Ian Smith

Ian Smith is the CEO of Gavin Anderson & Company (Australia).

In an article for the business pages of The Australian, Smith defended the former CEO of the National Australia Bank, Fank Cicutto, who had resigned in early February 2004 following revelations of hundreds of millions of dollars of undisclosed losses in currency gambles that went sour.

Smith bemoaned the decreasing duration of corporate CEO's terms and blamed the media "particularly those not granted interviews" - for demanding Cicutto's resignation. "Those of us working in the area of reputation management need to wake up to the repercussions of short-term strategy. Spin doctors, lawyers, independent directors and all those other experts need to think long and hard about the consequences of the quick fix," he wrote.

"Australia's are increasingly critical of poll-driven politics. Polls produce policy on the run, often against the best interests of the nation's long term interests. Corporations are now falling victim to the same scenarios. Let's be frank and face up to it," he wrote.