Australia’s largest operator Telstra said chief operations officer, Kate McKenzie, will retire after 12 years with the organisation.
Her departure adds to a series of senior staff losses since former CEO David Thodey resigned in February 2015. The operator dismissed its CTO, Vish Nandlall, in May after allegedly finding that he had falsified his CV and plagiarised presentation material.
The head of its retail group, Karsten Wildberger, resigned in December, less than two months after replacing Gordon Ballantyne, who left in October.
Prior to the departure of Ballantyne, who was seen as a likely replacement for Thodey, international group MD Tim Chen quit in July and its head of cost-cutting Robert Nason left in April.
McKenzie, who led three business units for Telstra over the past nine years, took over as COO in 2013. She was responsible for Telstra’s field services, IT and network architecture and operations.
She has been part of Telstra’s CEO leadership team since 2007 and joined Telstra in 2004 as head of its regulatory group.
McKenzie will leave Telstra in the coming weeks, with Brendon Riley, group executive of global enterprise and services, taking over as interim COO with immediate effect while a permanent replacement is found.
Riley was Telstra COO from 2011 to 2013 and is a former IBM global executive.
Comments