WiseTech’s Richard White is shown how it’s done in the boardroom

A new Qantas chairman is quietly rebuilding a board dogged by scandal. The tech billionaire should take notice.

WiseTech founder and executive chair Richard White has tapped another former chairman to join the board.

Less than a year into the job, Qantas chairman John Mullen has shown WiseTech’s Richard White how it’s done in rebuilding trust in a damaged board.

Not that multi-billionaire White seems all that serious about corporate governance at his $26bn WiseTech. Even after a stinging rebuke from one of his biggest shareholders Australian Super, which recently dumped its stake in protest, this has made little difference to White.

Over at Qantas, Mullen has gently seen long-serving director, former advertising executive and TV host Todd Sampson edged out. Sampson plans to retire in coming months, midway through his three-year term.

Sampson has sat on the Qantas board for a decade, including as a member of the remuneration committee which waived through former CEO Alan Joyce’s bonus payments.

Qantas chair John Mullen. Picture: Nikki Davis-Jones

He became a lighting rod for investors during Qantas’ painful 2023 annual meeting, where the board copped an 85 per cent strike.

That same meeting, Sampson was re-elected with just 65 per cent of the investor vote. Other board members looking to return to the board secured in excess of 90 per cent. These were numbers Mullen couldn’t ignore.

Mullen is a former Telstra chairman and what he has done is not revolutionary. But, it should be enough for White to take notice.

Taking Sampson’s place is Don Weisler — the former global chief of HP. Weisler has been a member of the BHP board for the past four years as well as US chipmaker Intel. He too is highly-rated by the miner’s outgoing chairman, Ken MacKenzie. It’s worth noting at BHP MacKenzie had an informal nine-year limit on directorships at a company.

For Mullen, Weisler is the full definition of an independent director. He’s got no connection to Qantas or the board and he’s likely to bring serious perspective around technology and AI, which is playing an ever-bigger role in the running of an airline. He’s the latest of the Qantas board changes already in train when Mullen took charge.

Friendly board

Across town, White is in the process of rebuilding his WiseTech board, but he is taking a more friendly approach.

The latest recruit is in former WiseTech chairman Andrew Harrison, who was chairman for five years until late 2023. Harrison was a member of White’s board from 2015, joining a year before the tech company went to a stock market listing.

The addition of Harrison means WiseTech now has two former chairmen in its boardroom — Charles Gibbons first joined the board in 2006. White last month brought back foundation investor Michael Gregg – another long term director – when four independent directors walked en masse. The two new recruits owe a lot to White’s WiseTech and could hardly considered true independents.

White on Monday also named Chris Charlton, someone starting out on their director career after being a career executive with UPS, one of the biggest customers of WiseTech’s CargoWise software. One small win is White is at least bringing in someone who hasn’t sat in the WiseTech boardroom.

Qantas board member Todd Sampson will retire in coming months. Picture: Luis Ascui

WiseTech’s new and friendly board — that White leads — recently gave the founder a pass after an investigation concluded he had misled the former board multiple times.

This followed White’s boardroom coup where he installed himself as executive chairman after the former board walked. The directors who left had been subject to legal threats from White’s lawyers.

At the same time, law firm Seyfarth Shaw — which had been commissioned to investigate White during the middle of mounting scandal around his personal life — concluded the WiseTech founder mislead his former board at least twice about the nature of his intimate relationship with two woman who also had professional dealings with WiseTech.

After AusSuper’s exit, WiseTech has since had feedback from big investors about its direction, unsurprisingly raising concerns over the tech company’s governance.

They want a clear succession plan that paves the way for a new chief to eventually take over from White, who just turned 70. A search that started last year was put on hold by White’s return as executive chairman. WiseTech says it will have more to say on this shortly.

Big shareholders have told WiseTech they want to see a strengthening of board independence as a priority.

White’s answer to this is to call in his old hands. WiseTech will eventually faces another governance crisis and more big investors are likely to follow AusSuper. After all, looking back only gets you so far.

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Originally published as WiseTech’s Richard White is shown how it’s done in the boardroom