How Billionaire Richard White and new WiseTech CEO will handle conflict

Richard White has told investors that WiseTech’s executive ranks will ‘not override’ each other even if they have the ability to do so as he steps into new founding chief executive role.

WiseTech founder Richard White at the company's investor day in Sydney.

WiseTech founder Richard White has promised investors he would not “override” management in his new advisory role, describing his exit as chief executive as a necessary “circuit breaker” following a scandal in which he allegedly offered business advice for sex.

In one of his first public appearances since the saga, Mr White attempted to reassure investors that he and WiseTech’s executive ranks would not butt heads and would be able to keep the company’s best interests at heart.

“If you have the good of the business in your sights and you have a disagreement, what you’ve got is an opportunity for improvement,” Mr White told more than 100 analysts and fund managers at its investor day at Sydney’s W Hotel.

“It’s not a time to override the other person just because you can and say this is the way we’re going to do it; that might have to happen in the end so you have consistency, but ultimately what you’re trying to do is to stop worrying about the mechanism.”

The billionaire WiseTech founder said he would also take inspiration on how to deal with conflicts from a book first published in 1984.

“If you focus on the effect we’re trying to create and not the mechanism, that I believe is the right way to do it, you often come to much better answers … and that, by the way, is a very large chunk of the second Eliyahu M Goldratt book called It’s Not Luck,” Mr White said.

He had referenced the prequel to that book, The Goal, several times earlier, which he said had helped inspire some of WiseTech’s methods and strategies. Mr White made the comments while sitting alongside WiseTech chair Richard Dammery and the company’s interim chief executive, Andrew Cartledge, who admitted the pair didn’t always see eye-to-eye, including as recently as last week.

“Look, Richard and I have worked together for nine years now, right, and we’ve not agreed on everything all the time, right. Clearly there’s been things that we have discussed and debated,” he said.

Mr White stepped down from the WiseTech board and chief executive position in October amid a raft of sensational allegations about his personal behaviour aired amid a legal battle with his former lover.

That fight was about $91,000 worth of luxury furniture his ex-lover Linda Rogan had purchased – allegedly at Mr White’s direction – to deck out a $13.1m mansion in Sydney’s wealthy suburb of Vaucluse that he bought for her in 2022.

In his new role as founder and founding CEO, he will advise WiseTech’s current chief executive on a $1m annual salary.

Questions have been raised over how Mr White would cope with new leadership being in charge of the company he has run since 1994.

Mr White said the role would largely focus on product but from time to time he expected to be flown off to meet customers and occasionally pulled in to assist the board.

“I’m hoping that 95 per cent of my time is the ideation and the creation and delivery of product commercial models and the merger and acquisition structure that enables the growth of the company,” he said.

He also defended his exit from WiseTech as a “circuit breaker” move to protect the company while Mr Dammery said it was “natural”.

Mr Dammery attempted to address the exit early on Thursday, telling investors in WiseTech’s first session that Mr White’s commitment to the company “was as strong today as it has ever been”.

“His new role changes nothing in that regard,” he said.

He also downplayed the exit of Mr White amid the scandal, telling investors the pair had spoken about Mr White stepping down and describing it as a “natural” part of the company’s “evolution”.

“Richard is not going anywhere. Richard is going to be focusing as we’ve said repeatedly on the things he enjoys,” he said.

WiseTech co-founder Maree Isaacs at the company's investors day in Sydney.

Mr White joined in, telling analysts that “this was a decision I made by myself and brought it to the board”.

“It was a circuit breaker because some of the noise in the media was hurting the company and I wanted to make sure that the company was protected.”

The investor day arrived just days after WiseTech executive director Maree Isaacs sold her stake in the company to Mr White.

Ms Isaacs sold her 10.2 million shares in the $41.8bn company to Mr White, which was disclosed in an ASX filing late on Friday evening.

She owned WiseTech shares via her 8 per cent stake in RealWise Holdings, which controls about 37.4 per cent of WiseTech.

Mr White owns the other 92 per cent of RealWise Holdings.

Ms Isaacs is set to reap an initial payment of $285m and future quarterly payments based on the volume weighted average price of WiseTech shares over a period of up to seven years.

Ms Isaacs said the sale would allow her to “access the value and liquidity of her shares” and she “remains committed to WiseTech and its future”.

WiseTech downgraded its earnings just minutes before its annual meeting 10 days ago – with Mr Dammery citing the allegations surrounding Mr White.

At the “virtual only” AGM, Ms Isaacs was granted $250,000 worth of share rights, as part of its short-term incentive plan.

Originally published as How Billionaire Richard White and new WiseTech CEO will handle conflict