Harcourts Inside

16 INSIDE Harcourts Although filledwith uncertainty, the COVID-19 pandemic has coincided with a rising Australian propertymarket. It’s also coinciding with our own rising status. As a network, we’ve secured the position of the country’s second-largest real estate brand amid one of themost tumultuous periods inmodern times. It’s a goal we set years ago, which felt lofty and aspirational then. Now, it feels like a foundation for the future. Yes, we’re selling and leasingmore property, mortgaging, insuring andmanagingmore, welcomingmore newmembers who share our values, and expanding into suburbs and towns where the #betterinblue brand ismaking an indeliblemark on people who deserve the Harcourts difference. But that’s not why we’re succeeding and thriving through a time in history that has the potential to flatten us all. It’s our connection through culture, vision and ethics that is driving us forward. While other major brands are receding, we’re proceeding with greater certainty and connectedness than ever before. Since Harcourts arrived in Australia some 24 years ago, we’ve had incredible success, but we’ve experienced plenty of headwinds from global financial crises to raging bushfires to COVID-19. Despite all those challenges, our vision has always been clear. That vision connects us in a way that is stronger than any crisis. This pandemic is being felt everywhere – financially, mentally and emotionally. The need to ensure a strong sense of connection, trust and safety has been heightened by the arrival of COVID-19, and it has been heartening to see our network inspired by each others resilience, ingenuity and ambition. At a corporate level, this year has been a watershed for our tech, training, and branding strategy as a company. On the tech front, a momentousmove to VaultRE enables us to offer significantlymore choice tomembers around digital platforms, and it opens up the door for us to further enhance other products like our websites, data lakes and efficiencies in SEO. That tech decisionwasmassive for our Group, and I’mgladwe’vemade it. The newoffering will be rolled out across the Group, on top of our brandmanagement solution, over the next 12–18months. This will help ensure that our teams have platforms that are not only cost effective, but also help them to bemore efficient in their roles. We’vemade some significant ground around our brandmanagement and branding, and the company’s training academy nowdelivers learning for more of our members inmore ways. Central to the success of the academy are the “masters” - both in the network and in our corporate teams - that are generously sharing their knowledge on everything from leadership to leasing, marketing tomanagement, appraisals to auctions. “People first” is a phrase that is central to every decisionwemake. The quality of people we invite into our network and into our strategic leadership team is something we fiercely defend, andwhile we’ve welcomed leading agents and visionary leaders to our network, we’ve also amplified our talent with key leadership appointments this year. Lisa Pennell recently joined as Chief Operations Officer, while Adrian Knowles is our first CEO of Growth for Australia, Karmen Costiganwas appointed Head of Property Management, and Christian Hamilton has been named Head of Auctions across Australia. These individuals provide crucial pillars that will strengthen this brand and its offering now and into the future. We’re a brand that knows where we’re going, that has very strong values and a good strategic plan. Those values are verymuch about “people first”. It’s all about doing the right thing while being courageous and having fun. Those values we protect very, very carefully. They are values that we turn to on a consistent basis to help informour decision-making processmoving forward. They’re the values that are getting us through a pandemic. We are happy to report that, unlike somany businesses and industries, none of our teammembers weremade redundant as a result of covid. We held on to every single one of themwhichwas a great thing to do because who could have possibly predicted that themarket would come back strong? Andwhen it did, we still had our full teamof people with the structure behind us tomove really, really quickly. I’ma firmbeliever in the importance of the journey rather than the destination. And I'mdelighted to be on this journey with you all, no matter howbumpy the roadmay be right now. AUSTRALIA UPDATE Marcus Williams CEO, Harcourts Australia marcus.williams@harcourts.net INPLACEAUSTRALIA