When the pandemic hit in 2020 and three-time premiership player Chris Johnson found himself unexpectedly sidelined from his work at the AFL, it forced a career rethink.
At the time, he didn't realise the disruption would set him on an entirely new path, taking him to the boardroom and into the world of Indigenous enterprise.
After reaching out to friend and former Swans legend, Michael O'Loughlin, Mr Johnson found work at a recruitment agency. There, he encountered the Indigenous Procurement Program (IPP) for the first time.
Sitting in a brightly lit office in West Melbourne, Mr Johnson tells the Indigenous Business Review that having initially not known what IPP was, he thought, "Well, there's a good opportunity that I could probably get something off the ground if I found something I was passionate about and wanted to do".
That spark eventually led the Gunditjmara and Wiradjuri man and father of four to launch SKS Indigenous Technologies. Established in 2022 in partnership with SKS Technologies, the company delivers audiovisual, communications and electrical solutions across Australia.
A partnership model built on trust
The road into the industry was built through relationships.
Conversations with family friend Bob Shephard from Leader Access Hire led to introductions with SKS executive chairman Peter Jinks, executive director Greg Jinks and chief executive Matthew Jinks.
After months of back and forth, a shared service agreement was signed, and the joint venture took shape — even if the learning curve was steep the former Brisbane Lions champion.
He says that whilst he didn't have an audiovisual, communications and electrical data background, "everyone in the building now, and everyone around the country, has helped me out in that space".
The structure is deliberate. The four-person board is 50 per cent Indigenous, with Matthew and Peter Jinks alongside himself and Kirrae, Peek and Tjab Whurrong man Jason Misfud. Mr Johnson holds a 51 per cent ownership stake, with SKS Technologies holding 49 per cent. With that arrangement, he notes, "if there's a dispute on the board, I've got the pending vote".
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In an era when scrutiny around "Blackcladding" shadows some corporate Indigenous partnerships, Mr Johnson speaks openly about trust and the SKS team. He says its executives are genuinely invested in opportunity, particularly apprenticeships for young Aboriginal workers.
"I wouldn't have been able to get off the ground without these guys," he says. "They gave me an interest-free loan, and then over two years, I paid that loan back to them through the work that we've completed."
What drew him to SKS, he adds, was their commitment to mirror the Indigenous population — around three per cent — as a minimum employment benchmark across the company.
"When they told me that," he says, "I was like, 'Yeah, these guys are fair thinking, they're very serious, they want to do something different, they want to give young people opportunities.' I think that's what's sort of made me think these are the right people for me.
"[Them] saying to me that they wanted to give young Indigenous people opportunities in apprenticeships was something that really struck me."
Creating stable jobs, not short-term contracts
From modest beginnings, SKS Indigenous has grown to a team of 37. A service agreement with the parent company allows workers to move between projects, ensuring continuity of employment.
"The reason why we've got a service agreement in [place], and why we work very closely with SKS [Technologies], is that when the Indigenous part of the company doesn't have work, they can still keep working," Mr Johnson says.
"We don't have to actually then say, 'Hey guys, the Indigenous company hasn't got any work, we have to send you home for three months'...they just transfer over to SKS technology jobs."
Sitting in SKS Indigenous Technologies' office, Mr Johnson proudly gestures toward a digital display installed nearby, highlighting the many completed projects now under the company's belt. These include major works such as the North East Link in Victoria, RAAF Tindal in the Northern Territory and the Munarra Centre for Regional Excellence on Yorta Yorta Country in Shepparton.
"What we've been able to do over the last three years is inject over $6 million into Aboriginal households," he says. "To actually inject money back into Aboriginal households and put food on the table, pay bills, and be able to just live lives with all the cost of living going up — that's what I want to achieve."
Football and community also remain important for Mr Johnson (he still sits on the Brisbane Lions board, and when Indigenous Business Review caught up with him, he was fresh off completing radio commentary duties for the State of Origin game in Perth).
That connection flows back into the community, with the company giving support to the Fitzroy Stars Football Club, the Koori Basketball Academy and AFL Cape York House, whilst they have also sponsored a young Aboriginal boy to play tennis in the USA.
"A lot of our profits go back into the community as well," Mr Johnson says. "So that's what we're trying to do."
The future
Next year, the first two apprentices the company hired will sit their exams to qualify as electricians, including one of his sons — a milestone that feels personal as much as professional.
The workforce now spans most states, with expansion into New South Wales seen as the next big step Mr Johnson hopes to fill. Long term, he says he would "love to be at 100 people employed around the country" with an even spread.
"What we've got in Victoria here is quite unique," he says. "A lot of people think there's no Aboriginal people here in Victoria. We've got at least 28 out of 37 all working here in Victoria at the moment."
When asked about the future, his ambitions are practical.
Full Indigenous ownership is not the goal, he says, acknowledging the limits of his own skill set. Instead, the focus is on pathways and parity.
"I want to be able to give young Indigenous people, even qualified Indigenous people, the opportunity to compete with non-Indigenous people in the broader community," he says.
"It's around making sure that the growth within the business — the Indigenous business and the indigenous employees — that they know that there's a pathway coming through; not just to be on the tools, but certainly to be in a project manager role or an estimating role."
