 | Ian Pollard
Actuary and Rhodes scholar
Ian has been a director of more than 30 companies. Some of his roles have included as Chairman of retailer Just Group, of office products group Corporate Express and currently Chairman of Billabong International and of life reinsurer RGA Australia. He is also a director of listed investment company Milton Corporation and shopping centre REIT SCA Property Group. DCA Group, which Ian founded in 1984, became an ASX 100 company before being taken over in 2006 by private equity firm CVC. Ian is also currently a director of the Purves Environmental Fund, the Wentworth Group of Concerned Scientists and LifeCircle Australia. Ian has written a number of books, his most recent being “Investing in Your Life – your biggest investment opportunities are not necessarily financial”. He is an executive Coach with Foresight’s Global Coaching and an Adjunct Professor at UTS Business School. Ian has a DPhil in finance from the International Management Centre and an Honorary Doctor of Business from Macquarie University. |
 | John Walsh AM
Magoo Actuarial Consulting
John spent over 20 years as a Partner in the Advisory practice of PWC, before retiring from full-time employment. John's major client work was in the areas of social policy and funding of accident compensation, health and disability services. His ability to contribute to social policy is assisted by his own disability, traumatic quadriplegia.
He is currently actuary to the NSW Lifetime Care and Support Authority, Deputy Chair of the National Health Performance Authority established as part of the COAG national health reforms, National Disability Insurance Scheme board member and chair of its Financial Sustainability subcommittee. In 2001 he was named Australia’s Actuary of the Year, and in 2011 was appointed a Member of the Order of Australia, and received the Prime Minister's Award for outstanding service to the disability sector. In 2015 John was appointed Australia's Patron for the United Nations International Day of People with a Disability. |
 | Suzanne Smith
General Manager Group Insurance, MLC
Suzanne has more than 25 years’ experience in global financial markets and extensive relationship management experience in the funds management, superannuation, investment banking, hedge fund and commercial property sectors. Suzanne joined NAB in 2009 and worked across the Wholesale Banking and Product and Markets divisions prior to joining the NAB Wealth business in November 2015 as General Manager Group Insurance for MLC. Prior to joining NAB in 2009, Suzanne spent five years running the operations, investor services and compliance functions of a boutique global hedge fund she helped establish in 2004. Suzanne also held senior positions within ANZ Investment Bank and ANZ Funds Management and was elected as a Member Representative on the ANZ Staff Superannuation Fund. Suzanne’s career experience also includes 5 years as a Commercial Property Valuer and she also trained as a registered nurse prior to entering the financial services sector. Suzanne is an enthusiastic leader, passionate about people and enjoys coaching and mentoring people right across the business to help them reach their full potential.
Read more about Suzanne in this article A journey of learning, a destination of success. |
 | Trevor Matthews
Trevor Matthews has extensive financial services leadership experience in Australia, Canada, Japan and the UK. He returned to Australia in 2013 after fifteen years overseas and is currently a non executive director of AMP, CoverMore, Bupa Australia and New Zealand, FNZ Asia Pacific and Tokio Marine Asia and Chairman of the State Insurance Regulatory Authority and 1st Available. Previously, he was a director of Aviva plc. and Chairman of Aviva plc.’s UK and French businesses. He has also been the chief executive of Friends Provident and Standard Life Assurance Company, both based in the UK, as well as Manulife Financial in Japan. Prior to that he headed Manulife’s business in Canada and the NAB’s retail banking and financial services operations in Australia. He started at Legal & General on an actuarial cadetship and was their Australian MD from 1989 to 1996. Trevor has served as President of the Chartered Insurance Institute, Commissioner for the UK Commission for Employment and Skills, Chairman of the Financial Services Skills Council in the UK, and President of the Institute of Actuaries of Australia. He has an MA in Actuarial Studies from Macquarie University and is a Fellow of the Institute of Actuaries of Australia and the Institute and Faculty of Actuaries of the UK. |
 | Dr Jochen Schweitzer
Jochen teaches Strategy, Innovation and Entrepreneurship and is the Director of the MBA Entrepreneurship at the UTS Business School. He is also Research Stream Leader for Strategy and Creativity at the Center for Management and Organisation Studies (CMOS) and Founder/Director of U.lab, a multidisciplinary innovation hub. Previously he has worked as a Design Thinking Coach, Management Consultant, Production-Planning Engineer and Cultural Program Coordinator. His research, teaching and consulting focuses on issues of strategy, collaboration, entrepreneurship and innovation with a special interest in design thinking, urban planning and open innovation.
Jochen seeks to expand the capacity of strategy and design into truly interdisciplinary and open opportunities for innovation and entrepreneurship. He collaborates broadly and his work has been recognized internationally and published in academic journals and books. He is a winner of the Strategic Management Societies' Best PhD Paper Award and Honorable Mention for Best paper and he was awarded Honorable Mention by the Academy of Management Business Policy and Strategy Division for his dissertation. He has been granted numerous research and teaching grants totaling AU$320,000 as well as honors for his innovative and practice oriented approach including a UTS Business School teaching and learning award, UTS teaching and learning citation and a national recognition with the B/HERT Entrepreneurship Educator of the year award. He is a Future Leader for BESydney providing insight into emerging trends, alternate perspectives and fresh ideas in his field. |
 | Jocelyn Furlan
Principal, Furlan Consulting
Jocelyn Furlan’s vision is an Australian community empowered about their financial affairs. She pursues this vision by influencing financial service providers to maximise member and customer centricity in their culture, products and services, and to implement best practice in dispute resolution. Jocelyn is the Principal of Furlan Consulting and a director of First State Super and Strathcona Baptist Girls Grammar School. She was also the Chairperson of the Superannuation Complaints Tribunal for eight years until March 2015. Jocelyn started working in superannuation in 1984, auditing self managed superannuation funds. In 1991 she started her own tax practice and took up a contract at a major Victorian public sector superannuation fund where she worked as Secretary to the Board and part of the executive management team for eight years. She became the inaugural Company Secretary of VicSuper in 1999 before joining legalsuper as Compliance Manager in 2003. Jocelyn is a much sought after speaker and presenter, sharing her insights into the superannuation and life insurance industries through relating stories of the myriad of interesting complaints she has seen. |