A former chief executive of financial planning at ANZ has taken up a role as the head of legalsuper.
Luke Symons was appointed chief executive of the super fund, taking over from Andrew Proebstl, who departed the fund last year after 20 years.
Symons was formerly chief executive of financial planning at ANZ and director of advice channel performance at AMP. Other roles at AMP, where he worked from 2019 to 2021, included managing director of advice distribution and chief strategy officer for Australian wealth management.
Most recently, he was founder and chief executive of the Responsible Financial Services Group (RFSG).
According to legalsuper independent chair, Kirsten Mander, Symons had exhibited “the great clarity of insight and innovative thought that he is known for” throughout the recruitment process.
“He was also enthusiastic about the strategic benefits presented by legalsuper’s legal profession specialisation and the associated opportunities for innovation, agile decision-making and personalised member engagement.”
Symons’ resume included numerous senior roles leading and managing end-to-end businesses across both traditional and start-up environments within financial services, with expertise in digital advice solutions, regulatory change, client engagement and M&A of advice firms.
In super, he had a particular focus on strategy, product innovation, member engagement and digital transformation.
According to Symons, the increasing focus on Australia’s super industry presented unique opportunities for innovation, growth, and member engagement.
“The superannuation sector is experiencing unprecedented attention from policymakers, industry commentators and the media at present, providing challenges and, more importantly, opportunities to establish clear market and service differentiation and continue developing genuine member solutions and experiences,” Symons said.
“Importantly, I look forward to working with legalsuper’s executive team and board to continue legalsuper’s strong, long-term investment performance, which has seen the fund’s MySuper returns, where the majority of members are invested, outperform the SuperRatings all fund median over one, three, five, seven and 10 years”.
legalsuper, the super fund for Australia’s legal community, managed over $5 billion on behalf of more than 41,000 members.
