Brad Welsh Appointed to NIB Board
First published on National Indigenous Times
July 2023
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Muruwari man Brad Welsh has been appointed to the board of NIB Holdings.
He joins Jill Watts as independent non-executive directors, with NIB chairman David Gordon officially welcoming the duo to the board from July 27.
Mr Welsh, who has spent more than a decade leading and advising global resource companies including Energy Resources of Australia and Rio Tinto, brings both public sector and commercial skills to to the NIB board.
He is currently CEO and managing director at Energy Resources of Australian and previously held roles as chief adviser to the CEO – Indigenous Affairs, at Rio Tinto and acting general manager of the Weipa bauxite operation in Northern Queensland, which made him the first Indigenous general manager operations in Rio Tinto's history.
He has also held several senior government relations roles, including in the Office of the NSW Premier, the Minister for Planning, and the Prime Minister of Australia.
Mr Welsh is from the Muruwari tribe in north-western New South Wales, and grew up in the Aboriginal community of Redfern.
In February after being appointed to the helm of ERA, Mr Welsh said he wanted to highlight the economic potential of Indigenous thought in business alongside his responsibility to shareholders.
"It would be remiss of me not to hopefully set a path for future Indigenous people to think about a career in an ASX-listed company, and to think about bringing Indigenous thought to senior leadership," he told National Indigenous Times.
"I always wanted to be a senior leader who is Indigenous, not a senior Indigenous leader.
"Things like NAIDOC Week and the reconciliation actions are really important, and I care about those, but I actually want to bring Indigenous thought into a competitive advantage for a company."
Ms Watts is a non-executive director on the boards of St Vincent's Healthcare, Icon Cancer Group and IHH Healthcare Berhad, which is listed in Malaysia and Singapore, and has operations in Turkey, India, China, and Europe. She is also on the board of Lendlease's retirement living business, known as Keyton.
Prior to returning to Australia in 2017, she was the group CEO of the UK's largest private hospital group BMI Healthcare, responsible for 60 facilities across the UK; and group CEO of Ramsay Healthcare, UK.
Ms Watts is is recognised as an influential health care leader, working across the private sector, with governments affecting public policy change, and private research institutes.
"I am very pleased to welcome Jill and Brad to the nib Board," Mr Gordon said.
"Their personal and professional experience will broaden our perspectives and align nicely with our business strategy."
The appointments reflect nib's ongoing focus and commitment to orderly Board renewal and future Board succession planning.
Ms Watts and Mr Welsh will stand for election at the 2023 Annual General Meeting in November. Their appointments follow the retirement of Ms Lee Ausburn as a non-executive director last year.
