Just last month, we celebrated Mark’s 35th anniversary with the firm. We caught up with him to talk about his journey from starting out as an eager graduate to guiding the practice as Managing Partner—and everything he learned along the way.
Image: Mark McLean celebrating 35 years at Ulton (2025)
First off, how did you get started with Ulton?
I started at Ulton as a graduate in January 1990 and had the pleasure of working with Daryl Corpe, Peter Sawyer, and Ron Hancock. Back then, it was Schoch, Schoch, and Hancock. What came with being part of a smaller regional firm was a lot more responsibility and a lot more opportunities earlier in your career.
I was thrown in the deep end at times, but it gave me the opportunity to mix with people, build relationships, and grow from there. I got to travel with those partners and managers, and I learned a lot from just sitting in the car talking to them or going to client meetings with them and seeing how they interacted with clients.
Image L-R: Ulton Partners Peter Sawyer, Mark McLean and Daryl Corpe (2005)
And what does it mean to be the firm’s Managing Partner?
In the day-to-day, I work closely with our COO Ammie Cauchi to oversee the administration of the practice. The other part of my role is managing some of our larger clients, also: getting out there—networking, spreading the word about the firm, building up relationships and ultimately looking to onboard new clients.
Is networking and building relationships something that has always come naturally to you?
Yeah, I think it is. I enjoy the relationships that we build with our clients.
Let’s say you’ve been introduced to someone and built up enough of a rapport for that person to come onboard as a client. With time, you build a really good relationship with them. They become friends and eventually, you almost become a part of their family. And what happens naturally over time is that they introduce you to people in their social networks, and you build relationships with those people too—and on it goes.
A client you get straight away is generally one you lose straight away as well. It takes time to onboard a new client and build up that trust. But when you do, that client will generally be a client for life.
What’s the best part of your job?
It’s twofold. First, seeing young people come to the firm and watching them grow—seeing them develop into better people but also seeing their careers prosper. Being able to provide them with a career path where they can go on their own journey and achieve as much as they like—that gives me a lot of satisfaction.
The other thing that gives me a lot of satisfaction is seeing our clients have success. Seeing them achieve everything they want to achieve and ticking off their goals—their goals for their lifestyle, their family—not just the financial side of things.
And what’s the most challenging part?
The skill of delegation is also a challenge. A lot of people struggle with this and this was something I struggled with too. I thought that if you wanted something done a certain way, you had to do it yourself.
I think that when you can learn the skill of delegation and passing that down, it creates more time. It’s really important to do that and to train other people how to do things. Because once you do that, those people can do that job forever. But if you keep hanging onto it, that job will be yours forever.
What’s the thing you appreciate most about the practice?
The biggest thing I appreciate is the effort that every person puts in every day. There’s no way we could have achieved what we have without the contribution of everyone.
I am so thankful to have such a good team of people who really put so much effort into looking after our clients. And it starts at the first time they call or the first time they’re greeted in the office—they feel so special from that minute on.
I guess this really emphasises that we’re a real team here. Ulton is not just Daryl Corpe or Kylie Wright or any one person—it’s definitely not Mark McLean. It’s the team. It really is. The team is what makes it special. I don’t feel like any of the people here work for me, I feel like we all work together. And that’s what makes it rewarding and fun to turn up to work everyday.
Image L-R: Enjoying the Ulton Annual Dinner (2024)
And going back to the beginning, what was life like for you as a kid?
I was just like every other normal kid at that time. You play a lot of sport—soccer in winter, cricket in summer. I was very lucky to be brought up in Bundaberg.
I had hardworking parents with good values and a good work ethic. Dad was with Bundaberg Sugar for over 40 years and Mum had a number of different administrative jobs over the years—working in the TAB is the one I remember most. I learned a lot from them.
What’s something about your life that the broader Ulton team may not know about you?
Back when my first son was born, I was 22. At that time, I was working as an accountant by day but I had to get a job delivering pizzas at night and a job pouring fuel at a service station on the weekend so that we could afford to pay the rent, pay the cars off, and support our young family on one person’s income. Things like that, you look back on with a lot of pride, but that’s just what you did back then to get ahead.
We all know you love horse racing—could you tell us a little about what got that fire started for you?
It was a client, John Pressler, that really got me started on it. He was selling a yearling at the big Inglis sale in Sydney. I was 20-something at the time and I’d never been on a plane before. John knew I loved the horses and said to me, “If you get yourself to Sydney, I’ll look after you down there.”
He took me to the races at Randwick, the Inglis sales, out dining at Doyle’s on Circular Quay. I remember eating the jumbo prawns and just thinking to myself, how good is this.
From here I had the opportunity to purchase a horse with four of my mates, and we were lucky that our horse won it’s first two races. And from there it has just grown to the point where I have a separate business, Archer Park Racing, that I run with a good mate, Chris Wessel, where we buy and syndicate horses.
My eldest son Stephen has got the bug for horse racing too. He has worked in the industry since he was 14 and has now set up his own business training on the Gold Coast.
In our family we live and breathe racing every day of the week. ‘Its just a lot of fun.’
Image: Mark McLean enjoying the races (2025)
What’s one of the biggest life lessons you carry with you?
We have all experienced hard things in our lives—we all know what it’s like to lose friends or loved ones. So with that, I think that every day we wake up, we should recognise how lucky we are and make the most of it. Because life is far too short.
This also means learning to not worry about the little stuff. Things are never going to be perfect. If you make a mistake or stuff up, don’t overthink it. You can change everything from this minute forward, but you can’t change anything that happened two seconds ago. So don’t fixate, learn from it and move forward—there is nothing that is unfixable.