Luke Sayers
He’s not afraid to “scramble a few eggs” but the outspoken CEO of PwC Australia reveals a softer side to Kirsten Galliott.
How do you define good leadership?
For me, good leadership is what’s seen through other people’s lenses. By that I mean the way other people see you and what they take away from a conversation. It’s a mixture of head and heart so it’s a combination of intellect and clarity of communication. It’s also a combination of empathy and understanding, respect and being curious.
So if you’re judging your leadership on how others perceive you, do you modify your behaviour for different people?
One hundred per cent. There’s leadership from a distance and leadership as person by person. I’m not a big believer that you change organisations in a mass way; I see it as a person by person opportunity.
Do people have changed expectations of leaders now?
A decade ago, the biggest, strongest, most powerful, almost autocratic leaders rose to become CEOs and led en masse. Today, it’s very different – more authentic, personal and humble. It’s less about the individual leader and more about the team and a broader number of leaders.
What do you think is your absolute strength?
A blend of empathy and understanding with the courage to try different things and make the necessary decisions.
And what do you think is your biggest gap as a leader?
Sometimes I’m too loving and caring of the individual and therefore slow to make a decision that needs to be made.
Even though you have empathy, you’re also renowned for saying it like it is. Has that ever got you into trouble?
It’s a mix of empathy and authenticity so when I have something that I believe needs to be said, I do say it. That might ruffle feathers or scramble a few eggs but the reason I’ve said it is because I think we need to ruffle some feathers or scramble a few eggs. I’m not a leader who speaks in riddles. I think leadership is questioning, listening and then giving clarity and direction. People crave clarity.
To become CEO of PwC, you had to have buy-in from all the partners. How persuasive are you?
It’s a voting system here. Every four years, there are 700 partners who elect the CEO. You need an understanding of and emotional connection to the pain points of the partnership and the partners and also the ability to inspire. It’s a very different
leadership model [at PwC] than a corporate. You’re dealing with professional people so you need to match that intellectual rigour but then also be able to generate the emotional fellowship so we can all pull together.
When you became CEO in 2012, you had to transform the business. You shed 200 staff and about 10 per cent of the partners. Would you do anything differently?
I wouldn’t change the tough decisions that needed to be made but I wish I’d engaged better with the partners and the firm beforehand. I lost a lot of trust, not so much with the partner group but with the staff, and it took me another nine to 12 months to rebuild that trust.
So how would you prefer to have done it?
I’d have communicated differently with staff and partners. That probably would have pushed the time line out by a month or so but it would’ve been worthwhile, I believe.
You’re a strong advocate of the need for “leaders to lead” and you’ve been particularly vocal about diversity on boards and same-sex marriage. Why are they so important to you?
First and foremost, I have a daughter [Alexandra, 16] with Down syndrome. I don’t like seeing any human being marginalised or put in a box with regard to perceptions. Difference creates opportunity and breakthrough thinking. Let’s stop the judgement, get wonderfully different people around the table and create something that we wouldn’t come up with if we were all the same.
It’s hard to change attitudes, though, isn’t it?
I’m an incredibly optimistic, positive person. When individuals see it, feel it and get it, they do adjust. Words on a page and corporate-speak won’t change anybody or anything. But when you see it come to life time and time again, that does alter people. But it needs to be repeated and experiential.
What keeps you awake at night?
I’m a pretty good sleeper [laughs]. I can only do a maximum of two four-year periods [as CEO]. I’m into my seventh year so coming to the end of my term in June 2020. It doesn’t keep me awake at night but I’m focused on leaving the organisation in a great place.
Human nature would dictate that you’re probably starting to think about what you’re going to do after you leave PwC, apart from have a holiday, I hope.
[Laughs] Yes, absolutely – a great holiday in Italy. I’ve been able to put it in a box but there will come a time as I move through 2019 into ’20 where I think, “Okay, well, what’s the next chapter and what’s going to excite me and inspire me to grow and learn?”
Late last year, you received an anonymous letter detailing inappropriate behaviour by partners [including sexual harassment and bullying]. What did you do?
I discussed that letter with my leadership team and my general counsel. We then talked about our values, which need to dictate the way we respond when things are tough. I needed to talk to all of the partners about what was appropriate behaviour and what was not appropriate behaviour and how I had received this letter. And if this letter was true, in no way, shape or form was that living our values.
Fifty-three per cent of the staff at PwC are women, 26 per cent of partners are women and you’ve been a champion of diversity. Was the letter a disappointing moment for you?
It was disappointing but to this day I still don’t know whether that letter was fact or fiction. In my heart of hearts I hope that those behaviours were not happening within my firm but I don’t know whether that’s right or wrong. If staff have issues or concerns, I love that they can bubble them up to me. I just wish they weren’t in an anonymous fashion.
Do you sometimes feel a bit removed from what’s going on?
I think you do and an individual or a leadership team can only do and be across so much. That’s not said in an aggregation-of-responsibility way, just in a humanistic way. You can’t be everywhere at once. What you need to do is build a culture and values and system that means you get much more right than wrong.
What advice would you give a new CEO?
Get amazingly different people around you. Make sure those people are the epitome of the values of your organisation. Read, listen and engage, judgement-free, and then build a strategy and the confidence of the staff to create something special.
“LET’S STOP THE JUDGEMENT, GET WONDERFULLY DIFFERENT PEOPLE AROUND THE TABLE AND CREATE SOMETHING THAT WE WOULDN’T COME UP WITH IF WE WERE ALL THE SAME.”