WITH no intention of continuing with executive life, CBH Group boss Jimmy Wilson plans to improve his kite surfing skills after he resigns from his $2 million job at the end of June.
Rumours had been swirling for months that Mr Wilson was set to depart the co-operative, with CBH issuing a statement on Monday finally confirming his departure.
Mr Wilson started as chief executive officer in September 2017 and was tasked with cutting at least $100 million in costs per year, an undertaking which had not gone entirely according to plan, with only about $65m achieved.
CBH chairman Simon Stead said Mr Wilson was brought into the co-operative with a "mandate for change" in terms of the organisational structure of the business.
"Jimmy has overseen a relentless pursuit of better safety outcomes and substantial simplification of our systems and processes to drive clarity and accountability through the whole organisation," Mr Stead said.
"There has been an emphatic focus on the core of the business, with CBH adding 2.5 million tonnes of additional storage to the network, completing 80 throughput enhancement projects and more than 200 sustaining capital projects over the past three years.
"Jimmy has provided clear guidance to the CBH team through the introduction of a focused strategy and tactical plan and safely guided the organisation through the COVID-19 pandemic, ensuring the ongoing operations of the supply chain."
Having come from a mining background, there was a perception from some farmers over the course of his tenure that Mr Wilson did not understand agriculture or the co-operative model.
However that is something he believes was never an issue.
"While this is an agricultural business, it is still a storage and handling business, a logistics business, a marketing and trading business and soon to become significant fertiliser import and trading business," Mr Wilson said.
"There are a lot of similarities between those businesses and what I have done in the past, as a result the strategy and the tactical plan are reasonably similar between what I was doing in the iron ore business and what we do here at CBH.
"The co-operative model here has worked extremely well and there is a certain uniqueness that it brings - it's a model that works for this business and one that is hugely supportive of, so I think it's the only model CBH can have going forward."
Mr Wilson signed a contract extension, with no fixed-term, in June last year, but according to Mr Stead, he made it clear at that time that he wouldn't be staying with the organisation for too much longer.
With that in mind, the chairman and chief executive officer have been in discussions around his departure for nearly 12 months, with Mr Stead's priority being that the resignation did not take place during harvest.
"During the last year we've been talking with Jimmy around what CEO succession looks like and being absolutely clear that he needs to have several internal candidates capable of taking on the role," Mr Stead said.
"It was by mutual agreement that we decided to avoid the harvest window which makes this the right time for Jimmy to exit.
"Jimmy has demonstrated to the board the capacity of his lead team, particularly over the past 12 months, so we're really confident that the business is in a good position."
Due to the strength of the lead team - made up of chief operations officer Ben Macnamara, chief financial officer Doug Warden, chief marketing and trading officer Jason Craig, chief external relations officer Brianna Peake and chief people officer Kelly McKenzie - the CBH board is in no hurry to appoint someone to replace Mr Wilson.
An interim CEO from within the business will be announced within the next few weeks, with CBH then planning to take as long as needed to conduct a search of internal and external candidates.
- For more on the story, see this Thursday's edition of Farm Weekly.
