Richard Durnall is the Head of Delivery for REA Group, based in Melbourne, Australia. The REA Group is entrenched in Australia as the operator of the country’s most popular residential and commercial real estate websites. REA is Australia’s sixth largest online publisher by revenue and when compared to online real estate classifieds peers, ranks third worldwide in revenues. The success of the proven business model in Australia has permitted the REA Group to dedicate a small portion of its earnings to expand outside of Australia since 2006. Now the company has operations on three continents.

Previously, a Principal Consultant for ThoughtWorks, Richard helped ThoughtWork’s clients to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of their IT divisions by applying Lean and Agile techniques to their businesses.

Richard spent a number of years working in the Manufacturing & Supply Chain Systems Division of Ford Motor Company, working with a global team to introduce ‘Lean’ principles to the manufacturing plants and re-align the IT systems to the new processes. Richard was lucky enough to work with a number of Lean experts, some ex-Toyota, and has been applying this knowledge in the IT domain for the last 5 years.

Richard is a frequent author on applying Lean management thinking to IT divisions at his site (www.richarddurnall.com) and presents frequently on the applications of Lean in IT.

Richard has spent a number of years working with Agile software development teams and uses his Lean knowledge to resolve the larger organisational issues often experienced by large organisations moving to new working practices.

Richard’s clients include some of Australia’s largest businesses in the financial services, government, print, on-line and service sectors.

Richard is a certified 6-Sigma practitioner and a chartered member of the British Computer Society.

Career History

Principal Consultant - ThoughtWorks Inc. (Australia)

Independent Consultant - TAC IT Strategy Group (Australia)

Project Manager - Ford Motor Company (United Kingdom)

Senior Business Analyst - Ford Motor Company (United Kingdom)

Analyst Programmer - British Airways (United Kingdom)

Technical Specialist - Roldec Systems Plc. (United Kingdom)

Computer Science BSc. (hons.) - The University of Aston (United Kingdom)