The Qantas board reduced former CEO Alan Joyce’s final pay by $9.26m (€5.5m) due to a governance review which blamed his leadership style for reputational damage and customer service issues.
The reduction includes forfeiting shares from a long-term incentive plan and a 33pc cut in short-term incentives, impacting other executives as well.
A review by business adviser Tom Saar blamed Joyce for delays, lost baggage, and legal challenges faced by Qantas, along with poor communication on flight cancellations and breaches of the Fair Work Act.
The review said the former CEO was responsible for issues with Qantas’ culture, leadership style, governance, handling of the Covid impact, and external communications, recommending improvements in engagement, challenge, and transparency.
Mr Joyce, who was born in Tallaght, faced anti-Irish and homophobic slurs throughout his tenure as CEO since 2008 and became the subject of a media campaign after he engaged pugnaciously with the airline’s 17 trade unions. He delivered a record $2.47bn (€1.5bn) profit in 2023.
Mr Saar claimed in his report: “the Qantas group held a ‘command-and-control’ leadership style with centralised decisions and an experienced and dominant CEO. This contributed to a top-down culture, which impacted empowerment and a willingness to challenge or ‘speak up’ on issues or decisions of concern except in relation to safety matters.”
Qantas board said: “the events that damaged Qantas and its reputation and caused considerable harm to relationships with customers, employees and other stakeholders were due to several factors. As part of a settlement with the ACCC, Qantas has admitted to misleading customers about flight cancellation processes and, subject to Federal Court approval, will pay an AUD100m [USD66m] penalty. Qantas has also agreed to a AUD20m [USD13m] customer remediation programme. Penalties and compensation arising from breaches of the Fair Work Act are still to be determined. While the governance review did not find any deliberate wrongdoing, it found that mistakes were made by the board and management which contributed to the group’s significant reputational and customer service issues“.
