Michael Ackland joined Telstra in 2016 as executive director of Telstra Country Wide, and was responsible for over 350 retail stores and over 16,000 partners nationally. He then became its sales and service executive in October 2017 where he led Telstra’s consumer & small business sales and service channels including global contact centres, Telstra Country Wide (TCW) and Telstra Digital. As group executive for consumer & small business in April 2019, after acting in the role since September 2018, he created and delivered the best experiences possible for consumers and small business customers through radically simplifying its products and services, while also working to transform the experience customers have with the company. Mr Ackland has been a group executive and chief financial officer of Telstra since September 2022.
Prior to Telstra, Mr Ackland was the chief executive of GE Healthcare, Australia and New Zealand. He had held various executive leadership roles across GE’s Australia and New Zealand business including financial services, corporate and healthcare divisions. Prior to GE, Mr Ackland was a principal at the Boston Consulting Group where he spent eight years.
Mr Ackland holds a Bachelor of Commerce and a Bachelor of Chemical Engineering from the University of Melbourne.
