Although unwilling to further address the departure of former AMP Australia chief executive, Alex Wade, chief executive of AMP Limited, Francesco De Ferrari, said the company is committed to fixing workplace culture and has dealt with these matters “appropriately”.
Speaking at the firm’s H1 2020 results teleconference, he said half the challenge was fixing the business model, while the other half was fixing the culture.
“Our commitment for 2020 was to work on accountability and execution, I think if you have seen the progress that we’ve made, we have a really complex transformation,” De Ferrari said.
He said he disagreed with the assessment that it had taken the firm too long to deal with cultural issues in the company.
“We have been working on improving execution and accountability from day one… it was very clear from the beginning this does not happen overnight,” De Ferrari said.
“This is not me trying to evade questions, I am trying to run a business that delivers for clients and shareholders.”
“And it is important that I am able to tell the story of the fantastic work that the majority of our employees have achieved while coming to work every day.”
De Ferrari said he wanted to ensure the firm maintained the privacy and confidentiality of these matters because it was important to have an environment where employees were free to speak up about any concerns.
“If I compromise on this, I will not have fulfilled my role as chief executive, as hard as it is, these matters have been dealt with appropriately,” De Ferrari said.
As far setting up an independent consultant to address workplace culture, he said they wanted to make sure they had the best person appointed and who would understood the work that needed to be delivered.
“The cultural working group that has been set up has already had its first session and the inclusion task force was set up immediately, I’ve already chaired two sessions of that,” De Ferrari said.
