 1: Selecting the Master CEOs
Chapter 2: Tough Medicine
Chapter 3: David to Goliath
Chapter 4: The Best Mistake I Ever Made
Chapter 5: Making the World Little
Chapter 6: The Hills are Alive with the Sound of Music
Chapter 7: SuperSonic
Chapter 8: Building a Kingdom
Chapter 9: Banks, Boats and Bundy
Chapter 10: Soaring High
Chapter 11: A Bloody Miracle
Chapter 12: Out of Africa
Chapter 13: Mining for Values
Chapter 14: Go Gerry, Go, Go, Go
Conclusion
Index
,pter 1
Selecting the Master CEOs
The selection process for the Master CEOs was kept quite simple. There were four key criteria:
The CEO or managing director must have been in charge of the company for a
minimum of ten years. The minimum tenure was based on a desire to, as best as possible,
eliminate the benefit or detriment of an economic cycle —that is, we wanted the CEOs to
have performed through good and bad times. The average term of CEOs in listed
companies is closer to five years.
The CEO had to be still actively running the company at the time we invited them
to participate in the book.
The company must have been listed on the Australian Securities Exchange for at
least the ten years the CEO was in charge. There were many companies whose CEO had
been there for many years before listing, but these companies could not be considered
because they had been listed for less than ten years.
The company’s total return to its shareholders must have outperformed the All
Ordinaries Accumulation Index over the period the CEO was in charge. The All Ordinaries
Accumulation Index measures the overall performance of the Australian sharemarket,
including dividends, so we thought it was the best benchmark to work from.
We applied the criteria to the companies in the All Ordinaries Accumulation Index and more than
twenty CEOs qualified. Letters were sent to these people and thirteen accepted. This was a
tremendous response, given the time constraints and obligations of the people involved. We accept
that the list of CEOs is not exhaustive; however, it contains a variety of people from different
industries and backgrounds, and all have inspiring stories to tell. Selection processes are often
contentious, whether they are for the best teams in sport or the top musicians of an era, and our
selection process will not suit everyone.
Three of the CEOs retired after being interviewed — David Simmons of Hills Industries, Pat Grier
of Ramsay Health Care and Owen Hegarty of Oxiana. It was decided that all three should stay in
the book, given they had a lot to offer and that they had already been involved in the process.
Each of the thirteen CEOs was interviewed directly by the authors. The intention was to have them
tell their life story and at the same time explain why they have been such outstanding leaders in
corporate life. Most of the interviews begin with the CEO’s childhood and rise to the top, before
switching to the subject of leadership and management.
These leaders are from a range of sectors, with health care the dominant industry (providing four
of the thirteen people). The remainder are from industries including banking, retail, construction,
grocery wholesaling, transport, mining, mining services and diversified industry. Interestingly,
they also come from a good cross-section of the country, with six from New South Wales, three
from Victoria, two from Queensland, one from South Australia and one from Western Australia.
Nine grew up in Australia, two in South Africa, one in Zimbabwe and one in Italy.
, Of significance was that only one of the CEOs was brought in from overseas to run a company.
That person was Andrew Reitzer, who was placed in the top job at food and liquor wholesaler
Metcash after his South African employer made a takeover bid for the company. The rest had
learned their management skills in Australia — a fact not wasted on Leighton Holdings CEO Wal
King, who had some strong comments about the conduct of Australian boards and the selection of
management.
Unfortunately, no female CEOs passed the selection criteria. The one exception was Katie Page,
who along with her husband, Gerry Harvey, has run the highly successful Harvey Norman retail
group for twenty-five years. We were hopeful that Katie and Gerry could be interviewed together,
but she preferred not to be involved, leaving Gerry to do the talking.
There were a number of objectives in writing this book. Firstly, we were keen to look beyond the
numbers and investigate how some leaders manage to continually perform highly. All too often
analysts and funds managers are only concerned with the end result, rather than with why some
managers have the ability to deliver outstanding results over long periods. Sustainable businesses
are difficult to find, and when we do come across them it is incumbent on investors, managers and
employees to study why they have delivered great outcomes.
Secondly, the subject of leadership has been much researched in other western markets, such as
the United States and United Kingdom, and is a much-debated topic in other fields, such as politics
and sport. However, leadership in Australian companies has been explored very little.
Finally, as students of business and life we are excited by the subject of success. The thirteen CEOs
we interviewed for this book have enjoyed outstanding success in their chosen careers. Tapping
into their thoughts was an exercise worth doing even if we had not been writing a book.
Table 1.1 overleaf sets out the returns the thirteen Master CEOs have presided over at their
companies. While the returns vary greatly, we believe each leader has done an outstanding job for
their investors, given the time frame and the industry they are in. The returns are based on when
the individuals became CEO until we started interviewing them in February 2008.
Table 1.1: company returns
