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Gail Kelly
Gail Kelly (née Currer; born 25 April 1956) is a South African-born Australian businesswoman. In 2002, she became the first female CEO of a major Australian bank or top 15 company, and in 2005 was the highest-paid woman in an Australian corporation. She is the former CEO of Westpac, a role she held from 2008 to 2015. In 2010 Kelly was named 8th most powerful woman in the world by Forbes; in 2014, she was listed in 56th place.
Gail Currer was born in Pretoria, South Africa. Currer attended the University of Cape Town where she undertook an arts degree, majoring in history and Latin, as well as a Diploma in Education.
She married Allan Kelly in December 1977. They have four children, including triplets.
The couple moved to Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), where she taught Latin at Falcon College while he served in the Rhodesian Army. They returned to South Africa, where Allan Kelly studied medicine at the University of the Witwatersrand and Gail Kelly taught at a government high school.
Kelly started work at the Nedcor Bank in 1980 as a teller but was fast-tracked into an accelerated training program. She started an MBA at Wits Business School, the graduate school of business administration of the University of the Witwatersrand in 1986 while pregnant with her oldest daughter and graduated with distinction in 1987. In 1990, she became head of human resources at Nedcor (after having given birth to triplets five months earlier). From early 1992 to 1997 she held various other general manager positions at Nedcor, including cards and personal banking.[citation needed]
Kelly and her family, like many white South Africans, became disillusioned with South Africa following the end of apartheid and sought to emigrate. In June 1997, she flew to Sydney, Australia, where she interviewed with four of the major banks; by July 1997, she had been appointed to a senior position at the Commonwealth Bank.
Kelly started work as the General Manager of Strategic Marketing in the Commonwealth Bank in October 1997. By 2002, she was head of the Customer Service Division responsible for running the Commonwealth Bank's extensive branch network.
Her performance at the Commonwealth Bank led her to be recruited as CEO of St. George Bank (after the death of the incumbent CEO from a heart attack). She commenced in January 2002 – at the time, St. George was seen as a possible takeover target (especially after the purchase of Colonial State Bank by the Commonwealth Bank) but Kelly increased the bank's profitability and achieved much higher levels on return on assets. In November 2004, St. George Bank gave Kelly a pay rise and extended her contract indefinitely with the capitalisation of the bank having risen by $3 billion since the start of her term as CEO. The Australian Banking & Finance magazine gave her an award for Best Financial Services Executive in 2003 and 2004.
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Gail Kelly
Gail Kelly (née Currer; born 25 April 1956) is a South African-born Australian businesswoman. In 2002, she became the first female CEO of a major Australian bank or top 15 company, and in 2005 was the highest-paid woman in an Australian corporation. She is the former CEO of Westpac, a role she held from 2008 to 2015. In 2010 Kelly was named 8th most powerful woman in the world by Forbes; in 2014, she was listed in 56th place.
Gail Currer was born in Pretoria, South Africa. Currer attended the University of Cape Town where she undertook an arts degree, majoring in history and Latin, as well as a Diploma in Education.
She married Allan Kelly in December 1977. They have four children, including triplets.
The couple moved to Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), where she taught Latin at Falcon College while he served in the Rhodesian Army. They returned to South Africa, where Allan Kelly studied medicine at the University of the Witwatersrand and Gail Kelly taught at a government high school.
Kelly started work at the Nedcor Bank in 1980 as a teller but was fast-tracked into an accelerated training program. She started an MBA at Wits Business School, the graduate school of business administration of the University of the Witwatersrand in 1986 while pregnant with her oldest daughter and graduated with distinction in 1987. In 1990, she became head of human resources at Nedcor (after having given birth to triplets five months earlier). From early 1992 to 1997 she held various other general manager positions at Nedcor, including cards and personal banking.[citation needed]
Kelly and her family, like many white South Africans, became disillusioned with South Africa following the end of apartheid and sought to emigrate. In June 1997, she flew to Sydney, Australia, where she interviewed with four of the major banks; by July 1997, she had been appointed to a senior position at the Commonwealth Bank.
Kelly started work as the General Manager of Strategic Marketing in the Commonwealth Bank in October 1997. By 2002, she was head of the Customer Service Division responsible for running the Commonwealth Bank's extensive branch network.
Her performance at the Commonwealth Bank led her to be recruited as CEO of St. George Bank (after the death of the incumbent CEO from a heart attack). She commenced in January 2002 – at the time, St. George was seen as a possible takeover target (especially after the purchase of Colonial State Bank by the Commonwealth Bank) but Kelly increased the bank's profitability and achieved much higher levels on return on assets. In November 2004, St. George Bank gave Kelly a pay rise and extended her contract indefinitely with the capitalisation of the bank having risen by $3 billion since the start of her term as CEO. The Australian Banking & Finance magazine gave her an award for Best Financial Services Executive in 2003 and 2004.