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The rising cost-of-living burden has left more Australian unhappy.

Social cohesion hits record lows, support for immigration slumps

The cost of living, high interest rates, the growing wealth gap and concern over migration all contributed to Australians feeling more anxious about life.

  • Patrick Durkin
Grant Wilckens presides over G’Day Group, a holiday parks company that owns $2 billion of property and is the largest provider of regional accommodation in the country.

This former investment banker now runs a $2b caravan park business

Grant Wilckens spent his early career raising capital for clients. Now he’s the CEO of the holiday parks company he founded, G’Day Group.

  • Sally Patten
Nick Mann, regional CEO of Australia, Asia and New Zealand and rotating group CEO of Swisse’s parent company H&H Group, at Swisse’s office in Collingwood, Melbourne.

Why the Swisse CEO fasts for 19 hours a day

Nick Mann, regional CEO of the parent company that owns Swisse, has stepped up into the role of global group CEO just as the wellness industry is booming.

  • Euan Black
Coles Group chief executive Leah Weckert told the Chanticleer brunch the top job was “something I had always aspired to”.

If you want the top job, say so: Coles CEO

Leah Weckert has some refreshingly honest career advice for aspiring executives, particularly women.

  • Patrick Durkin

This top fundie names the best business leaders she has met

WaveStone director Catherine Allfrey has worked in equity markets for 30 years. Over breakfast, she reveals the top thinkers who have impressed her most.

  • Sally Patten
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This Month

Why retail was the Bunnings MD’s third career choice, and why he stayed

Michael Schneider found doing the thing he was passionate about helped make his career much more worthwhile than seeing it as a job with a fortnightly pay.

  • Sally Patten and Lap Phan
VRC CEO Kylie Rogers

How Victoria Racing Club’s new boss plans to turn around its fortunes

Kylie Rogers was used to managing people with different priorities and agendas as one of the AFL’s top commercial executives. Now she has an even bigger challenge.

  • Zoe Samios and Patrick Durkin

October

Netflix co-CEO Greg Peters spent months with an executive coach to train him to co-lead the world’s biggest entertainment company.

Netflix’s co-CEO says it’s ‘impossible’ to run the $500b giant alone

Greg Peters once wanted to be an astronaut – now he’s leading a company worth more than Disney, Paramount and Warner Bros Discovery combined.

  • Sam Buckingham-Jones
BHP chairman Ken MacKenzie in 2022. He is expected to announce his resignation next year.

Inside the contest to succeed Ken MacKenzie at the top of BHP

It has been one of the most coveted prizes in corporate life. The next chairman of the Big Australian will have profound influence on the entire market.

  • Patrick Durkin
BHP and ANZ director Christine O’Reilly; Macquarie Group director Rebecca McGrath and AUB chair and CBA director Peter Harmer.

2024’s most powerful and influential directors revealed

As AGM season gathers pace, the BOSS index of the country’s most powerful and influential directors reveals a new cohort rising through the ranks.

  • Patrick Durkin
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A conversation with a career coach helped Canva’s Charlotte Anderson realise she wanted to create a new role for herself.

How execs create their own jobs

BOSS talks to three executives who came up with their own titles or convinced an employer to create a new position for them.

  • Euan Black

How to have a job you love, save the world and earn up to $800k

This week BOSS speaks to four executives who are helping to save the planet. All have a high level of job satisfaction, and all earn decent money. It appears it is possible to have it all. 

  • Sally Patten
Jaqui Lane, Founder of The Book Adviser.

This year’s worst corporate jargon, and the woman trying to fight it

Ducks in a row, reinventing the wheel, putting a pin in it, circling back, low-hanging fruit and thinking outside the box are among this year’s most hated buzz phrases.

  • Patrick Durkin
South Africa’s first fully representative democratic elections in 1994 were a pivotal moment in Biopak CEO Gary Smith’s career.

Why Nelson Mandela’s election was a turning point for this CEO

A contract to provide the computers for South Africa’s first all-race democratic elections in 1994 was a pivotal moment in the career of BioPak CEO Gary Smith.

  • Euan Black, Sally Patten and Lap Phan
Premier Investments chairman Solomon Lew.

Solomon Lew reveals why he is still obsessed with Myer

The 79-year-old retail billionaire has fought a lot of corporate battles over the years, but he remains fixated on the department store chain.

  • Patrick Durkin
Former sex discrimination commissioner Elizabeth Broderick.

What men really think about the push for gender balance

Most men agree with the need to create equal opportunities for male and female workers, but many still harbour concerns that job appointments are not based purely on merit.

  • Sally Patten
Peter Wilson, CEO of plumbing giant Reece.

CEO son crowned head of Rich List family’s $18b plumbing empire

Owners of Australia’s largest plumbing empire, the Wilsons are less known but in the same wealth echelon as the Pratts, and son Peter is about to take charge.

  • Patrick Durkin
Australian fashion designer Erin Deering eats breakfast at The Bond Store cafe in Southbank, Melbourne.

Why this former Young Rich Lister is running for deputy mayor

Australian fashion entrepreneur and small business owner Erin Deering says she wants to make Melbourne a more business-friendly city.

  • Euan Black
Recruiters and consultants say our people skills are getting worse the more time we spend on our own in front of screens.

How office workers are losing their social skills

Consultants say incidents of inappropriate workplace behaviour are becoming more common as increasing technology use erodes our people skills.

  • Euan Black

September

Richard Goyder.

Richard Goyder on his biggest mistake at Qantas

The recently departed Qantas chairman admits he made some mistakes but says people forget how the pandemic changed the game.

  • Patrick Durkin
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Georgia Hewett was chief of staff to two CEOs.

Why becoming a chief of staff is good for your career

Three top executives who took on the role early in their careers say the position was a springboard to far bigger jobs.

  • Sally Patten
The Walt Disney Company’s managing director ANZ, Kylie Watson-Wheeler, is also president of AFL club the Western Bulldogs.

Disney chief goes retro for AFL finals to reel in streaming rivals

Disney’s Australian boss Kylie Watson-Wheeler is bringing her AFL obsession into her day job as the US giant takes on the dominant players in the local streaming wars.

  • Patrick Durkin
Sydney’s Isaac Heeney celebrates a goal against GWS in the qualifying final at the SCG.

AFL more important to Khuda than data centres, Swans chairman suspects

Andrew Pridham is vice chairman of asset manager MA Financial and chairman of Sydney Swans. AirTrunk founder Robin Khuda texts him before games.

  • Sally Patten
Tabcorp chief executive Gillon McLachlan has ordered staff back to the office five days a week.

Tabcorp CEO Gill McLachlan orders staff back to office five days a week

Tabcorp and Amazon have ordered their staff back to the office five days a week in the latest salvo in the work-from-home battle.

  • Euan Black and Patrick Durkin

What this CEO learnt from Mike Cannon-Brookes and Scott Farquhar

Culture Amp chief Didier Elzinga met the Atlassian duo at an awards function years ago, and got an insight into scalable business models.

  • Sally Patten and Lap Phan

Original URL: https://www.afr.com/boss