To be honest, it is a combination of humbling, exciting and a fraction surreal. This all happened quite quickly and, since taking on the role, I have been overwhelmed by the level of support from partners, clients, current and ex colleagues, and friends. Having grown up in the firm, I have a deep appreciation of our history, culture and capabilities and I am genuinely excited about what we can achieve together as a team of partners and professionals.

Two things get me out of bed every morning – people and impact. In professional services, we are privileged to be able to work with very talented individuals inside and outside the firm and I am always energised by the opportunity to get to know and build relationships with people from diverse backgrounds and with different perspectives. I am also motivated by the ability to mobilise the extraordinary depth and breadth of expertise we have in a firm like Deloitte to make a positive and tangible impact for our clients and to have a voice on the issues that matter for business, the economy and our nation more broadly.

Being the AP Consulting Leader was one of the most interesting and rewarding roles of my career. Having an opportunity to lead a team of around 18,000 people across a region as dynamic and diverse as Asia Pacific – from India, China and Korea through Japan, SEA and ANZ - was a real privilege. Over the past three years, we significantly grew our APAC practice and achieved a lot, particularly in terms of building scale and capability to support our clients with complex technology transformation programs. At a personal level, working in APAC taught me how to be a more patient, respectful, culturally aware, and outcomes-oriented leader. It also highlighted the extraordinary opportunity sitting on our doorstep as a nation if we can more effectively and sustainably engage with our Asian neighbours.

Over my time at Deloitte, I have had the opportunity and good fortune to do many things and I have had a lot of enjoyment and career satisfaction along the way. From a client service perspective, my highlights would be:

• Delivering my first ever consulting project for the Aboriginal Housing Authority in Melbourne which was a grounding and humbling experience
• Leading the development of the national eHealth strategy on behalf of Australian federal and state governments
• Winning and quality assuring our very large and ground-breaking SAP program of work at Transport for NSW. 

From a personal and practice perspective, some highlights would include:

• Spending two years on secondment as a new manager in the Deloitte Seattle office (and having a US born daughter while over there)
• Making partner in 2003, mentoring many others on their partner journeys
• Helping build our Deloitte Digital, Data and Technology consulting businesses
• Leading and growing the Consulting business and team in Australia
• Being part of the Global Consulting leadership team for over a decade 
• Most recently, having the wonderful opportunity to build a team and practice across the diverse, fast growing and always interesting Asia Pacific region.

I would start with family – this has always been core for me. I am very fortunate to be part of a close (although somewhat loud and eccentric) family and I am also very proud of the fact that I have just celebrated 31 years of marriage to Jane and together we have raised three wonderful children and two fluffy white dogs. My other main passions are sport and socialising. I still play cricket and golf despite a few age-related aches and pains (even if my golf game can best be described as ‘expansionary’) and am a keen – and increasingly optimistic – Essendon supporter. I also love catching up with my friends and enjoying a nice wine (particularly old Australian reds) and good food from anywhere around the world with a particular weakness for the humble dumpling.