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As we enter our 70th year, we’re doubling down on strengthening our future, putting the right people in the right positions with a new management structure.
For the best part of two decades, Tom Hensgen has lived and breathed John Deere. Having worked for Deere in Australia and New Zealand for five years in technical support, training and customer support roles, Tom started with Hutcheon & Pearce 11 years ago and was our Group Aftermarket Manager overseeing the strategic and operations side of Parts, Service and TECSight sides of our business. So, when company growth saw us creating a Chief Operating Officer (COO) role, Tom naturally had to put his hand up.
The company has obviously continued to grow and it had reached a scale where Arron [Hutcheon] was looking to put a role in place that helps him with the day-to-day operational side of the business so he can focus on the strategic side and doing what he enjoys, which is spending time visiting our customers and branches for that broader oversight of how the business is tracking in line with the vision for the company.
“As COO, my role is to oversee the company’s operations and work closely with our leadership team to ensure we execute on Arron’s vision. I will oversee a leadership team of experienced and passionate managers in what we call the functional areas of the business – Sales and Marketing, Supply Chain, Aftermarket (Parts and Service) and HR – and as part of our structural change, we have introduced three Regional Operations Managers to oversee 5-7 branches each.”
The three Regional Operations Managers are Bill Armstrong in Finley (Southern region), Matt Newham in Cowra (Central region), and Rodney Landers in Tamworth (Northern region). Tom said these new roles are designed to support branch management to deliver on business, staff and customer objectives.
Three Regional Operations Managers:
| Southern Region | Central Region | Northern Region |
| Bill Armstrong – Finley | Matt Newham – Cowra | Rodney Landers – Tamworth |
These new roles are designed to support branch management to deliver on business, staff and customer objectives.
“While we have grown a lot in recent years, we want to ensure that we remain true to our family-owned customer and staff focused business. The aim is to empower our Branch Managers and Regional Operations Managers to make customer centric decisions. It’s my job to ensure we have all the polices and procedures in place for branches to make decisions and resolve issues as close to the customer as possible, rather than decisions becoming bureaucratic. For us it’s about ensuring there are no barriers to a branch making the decisions they need to make and getting on with the work they need to do to get the customers back out in the field quickly.”
About Tom...
Growing up on a farm just outside of Mildura, Tom has been involved in horticulture, viticulture, grain and cattle farming enterprises, so brings a stack of understanding of different crops, a range of machinery across different industries and the business of farming to the new role. Not to mention a deep understanding of the Hutcheon & Pearce business – it’s operations, culture and staff.
“I have a broad knowledge in the industry, and I think that’s helpful in understanding the layers of decision making we have in this business. I’m very focused on continuing to build a high quality and cohesive team, and providing staff with the right level of training, guidance and support they need to get the job done, particularly as things are evolving so rapidly.
“We now live in a world where everything is connected. By 2026, John Deere has ambitions to triple the number of connected machines in the market. We want to ensure that customers are supported along this journey by assisting them to work with this data to optimise machinery usage and uptime, as well as agronomic decision making. This can only be done efficiently by ensuring that our branch staff, TECSight Remote Support staff, TECSight Field Machinery Optimisation and specialised Precision Ag all work together on holistically supporting our customers.
“I look forward to ensuring our business is aligned and ready to support this next phase in technology and hope it gives our customers confidence that we will continue to support their needs now and into the future.”
Growing our own - Matt Newham
Matt Newham is what we call a H&P stalwart. Rapidly approaching 20 years at Hutchies, Matt started out in our Parts department before becoming Branch Manager of first Cowra and then Orange. Now as one of our newly appointed Regional Operations Managers, Matt will be helping the Branch Managers in Cowra, Orange, Temora, Forbes, Condobolin, Dubbo and Warren implement their plans for the short term and long-term.
“In the role, I'll be working alongside senior management to help execute the broader company plans at a branch level and feed back to the management team what's working, what's not, and what extra help and support we need to make those things happen. Ultimately, it’s about making the business as efficient as possible to achieve the best outcomes for the customer and the company.”
Matt said he’s most looking forward to working with the branch managers to meet the challenges of their roles.
“I’m looking forward to working with a great group of branch managers. Having been a Branch Manager myself, I have a good understanding of the day-to-day struggles and things that get thrown at a branch, and I’m really looking forward to helping those guys through those challenges.
“The rapid growth in Precision Ag that’s coming in the next few years is also exciting. Precision Ag is getting ready to explode and that will mean some pretty big changes to Deere, Hutcheon & Pearce and our customers. I can’t wait to roll up my sleeves and help our customers connect to what’s coming and take full advantage of the new and upcoming technology.”
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