INTHEBLACK April 2022 - Magazine - Page 22
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David Walsh has described The O as the
single most essential ingredient of the entire
Mona experience.
“If The O wasn’t there, I was never going
to open, because it was the thing that gave
me the freedom to create in the way that I
wanted to create,” he says.
Having witnessed what Art Processors
had been able to achieve from the client’s
point of view, Scruton joined the business in
2018. She led the business through a period
of massive growth, from 18 to 75 staff. Then
came the challenges of COVID-19.
“Even in normal times, partnering with
cultural institutions that have minimal or
tenuous funding can be very difficult from
a financial perspective. We’ve had to build a
business model that allows for that,” Scruton
says.“If our primary focus is to create
incredible visitor experiences that enhance
the assets of the institution, it can’t be just
for well-funded galleries. So, we’ve had to
invest heavily in our people and processes to
create an offering that can be shared in
a more egalitarian way.”
Making this a reality has involved turning
some of the company’s focus on innovative,
22 ITB April 2022
creative technology inwards, to transform
the inner workings of the organisation to
better prepare it for a new era of business.
FINDING HER NICHE
Raised in Toowoomba in Queensland,
Scruton didn’t originally intend to become
an accountant, or work in Tasmania. She
imagined her career being based in the
political or diplomatic space.
“I was young and fell into a business
degree, and it was then that accounting
struck a chord,” she says. “It required an
organised mind.
“I had an interesting journey, as my degree
was punctuated by the birth of my son in my
early 20s. I had to work hard to make sure
I didn’t get left behind as I tried to balance
finishing my studies and motherhood, and
finding opportunities that didn’t see my
family suffer.”
After completing a bachelor of business
degree at Queensland University of
Technology, Scruton made her family part
of the solution. She entered her own family’s
small construction-related business, Fixlay
Tiles, and helped to grow the company to
a 30-plus workforce with a reputation for
technical excellence.
As is typically the case in small businesses,
Scruton gained experience in numerous
fields rather than specialising in just one.
“I really built some confidence up when I
was there,” she says. “That basically took care
of the first decade of my working life.”
Her next job, with a large, publicly listed
retailer, couldn’t have been more different.
She felt like a small cog in a large machine,
and it wasn’t a situation she enjoyed. Then
came the job opportunity with Mona.
“I stayed in that role for over seven
years, and that’s what made me the finance
professional I am today,” she says.
“It was very fast moving and involved
quite a number of industries within the
group, including wineries, breweries,
hospitality, cultural institutions, philanthropy
and more. Although we tried to create a
modicum of structure and process, you didn’t
know what was going to happen when you
turned up to work each day.”
It takes a particular personality to work at
the leading edge of the art world, Scruton
says.