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PwC Australia’s new corporate strategy is all about business reinvention; six months after her ousting, former chief executive Kristin Stubbins announces her new venture.
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PwC reveals new corporate strategy; former CEO Stubbins goes it alone
29 April 2024
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Business reinvention takes centre stage in PwC Australia’s new three-year corporate strategy as the firm positions itself as a one-stop shop for businesses facing unprecedented technological, social, and environmental change.
The strategy, which is not being made public, will see investments in core capabilities including audit, tax and deals, risk and transformation, and cloud and digital, according to the firm.
Artificial intelligence (AI) and other technologies, economic uncertainty, skills shortages, and changing social expectations were all identified as disruptors that the firm aims to help its clients navigate.
In a statement made Friday, the firm said its research found that the majority of global CEOs believed business transformation to be essential for ongoing viability, while 70 per cent saw technology as a significant impact on business value.
PwC Australia CEO Kevin Burrowes said: “Australian businesses are no different and we want to get ahead of this with them and be their partner through their business model reinvention.
“We are on the journey to transform through technology and AI that delivers leading insights, quality, and outcomes for our clients. This will also ensure we provide our people the best possible working environment, skills uplift, and career development in a firm they are proud to be part of.”
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Reinvention was the theme of the cultural commitments; the firm said it has reaffirmed in the new strategy, saying it will continue to act on the findings of the Switkowski review into the firm’s governance and culture.
It is focusing on “being a well-managed firm,” including by tackling firm culture, ensuring good governance, risk and ethics, and by ensuring it has a “market relevant operating model” and responsible business practices.
While the firm has renewed its commitments to change, Burrowes recently told the Financial Review that it was time to pivot away from the tax leaks scandal that has engulfed the firm in recent times.
“If I felt we were not making enough progress around [delivering on PwC’s commitments to change], then it wouldn’t have been the time to look at a new strategy and rebuild the brand,” he said.
Burrowes’ predecessor Stubbins has also been making headlines with now-confirmed rumours she planned to start her own firm.
Confirmed on Thursday, Ironbark Associates was registered with ASIC in December and will launch in May, marking seven months since Stubbins was ousted to make way for Burrowes.
Stubbins joined PwC Australia as a graduate in 1995, making audit partner within a decade. After serving as the managing partner of assurance, Stubbins was elevated to acting CEO in a period of chaos, following news a former partner had leaked confidential government information.
To this date, the firm is subject to an AFP investigation and several investigations by the TPB and Chartered Accountants Australia and New Zealand. Parliamentary inquiries have held the firm, its competitors, industry representatives, and experts to account.
In her three months at the helm, Stubbins exited nine partners over the tax leaks scandal, commissioned the Switkowski review, and penned an “open letter” of apology.
Senator Deborah O’Neill said the episode was an example of a time-honoured practice of women leaders being ushered in for a “clean up” job.
“Often that’s the way women get to the top – when the boys have made a big mess of it, the women come in to clean up and then exit somewhat unduly hastily,” she said.
Senator Barbara Pocock drew parallels with the untimely dismissal of Victoria’s first female premier who took office during an economic recession in the early 1990s ahead of an unwinnable election.
She also raised concerns that PwC International, in handpicking Burrowes for the role, had overstepped.
“This a case of PwC International coming in right over the top of PwC Australia, all of its governance structures set aside in a protective operation and control operation, clearly,” she said.
“That is a real concern to me, I must say that international PwC has come in, and they move you out, and is now running the show.”
It is yet unclear what services Stubbins’ new firm will offer, though she told the AFR that she is “focused on doing what I love – helping large Australian businesses execute their strategies.”
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