Lasting Rummukainen legacy

BROAD Group founder and chief Kari Rummukainen will leave a lasting legacy in the construction company as well as the broader industry following his sudden death last week.

The company’s chief financial officer Roger Lee and executive chairman Peter McMorrow said Mr Rummukainen had driven the company with his strength, ambition and pursuit of high standards, a quality that runs through the organisation at all levels of management and which will continue to sit as a pillar in the company’s future growth.

“The leaders here all share Kari’s DNA, which is integrity, pursuing a high standard of excellence and delivering on your promise,” Mr Lee said.

Mr Rummukainen founded Broad Construction in 1991 after being told he wouldn’t progress beyond superintendent level at his previous job, according to Mr McMorrow, who has taken over the role of managing director in the interim.

“He proved everyone wrong,” Mr McMorrow said.

Mr Lee was Mr Rummukainen’s right-hand man almost from the beginning of Broad, and said the founder’s strength in stewardship of the company led it through one of Australia's worst recessions in its early days.

“It was difficult; we started off in the construction business and no-one really wanted to know us, but back then Kari wrote a business plan which was very ambitious and driven. He wanted to drive the company to be a large, strong robust entity and when we achieved that in WA and built a name for ourselves we went off to the next challenge, setting up branches interstate,” Mr Lee said.

“His dream was to make it a national construction company and when we achieved that we set about diversifying the company even further by adding a property development arm to the business.”

Master Builders Association WA construction director Kim Richardson said Mr Rummukainen made a significant contribution to the industry by showing strength in his dealings with unions following the Royal Commission into industrial activity within the industry.

“Broad made the decision, certainly led by Kari, that the company needed to be in control of its own destiny and in control of its own construction sites. It seemed from that point on, after breaking away from the influence of the CFMEU, to establish itself with a much stronger position within the commercial market in WA,” Mr Richardson said.

“It established its credibility that it could do major projects and do them particularly well.”