"I'm a naturally curious person": Q&A with Mercy Super's new CEO Wendy Tancred

I'm a naturally curious person who loves to learn and to be challenged. In hindsight, financial services was a good career choice for me. In my opinion, everyone should have a strategic plan for themselves and for their career, which I have. I achieved everything that I needed to in my original strategic plan and I retired a few years ago. I totally failed at retirement and now I'm back, creating a new career plan. I built up a portfolio career - I was on multiple boards and I was lecturing at a University - but I just really missed people and the mental stimulation that I used to get, so I had to do something again.

In terms of the opportunities that you can have and the growth that you can achieve, both personally and professionally, I think this is a fantastic industry to work in.

Mercy is a corporate super fund, it's open to current and former employees of Mater Health Services and other Sisters of Mercy organisations in Queensland. Our biggest sustainable advantage is that we have a contact centre on the site of our principle employer. Members literally walk in and talk to our team every day of the week. To me, the focus of the next 12 months is all about member engagement and retention. We need to take advantage of our contact centre and learn how to further add value to our members through this service.

As a corporate fund our member numbers and FUM are in positive growth and our returns are currently first quartile. We need to be as good as we can be with the business as usual requirements and be innovative on engagement, so we are sustainable and relevant from a member perspective.

Firstly, I'm sure that there are funds with above $2 billion that aren't viable. Secondly, I don't think the issue is about size, it's about the fund remaining relevant including net benefit to members and engagement with members. If members see your product as a commodity and you become more expensive, you may not be viable, no matter what your size. The last time I was running a super fund was in 2011, and this scale issue still keeps on coming up.

I wish we'd just move on. Why not change the discussion to dealing with longer life expectancies and increasing dependency ratios? The industry should stop arguing about scale and industry versus retail. There are other things for us to talk about. I don't think a particular dollar figure is a magic number for any fund.

People tend to forget about the advantages of small or corporate funds; funds that have a targeted membership. A lot of funds have become public offer over the years, including traditional industry funds. I think some of them have definitely lost that club/community feeling, which is something that pulls a fund's members together. A lot of funds these days are trying to create this, but they've got a diverse membership and diverse employers, whereas some smaller funds can have that naturally. At Mercy Super we know about our members. We walk past them in the corridors at the hospital grounds every day. We have a lot more levers to drive retention and engagement. For example, as of July last year we have renewed our insurance arrangements and they're incredibly advantageous to our members. One of the reasons that we can drive such good insurance arrangements is because of our relationship with our principal employer and the fact that we know what suits the members.

I came into the industry in the mid 80s, so there have been a lot of changes since then. There are the obvious changes, such as constant regulatory ones, but there has been one change that I found to be most intriguing. In 2005 I went from a retail fund to an industry style fund and I was stunned when looking at what was going on in the industry funds. I thought they were ten years behind in the professionalism and the innovation of the retail funds; but they caught up very quickly. Now I don't see a huge difference with the professionalism and innovation of the businesses or staff. It now feels similar across all segments of the industry, where it used to feel very different. I think that's because talent is now moving between the sectors. Back in the 80s or 90s, if you worked for an industry fund, you always worked for an industry fund. Same goes for retail. Now, with talent moving across the sectors, everyone's game has been lifted across the industry, which is a great outcome

Listen before you speak and always be aware that there are two sides to every story.

Be flexible, put yourself forward for any opportunities and if you're in the superannuation industry, never burn bridges because it's a small industry and we all know each other.

Relationship and communication skills, being authentic and human, and resilience. Also, being able to provide clarity to your team.

I think I'd have to say every leader that I've had over my career because that gives you the experience of both good and bad leadership and you can develop your own style from that. You learn from what they do well and what they don't do well. It can have an incredible influence on your success if you learn from mistakes.

I bet you haven't had this one before. The first job that I was paid for, when I was around 15-16 years old, was a cattle station cook during my boarding school holidays. I had to cook for about 20-30 stockmen. My first job in the industry was working as the Inwards Mail Clerk at AMP when I went to Brisbane to go to uni at the age of 18.

The answer is that I don't, I'm lousy at it. I'm learning to spend my spare time differently now because until a year or so ago my non-work time was totally dictated by having school aged children. Now I'm enjoying being able to choose what I do with my time.