GROWING UP in Queensland, Australia, young Laurie Barlow absorbed working knowledge that would later dovetail into his own lifetime career.
“My father was a civil engineer in a contractor company that built roads, airports, etc – all the time I was growing up, we were talking about project delivery and contract management,” remembers Mr Barlow in an interview with NextInsight recently.
He gained first-hand experience too in the industry. “When I was in high school and university, I spent the holidays working on-site in the construction industry.”
Since graduating as a chemical engineer from the University of Queensland in 1983, and picking up a MBA along the way, Mr Barlow has spent three decades working on sites, or desk-bound work, all of which were related to projects in the mining, or oil & gas sectors in Australia.
Now 50, he was appointed CEO of AusGroup, which is listed on the Singapore Exchange, effective March this year.
AusGroup’s business is familiar terrain to him – AusGroup provides fabrication and manufacturing, construction and integrated services to natural resource development companies.
Previously, he was MD of the mining division of AECOM Australia.
AECOM is a much bigger company than AusGroup – AECOM is a Fortune 500 company listed on the New York Stock Exchange providing consulting and project management services.
While AECOM has annual revenues of US$8 billion, AusGroup reported AUD602 million in revenue (and AUD12.4 million in net profit) for FY11.
An interesting fact about Mr Barlow’s 4.5 years at AECOM is that he grew its mining division to become a significant contributor to AECOM’s annual revenue.
Similarly and strikingly, Mr Barlow had grown a start-up to a significant size at his previous workplace, SNC-Lavalin, one of the largest engineering and construction companies in Canada.
Based in Australia, he was Vice President and General Manager, responsible for the management of SNC-Lavalin business activities and operations in the Australian region.
It now has a major EPC (engineering, procurement and construction) operation in Australia.
Why join AusGroup?
"I wanted to run a company that was delivering projects to the resources sector in Australia, especially in mining and oil and gas. I looked closer at AusGroup -- it had 3,000 people, it was delivering iconic mega projects in Western Australia, and it had a fantastic safety culture."
Safety is not about measuring lost time but achieving accident-free days, he says.
Mr Barlow fishes out from his bag his work pass -- it has the words "Perfect Day" and a photo of him on a jet ski with his son.
"Our safety philsophy is - we want to go to work and come home and enjoy something we do at home. So my Perfect Day would be to go to work and come home and enjoy jet-skiing with my son."
Other things about AusGroup attracted him. As part of his research, "I looked at the share price and I thought there is a lot of upside for this company."
AusGroup operates in an industry where, according to a recent media report, there are some AUD300 billion of resource projects in the execution or planning stage in Australia, of which AUD220 billion is in Western Australia.
In the next financial year, Mr Barlow is looking to expand its business from Western Australia to Queensland in the east coast (where he grew up) either organically or through acquisitions.
"I have been to a lot of mine sites and travelled around Australia - by road, helicopter, plane. There's not many places in Australia I have not been to. The knowledge, coupled with a project delivery focus, will help AusGroup grow."
On his management philosophy: "We have a clear strategy for the business and my direct staff clearly understand that strategy and have the freedom to implement it.
"I'm very open, and I'm very results-driven. I need the bottomline because that's what our shareholders want."
Family and leisure
Mr Barlow has three children: Myles, 20, who is studying commerce at the University of Western Australia; Lydia, 20, who is studying physiotherapy at Curtin University; and Remy, 15, who is in high school.
His wife, Lee, used to work in consulting engineering but has since become a lady of leisure.
In his own lesiure, aside from jet-skiing, Mr Barlow enjoys scuba diving, citing the Great Barrier Reef and the relatively unknown Ningaloo Reef off Western Australia as his favourites.
I asked a hypothetical question: If he were close to retirement, what would he be planning to do?
"I would like to do a lot of travelling to nice places with my wife. I have done so much travelling in the past 20 years but not a lot of that's for leisure. I would fly to cities and have meetings but not have the time to see them properly. I have been to Beijing, Hongkong, New York, LA, Rio, you name it, I have been there -- I've been to Singapore a lot of times but I've only seen Changi."
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