12 Questions

I’m terrible at team sports and cooking. But I love the way sports give people the ability to test and stretch themselves. I bumped into one of our Marist women the other day. When I first met her at the pre-season muster a couple of years ago she was the shy girl in the corner now she’s playing for the Black Ferns 7s.

What was it like taking on your first board chairmanship at the Federation of Maori Authorities six years ago?

Dynamic and interesting. Some people said, “It really should be chaired by a man” but I was able to gain the support of the members and have been re-elected every year. My approach is to make sure we’ve got the strategy right and that all the stakeholders can sign up to that. In the end people do business with people, not organisations. So how do you gather people’s hopes and dreams and fashion them into a shared strategy to effect change? My job is to create space for that to happen.

Did you think of yourself as a feminist?

Proudly so. I grew up with strong nannies and kuia — fierce women who were deeply compassionate and committed to their communities. They taught me that men and women have different roles and if we both do those well then we’d have a platform to move forward on. As a female board member I’ve always thought of myself as adding value. I just figure everyone has a different contribution to make. If you do your job and I do my job — the job gets done.

What strengths do you bring to the boardroom table?

I’m a pragmatist which helps when conversations become overthought and unnecessarily detailed. I always think about strategy, that’s how I’m wired. I don’t get caught up in personal politics, it’s all about the purpose. Sometimes you have to have those adult conversations in order to set things aside and get on with the job. As chair, I make sure everyone has an opportunity to contribute and the chief executive has the support and space to do their job. Sometimes with this focus on separating governance and management I think we lose the opportunity for chief executives to draw on the board’s skill and experience. You’re more likely to see that co-design, co-development thinking with women.

You chair the National Advisory Council for the Employment of Women. Have we made enough gains in equal pay for women?

There’s more to be done. Some of this is as simple as people deciding to stand up. Where people can influence change we should and where difficult conversations need to be had we should stay at the table.

You’ve been appointed to the Waikato River Authority to restore the health of the river. Does that clash with your role as an agribusiness leader?

When we’re talking about dirty dairying, yes some dairy farmers aren’t great but in my experience there are a big bunch of operators who are trying their hardest to improve the way they farm in terms of environmental sustainability. Landcorp has done things like remove palm kernel from our farming systems. Maori authorities are doing similar things. We’re starting to see that if we continue down the commodity track we won’t achieve higher value. Consumers expect us to