I’ve been lucky enough to spend almost my whole career in tourism. After studying marketing at university in Australia, I spent some time travelling and thought: How can I get paid to do this? I took a job as a travel consultant at Flight Centre, which was a growing business. I later moved into a marketing role there.
The worst mistake I ever made was as a young marketer: I overspent my budget by a quarter of a million dollars in a month. I was petrified of telling my boss, but she handled it brilliantly. She knew it was a mistake; and one I wouldn’t be careless enough to repeat. That mistake gave me more strength, resilience and a licence to be bold.
The most important career lesson I’ve learnt is to trust people. Give people room to make mistakes and to do great things. I aim to hire great people, set a great vision, and then get out of their way.
My inspiration comes from the desire to build an organisation that is purpose-led and that people want to be part of. I’m driven by people enjoying the environment and culture our team has created and continues to build on. Everyone in the company has heard me say we want to be doing cool stuff, and having fun while we do it.
Read more: Workplace culture: values matter
I’m incredibly proud of how we’ve transformed our business. I became CEO in the middle of the Covid-19 pandemic, when, as tour operators, we had literally no customers. Tough decisions were needed, including a complete strategic reset for legacy travel brands. The two years that followed saw record revenues and a growing reputation for providing responsible travel, thanks to our sharpened focus on sustainability.
One of the greatest challenges for organisations over the next five years will be about how to align purpose and sustainability. Businesses need to get really serious about this. It’s tougher to decarbonise tourism than many other industries, and our 2030 emissions reductions goals are just around the corner.
Certainly, in our industry, there’s a challenge around how to collaborate with our closest competitors. We all want to retain our competitive edge but, ultimately, we’ll only achieve goals like greener aviation by working closely together to instigate dramatic change.
My HR director, Nicky Lyle, is a key collaborator in everything I do. She sits alongside me on the board and ensures that our culture, environment and people are considered within every strategic and commercial decision that’s made. Recently we’ve launched an AI-driven learning and development platform that I’m really excited about. It allows our team members to take control of their own development and it’s had 100% take-up across employees.
To make it to the C-suite, HR leaders need to have strong commercial nous and an instinct for where the impact on people sits within any business decision. They need to hold CEOs to account, to ensure that people at the heart of every decision the board makes.
My next read is going to be Citizens: Why the key to fixing everything is all of us by Jon Alexander. Our sustainability director recommended it. The book is grounded in how we transition from being consumers to citizens. I’m curious to see what applications that might have in a business environment, and how we elevate the role our people have in strategy and decision-making.
This article was published in the November/December 2024 edition of HR magazine.
Subscribe today to have our latest articles delivered to your desk.
