Building a better Buller and Stirling

There has only been two times in Mark Bennetts’ life he has been head-hunted for a job. “I’ve heard stories but it had never happened to me,” he said. The now general manager on Mt Buller was working at RACV when he received a call about becoming the CEO at Falls Creek. “I said, ‘I’d love to do that and the time doesn’t work for my family’,” he recounted. “The second time, four and a half years later, I was contacted by a different head-hunter also about the CEO role at Falls Creek. “I thought this is a bit weird. “It still wasn’t right. “I was always passionate about the mountains,” he explained. “I never would have thought about working there until I had those two calls.” Mark left RACV at the end of 2016 and was looking for his next adventure when the opportunity to be the CEO at Mt Buller came up. The vacancy opened up as the then Mt Buller and Mt Stirling Resort chief executive John Huber quit after ombudsman Deborah Glass found Mount Buller and Mount Stirling executives were misusing taxpayers dollars. Mark was hired on the Friday before opening weekend of Buller in 2017 and vividly remembers talking to the Mansfield Courier about his appointment. “I said I hoped to build a bigger and better Buller and Stirling,” he recalled. “If I look at where we are now, that’s a journey that never ends. “In those seven seasons, we have made huge progress in building a bigger and better Buller and Stirling.” Mark inherited quite the challenge, with many issues throughout the resort needing to be addressed. “The place was a mess,” he said. “There was a whole bunch of stuff that Deborah Glass hadn’t found or wouldn’t have looked for. “The most significant thing was the Resort Management Board (RMB) was not respected; it was not trusted and people didn’t have confidence in it. “It was really difficult for any [staff from resort management] to get successful interactions. “That’s one of the main things I think I’ve achieved; I’ve restored trust and respect and confidence of resort management,” he said. “To me, that was the major gap. “Buller Ski Lifts has done amazing stuff for a long period of time; the Chamber of Commerce has done amazing stuff for a long period of time; the ratepayers have done a lot of good stuff. “But the RMB was the missing link. “I think I’ve managed to bring us back to the table and in doing so the four groups have really worked fabulously well together; to tackle things and making them better.” Mark doesn’t think there was a single point in time where he felt as though the RMB was back to where it should be. “There’s a continuum; however there was a time where I started to realise I was really on the right path,” he explained. “After about three or four months there were enough positive signs, especially when people volunteered to tackle the challenge of turning people away from the resort. “I was shocked one busy Saturday when I got a call from Jimmy Hughes who said, “Just checking I can close the resort?” “I went to the chamber of commerce and a bunch of people were happy to work with me on that. “That was the first instance of solving a major ‘right now’ problem. “We sat in a room for about four hours and debated a whole bunch of things. “What stemmed from there was we said we have to get our product online so people can buy it before they leave home and they have no doubt they will get in [to the resort],” he said. “We came to quite a proposition there together and it worked really well.” Over the past seven winters and six-and-a-half years, Mark has been a part of some significant projects on and around the mountains, including the Boggy Creek Reservoir, restoration of the mountain biking and walking trails, essential services upgrades and significant expansion of the snowmaking system. He has also had a hand in implementing parts of the Mt Buller Master Plan. “There are a lot of things in that document which are never going to happen,” he admitted. “There was also a number of things that were sensible, just not very far progressed. “We worked through a number of areas together with broader stakeholders. “That included developing the Village Square, Whitehorse Village, Kooroora and bringing in the Olympic Training Centre. “Not to forget Stirling, we produced the Stirling 2030 vision document, building trust with Stirling’s stakeholders.” Mark’s role has also changed a bit over the years, especially with the introduction of Alpine Resorts Victoria (ARV) earlier this year. “I am absolutely a believer in an advocate for the change to ARV,” he said. “There are so many things that were not being tackled while all the resorts were working independently.” With the move to the ARV also came a change to Mark’s role from CEO to general manager. “I don’t interact with the board, stakeholders and staff; there is a central CEO,” he said. “The resort-level role is a general manager now; it has less responsibility than it used to. “There is nothing wrong with that; it is just no longer the role for me. “I was determined to stay there and see the transition through. “After the responsibilities of my new role were clear, I thought it was the time for me to step out and let someone else work at that general manager level.” Mark isn’t leaving Buller and Stirling any time soon, having bought an apartment on Buller to still be a part of the community. “I hope to be able to live there for large parts of the year,” he said. “I can’t picture myself driving off the hill for the last time and next time coming back as a visitor.”