New AMP chair Debra Hazelton in hot seat but with impressive record

AMP’s new chair Debra Hazelton smashed all sorts of glass ceilings in her time as a senior executive in the Japanese banking world.

AMP’s new chair Debra Hazelton, who has been on the AMP board since June 2019 and has more than 30 years of experience in the financial services sector. Picture: John Feder

After AMP’s new chairwoman Debra Hazelton was appointed as one of the most senior women in the Japanese banking world, in 2014, she travelled the world talking about how Japanese finance house Mizuho was determined to be different.

At a time when Japanese business was known for its sexism and its deep-seated, inward-looking anti-foreign culture, Hazelton — whose enthusiasm for Japan goes back to her days at Sydney University in the 70s — spoke of how Mizuho was determined to be a much more globally minded employer.

In conservative Japan, Hazelton’s appointment, by a very modern Mizuho chief executive at the time, smashed through all sorts of glass ceilings.

“The Japanese business scene is not good for women generally,” one long-time Australia-Japan observer told The Australian.

“It’s far behind any other first world countries in the treatment of women.

“Here was a woman and a foreigner appointed to the most senior ranks of the bank. She was one of the most senior women in the bank and a foreigner as well.

“She played a very important role for Mizuho in trying to encourage gender equality at the higher ranks for the bank and in the workplace.”

Hazelton is well known in Australia-Japan business circles (she has been a board member of the Australia Japan Foundation for two years) but is not well known in the broader ranks of corporate Australia.

Hazelton chose not to do any public interviews yesterday following her surprise appointment as AMP chairwoman following the departure of former Commonwealth Bank chief executive David Murray, who himself had been brought in under challenging circumstances only two years ago, although she did address the staff.

In her only formal statement she said she was “determined to restore the trust and confidence of our clients, shareholders and employees”.

She steps into the chair after just over a year as a director of an ASX-listed company, with a chief executive, Francesco De Ferrari, who himself arrived in Sydney less than two years ago with no background in corporate Australia.

As she oversees one of Australia’s most high-profile and troubled companies, Hazelton’s skills in managing human relations in a diverse finance house, particularly her role in promoting gender equality in sexist Japan, could prove to be one of her greatest qualifications for the job.

Her clear shortcoming is her lack of experience with the demands of running a public company in Australia. But she steps in at a time when the chair needs to smooth some severely troubled waters.

Hazelton did an honours degree at the University of Sydney, studying Japanese language and literature, and then a master of commerce from the University of NSW.

She got a scholarship for a PhD in the commerce department of Keio University, a leading private university in Japan, but did not finish, preferring to move into the financial world.

“After successfully completing the first half of the scholarship term, I decided to decline the opportunity to complete the degree in order to build my career in global financial markets,” she says in her LinkedIn profile.

She worked with Commonwealth Bank in Tokyo, where she was its treasurer for 10 years before becoming general manager of the bank’s Japanese operations.

Then Hazelton moved back to Australia, where she ran the local operations of Mizuho Bank, one of the top finance houses in Japan, from 2007 to 2014.

The local arm of the bank specialised in corporate finance, project finance and trade finance for major Australian, Japanese and multinational companies.

From there she moved back to Mizuho headquarters in Tokyo, as general manager of global talent acquisition and development — taking on a role where she was one of the most senior women in Japanese banking.

Arriving back in Australia from Japan in 2017, she continued as an adviser to Mizuho and was recruited to join the board of AMP Capital in June 2018.

With a different background, her skills will be important at the top level of the company.

“She has very good people skills,” said another person who has known Hazelton.

“She’s very collegial and gets on very well with people.”

When Hazelton addressed the staff on Monday, some remarked on the difference in style from the hard-driving Murray.

After taking over as chair­woman two years ago with the sudden departure of Catherine Brenner, Murray was determined to bring in tighter control of the organisation, particularly AMP Capital.

But the move backfired with the controversial appointment of Boe Pahari as chief of AMP Capital.

Murray has told friends that he stepped down to give De Ferrari some clear air to try to get on top of AMP’s many problems, and is hopeful that he and Hazelton can steer the company through its many troubles, including any vested interests in undermining it.

Hazelton’s background would be ideal if a Japanese finance house ever decided to take over AMP, which had a market capitalisation of more than $22bn in April 2015 but is now only worth $4.9bn.

But her appointment comes as AMP has just indicated its plans to buy back the 15 per cent stake in AMP Capital for $460m, a move seen in some quarters as cleaning up its corporate structure.

Hazelton brings a very different background and skill set to the chair of one of Australia’s oldest finance houses when compared to any of her predecessors.

Whether it will be enough to cope with the many challenges now facing AMP remains to be seen.