Telecom company, Spark NZ, is in trouble. It started this year with a share price of over $NZ 5. Its now around $NZ 2.80 - a decline of nearly 50%. Shareholders who've seen their wealth wiped are furious. A Main Stream Media journalist said its bosses had to field "hostile" & "misogynistic" questions at its General Meeting. Blaming gender is reprehensible. Let's instead take a look at the diversity of Spark's senior leadership. Many folks have tried linking less diversity on Boards to worse performance.
A former NZ Treasury Secretary said "Having greater diversity broadens the experiences & perspectives within organizations .. [it] enables better ideas, solutions & services. In today’s world that matters more than ever.” I've never understood this line - isn't it important to have the best people, regardless of background, gender and ethnicity? Shouldn't meritocracy be the deciding factor? But what do I know. Let's just go with the Treasury Secretary & compare the background of Spark Chairperson, Justine Smyth, with its CEO, Jolie Hodson. They're presented on LinkedIn (see below).
1. CEO Hodson is an Aucklander, having done a Bachelor of Commerce degree at the University of Auckland. Chairperson Smyth is an Aucklander, having done a Bachelor of Commerce degree at the University of Auckland.
2. CEO Hodson's BCom was in Accounting. She graduated in 1991. Board Chair Smyth's BCom was also in Accounting. She graduated in 1990. The two of them overlapped, in terms of doing the same degree, at the same University, in the same subject.
3. The CEO and Chair of Spark are almost the same age - in their early 50s - they finished their undergraduate degrees at similar times.
4. CEO Hodson worked at accounting firm, Deloitte's from 1992 to 2000. Chairperson Smyth, worked at Deloitte's from 1997 to 2000. They again appear to have overlapped.
5. CEO Hodson then worked at Lion, the brewery, in Sydney, Australia, from 2000 to 2003. Chairperson Smyth also worked at Lion - it also appears in Sydney - from 2000 to 2012. They again appear to have overlapped.
6. CEO Hodson became Spark's Chief Financial Officer around 2013. Chairperson Smyth became Spark's Chair in 2017. In 2019, Hodson was appointed the new CEO.
To work at the cutting edge of telecoms technology, could it be a tad important to have top bosses stacked with engineers? Or at least have a little bit of diversity in their backgrounds? Look at former French state-owned telecoms provider, Orange (Spark is former state-owned provider, Telecom NZ). Orange's CEO is Christel Heydemann. She's an engineer from top school, École Nationale des Ponts et Chaussées, and worked at Schneider Electric. Board Chair, Jacques Aschenbroich, is an engineer and graduate of another top French School.
But good luck to Spark - its like most other Kiwi public companies run by folks with BCom-LLB degrees - without backgrounds in the technology behind their industries. Go ask Kiwi Rail. Go ask Fletchers. Who needs an engineer in those outfits? After all, you can just put the ferry on autopilot. Maybe the NZ private sector should blame itself for NZ's low productivity. Maybe my mates - many of whom are mathematicians, engineers & computer scientists, left NZ since Corporate NZ put them down and threw them in the data & engine rooms, telling them they don't have leadership and comms skills. Funny how many of them now own their own companies or are CEOs of foreign corporations.
Sources: https://www.pressreader.com/new-zealand/the-press/20241102/282063397471749
https://www.linkedin.com/in/jolie-hodson-mnzm-8248a44a/?originalSubdomain=nz
https://www.linkedin.com/in/justine-smyth-cnzm-194a7122/details/experience/
Professor Robert MacCulloch holds the Matthew S. Abel Chair of Macroeconomics at Auckland University. He has previously worked at the Reserve Bank, Oxford University, and the London School of Economics. He runs the blog Down to Earth Kiwi from where this article was sourced.
https://www.linkedin.com/in/jolie-hodson-mnzm-8248a44a/?originalSubdomain=nz
https://www.linkedin.com/in/justine-smyth-cnzm-194a7122/details/experience/
Professor Robert MacCulloch holds the Matthew S. Abel Chair of Macroeconomics at Auckland University. He has previously worked at the Reserve Bank, Oxford University, and the London School of Economics. He runs the blog Down to Earth Kiwi from where this article was sourced.
4 comments:
Engineering needs very solid maths (- way beyond just arithmetic) and foresight training . Philosophy is very useful for this.
Too hard basket - so academic entry for Maori will be massively reduced for equity . But wait... of course, Maori building and computing expertise was way ahead of the Mesopotamia, Egypt and Greece....
God help NZ ' s development from 2040 on .
Oh robert you silly man, no problem here just still not enough diversify on the board, surely a couple more lgbqt and maori appointments will sort the mess out....
And let's not forget that Theresa Gattung served as the CEO of Telecom New Zealand (now Spark) from 1993 to 2007. I was working there at the time and I cannot recall anyone taking much notice of her gender. Roughly half of Sales and Marketing were female. Just saying.
Object Lesson: As one of many senior engineers employed by Motorola in the 1990's it was a well appreciated fact that the company had prospered under the leadership of firstly the Galin Brothers, both engineers and then Bob Galvin, the son of one of them and also an engineer. Legend said that he trusted his engineers with ensuring the health of the company finances. Incidentally, I completed a Diploma in Engineering Management and recall that it was impressed upon us that we should never let HR tell us who to employ and we should never let the bean counters tell us how to spend the money. The focus was essentially quality of product/service and customer satisfaction. We lived that ethos and I think Motorola was something like a $26B turnover company at that time. Then the grandson took over, Harvard 'educated' he changed the ethos into one of chasing the $ and doing more with less (one of his catch-phrases). Yes, the company made a few errors like the Iridium satellite one but the real issues as I see it was that change in focus and the tangible dive to the bottom that followed. There are those who say one should 'look after the Pennies and the Pounds will look after themselves' but I subscribe to the other one which is very simple 'Penny-wise - Pound foolish'. Conversion to Dollars and Cents is a no-brainer.
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