As far as branding goes, it doesn’t get much better and it’s a powerful statement about the company’s commitment to the city and intentions for the Greater Western Sydney (GWS) region in general.
Deloitte has taken 5,200 square metres in The Eclipse, making the relocation due this month the biggest single investment the firm has made in GWS in the past 30 years.
Parramatta office managing partner, Peter Forrester says Deloitte’s GWS practice is among the top performing offices in its Australian network. It also ranks as the only big four accounting firm with a high profile engagement in the region.
He plans to boost staff numbers by 127 per cent to 500 people by 2015 and to continue the firm’s hub and spoke strategy which aims to increase awareness across the region to meet the demand for professional services.
Peter Forrester spoke to WSBA editor, Mike Walls about the firm’s continued success and its strategy for regional growth.
WSBA: You have certainly made a significant impression in the Western Sydney. What drives your expansionary thinking?
Peter Forrester: We see a lot of potential in Western Sydney, and you know, just investing in our people programs with the benefit of our client base. We think that from a Sydney Metropolitan point of view that the majority of the activity, whether it’s from infrastructure or competitive business landscape . . . we feel as if Western Sydney’s going to be competitively advantaged. And hence that’s why Deloitte is here.
WSBA: When you say competitively advantaged' in what sense?
Peter Forrester: Well, if you look at the Metropolitan Plan to 2036, over more than 50% of the employment that’s going to be created in that time in New South Wales is going to be in Western Sydney. I’ll probably get this wrong, but I think it’s in the order of a million additional people living in Western Sydney by 2036. So I think labour is a big part of any business, even in the information technology world that we live in. Access to skilled labour is very important. So I think, as a result of that, as people will understand that specific demographic, business is going to relocate. And we’ve seen businesses relocate into the business path. So when I talk about competitively advantaged, I think certainly we’re going to see more businesses look to grow in this part of the world. I think we’ll see businesses relocate into Western Sydney to access the labour market. And as a result, provided government gets the infrastructure part of it right then we have a bright future. Now, I’m not in government, and it’s probably not smart for me to comment but I have a sense that government is really starting to understand the potential and the opportunity for the region.
WSBA: You must have an idea of what areas are growing in GWS; specifically to know what type of people you’re going to be targeting?
Peter Forrester: Well certainly, we’ve seen a real regeneration of Parramatta itself in the last two or three years or maybe a little bit longer, maybe three to five years. I think that sort of triangle of Parramatta down to Rydalmere, where there’s obviously a lot of activity in the University up into the medical research and hospitals at Westmead, I think that’s quite a dynamic area. I think that is a real dynamic area. The other dynamic area is up in the north¬west; hence our move to move into Norwest Business Park and do that merger 18 months ago. We see that as quite a dynamic area.
WSBA: Your brand seems to be aligned to this region. That can’t be accidental?
Peter Forrester: It’s not. I mean, we physically are here, and we’re taking, you know, more space in Eclipse Tower. We go in there in February. And just to give you a feeling for the scale of that investment, and hence our commitment, is we’re about 2,900 square metres here, and we’ve taken 5,200 square metres in the Eclipse. So it really does show our commitment to the region and our determination to grow. So we are physically here, and strategically we have it as a part of our firm-wide strategy, to be an organisation that contributes to the business community and is respected for shaping regional issues.
WSBA: With regards to people and culture; how do you think your people relate to this region?
Peter Forester: I don’t know how we describe the culture. I mean, our culture in this office would be very much around, you know, a steely determination; just to go and add value for our client base. I think the people that work in the Western Sydney office are very happy to be here. I think the majority of our workforce, I’d say 70-80%, have a Western Sydney sort of residential address. So I think we have the benefit. People see it as a work/life balance being here, you know. They’re sort of getting an hour and a half, two hours back of their day that they ordinarily wouldn’t have if they were travelling into the CBD. We certainly don’t see ourselves as second-class citizens, working out here. Obviously Parramatta probably doesn’t have the bright lights syndrome of the CBD. But because we’re here by ourselves, we see ourselves making a unique contribution. This is why we’re trying to build alliances. We really want Western Sydney business to be very confident that they don’t need to drive past Parramatta to get really world-class advice. And that’s why our relationship with the law firms is important. Whether it’s Deloitte, or Moore Stephens, or the legal firms, or a combination thereof, we need to be really strong so that the Western Sydney business community have got a lot of confidence that they don’t have to go into the CBD. From a people point of view, what we find is we have all types; we have people that come in at graduate, and very contented to work here. And then we have another group that might join us. They get the itchy feet; they’re attracted to the night¬life or whatever it is, the bright lights. They go away into work with Deloitte in the CBD. And then in their late 20s, early 30s, they’re sort of knocking back on the door sort of saying, “Okay, well, I’m in a different stage of life. Not having the two hours of travel is important.”
WSBA: Can we talk about your sponsorship relationships? When you sponsor an event, like Parramasala, are you looking for a direct return; to say “great we got 100 clients from our investment” or is it more a relationship building exercise?
Peter Forrester: Right at the top of the organisation, from a Deloitte point of view we have a saying that we put people at the apex of our business model. And particularly if you think of professional services, it’s still very much a people business. Yeah, okay, information technology is disrupting and it’s changing, but we’re still essentially people-based business. So the quality of our people generally and the talent of our people generally is directly correlated to the quality of our advice and solutions. So I think certainly, the programs that we run internally are heavily people-orientated. If you look at something like Parramasala, why that makes so much sense to us is, it allows us to be involved, obviously, in a festival that’s embodied in Parramatta and embodied in Western Sydney. It has arts and culture flavour and an event program that allows us to take our staff and engage with them and do some team-orientated stuff. But probably most importantly is the theme around cultural diversity, and that is really important to Deloitte from two things. Cultural diversity within Deloitte is a significant program in making sure that people understand, irrespective of background, race, religion, that in Deloitte, that you can thrive, and we really do a lot of work around cultural diversity internally. But then if you bring it back into Parramatta, you know, this is a culturally diverse part of the world. So you’ve sort of got the two themes merging together.
WSBA: So you wouldn’t necessarily think, “oh, great, we’ve got five new clients from that.” Are you measuring it in that way?
Peter Forrester: We are not sitting there measuring every dollar. It sort of gets to that test, “is it the right thing to do?” And for us, it’s the right thing to do for our people, because it allows us to celebrate cultural diversity with them and also do team-orientated activities. It’s the right thing to do in relation to Parramatta and Western Sydney, because it is the major festival now each year, and we’re a large business. We’re not dicing it up and measuring it to the nth degree. If you look at Parramasala, we’ve attracted the Premier both years. We look at the quality of the people that are attending our business conference. We’re now the sponsor of Western Sydney first. And then you look at the business holistically, and then it’s amazing, but this is the fastest-growing practice in Deloitte. It’s the fastest practice of our 16 offices nationally. So you sit there and you say, “okay, well you know, do we really need to go and do all the micro-calculations?” This office is growing quicker than our Perth and Brisbane office, and that’s in the midst of a two-speed economy. On last month’s results, our revenue growth in Western Sydney was double the nearest office. I better not give percentages that would be inappropriate. So we were growing twice as fast. Mind you, off a different base. So our Perth practice is at a much larger business. But we’re growing twice as fast as our Perth practice.
WSBA: Is Western Sydney First working for you? I mean do we really need another think tank out here?
Peter Forrester: Well let me start at the cynical end by saying I agree with you, is that somewhere in the future – and maybe Deloitte has a role to play here – somewhere in the future, the peak bodies or groups need to aggregate, in my view. I think it is something that’s troubled us for a long time, that there are just too many of these – what will we call them – discussion groups and forums.
WSBA: That’s massive challenge – to bring the groups together.
Peter Forrester: Maybe you can’t bring them together, but what you can do is bring the leadership of those in a room and just talk about alignment. Because what has been in the past and what will be frustrating and bad for the Western Sydney brand is if the groups are in conflict. I mean, if you have one group on the Thursday come out and say: “Sydney needs a second airport, and it absolutely should be in Western Sydney for the future of Western Sydney,” and then on the Friday you have another group saying, “the worst thing that could ever happen to Western Sydney is for the second airport located here.” That is where outsiders would look at it and go “why would you invest in it when they don’t even know where they’re going?”
