CHRIS SUTHERLAND
Independent Non-Executive Director
Chris is an experienced executive who has held senior management positions in various engineering, maintenance and contracting businesses with operations in Australia, Asia, Europe and the USA.
For 20 years, Chris was in various engineering and management roles with leading engineering companies including Clough and WorleyParsons, and had significiant involvement with the construction and maintenance of major oil and gas facilities on the North West Shelf, and in the Timor Sea and South East Asia. In 2006 Chris was appointed CEO of Integrated Group, an ASX listed company that was subsequently acquired by Programmed in 2007.
Chris was then appointed Managing Director and Group CEO of Programmed from January 2008 until his retirement September 2019. Programmed was a major public listed ASX company until October 2017 when it was acquired (for an enterprise value of $1 Billion) by the major Japanese company Persol who are listed on the Tokyo Stock Exchange. Programmed is a leading staffing, maintenance and facility management services provider with revenue in excess of $2.4 Billion and more than 25,000 employees across Australia and New Zealand.
Chris was a member on the Board for 4 years (2012-2016) of the Australian OHS Education Accreditation Board. Chris was also a co-founder and Chair of a Perth-based group CEOs for Gender Equity. In November 2017 Chris was awarded the Australian Human Resources Institute CEO Diversity Champion Award (AHRI).
Chris has now commenced a non-executive director career as well as pursuing a number of private business interests.
Chris currently is a non executive Director of Matrix, a public ASX listed company and Chairman of three unlisted emerging companies, Remsense (technology), Stelect (medical device) and Copper Search Australia (mineral exploration).
EDUCATION
- Bachelor of Engineering (UWA)
- Advanced Mangement Program (Harvard Business School)