Changing AMP from its past reputation

Likely her last executive role, leaving a legacy has been the key factor in accepting the AMP leadership role for chief executive, Alexis George.

Speaking at a Women in Super NSW event, George detailed how she decided to take the job from former CEO Francesco de Ferrari, which she took over in the third quarter of 2021, having previously been deputy chief executive officer at ANZ.

She said: “AMP is an iconic brand in Australia and it gets far more attention than it probably deserves in today’s world so I was really conscious of that. I also knew it was likely to be the last executive job I did so I wanted to lay my legacy and that was really important to me.

“I was laying awake thinking about it and I wanted to actually give it a go, I am not a person with a big ego but I thought I could make a difference.”

Asked by a delegate, what she would like her legacy to be, she said: “I want to be respected in the industry as a leader, I want shareholders to love us, well at least to like us. I want AMP to be somewhere where people want to come and work with us and want to be our shareholders. That is what will be important to me.”

She said AMP had unveiled a vision strategy and would be working on a set of values and purposes next year that it could use in the future.

“That is really important to me as it will drive our strategic direction, our culture and our to day-to-day. It won’t be the same as the AMP of the past,” she said.

Having started her job virtually during the pandemic, George said she felt proud of what she had achieved in a short period of time.

“It’s actually really hard starting a job in a virtual world as I’m a person who wants to meet with her team and her stakeholders and doing that in a virtual world means you don’t always make the right judgements because of that five-second window.

“But I feel proud of what I have achieved in the first 100 days and that came from working really hard in a really difficult environment.”