Register to attend this event on Zoom.

There are very few rules on how we do things on boards, and yet we all run board meetings in a very similar way tending to follow narrow custom and practice. What if we rethought our governance models? What does a female perspective bring to views on governance?

What does good governance look like? How shall we assess our successes and failures? Do we only value what we can measure?

Join the Acting Pro-Vice-Chancellor and Dean of the Wellington School of Business and Government, Professor Jane Bryson, and other invited guests for breakfast and a panel discussion with local experts.

There will be an opportunity to hear diverse perspectives on governance from accomplished New Zealand business leaders. There will also be an opportunity to ask your own questions and share your insights.

Moderator

Kirsten Patterson

Kirsten Patterson (known as KP) is the Institute of Directors Chief Executive. She is a qualified lawyer and a Distinguished Fellow of the Human Resources Institute of New Zealand, Deputy Co-Chair of the Global Network of Directors Institutes (GNDI) and was previously Chair of the Wellington Homeless Women’s Trust. She is currently Chair of the Brian Picot Ethical Leadership Advisory Board. With extensive governance and leadership experience, she is actively involved in community initiatives.

A strong advocate of diversity, KP was one of the founding members of Global Women’s ‘Champions for Change’, a group of senior executives and directors who commit to diversity in the workplace. She is also a founding member of WiSPA, an organisation promoting women in sport, and mentors a number of business leaders.

Panel members

Melissa Clark-Reynolds

Melissa Clark-Reynolds ONZM works as a foresight practitioner and professional director, with over 25 years’ experience as an entrepreneur and strategist.

She has been founder and CEO of a number of technology companies, along the way earning three Fast50s and several AsiaPacific Fast 500s. She has an eclectic academic background, including Anthropology, Epidemiology and Waste Management. In 2015 she was named Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit (ONZM) in recognition for her services to technology. She is deeply curious and especially interested in emerging business models.

Melissa currently sits on the boards of Atkins Ranch and Alpine Energy, and on the advisory board for Flux Federation. Her first governance role was for the Massey Students Association in 1980.

She is named for a mythological bee creature so tweets as @HoneyBeeGeek.

Professor Sally Davenport

Sally is Professor of Management at Wellington School of Business & Government. Originally, she trained as a research chemist but moved into the academic area of innovation management in the early 1990s, and has studied the commercialisation of science, research collaboration and high-tech entrepreneurship for the last three decades. From 2011-2020 she was a half-time Commissioner with the New Zealand Productivity Commission and is currently the Director of the Science for Technological Innovation (SfTI) National Science Challenge.

Suzanne Snively

Suzanne was Chair of Transparency International New Zealand (TINZ) between 2012 and 2020, focused on improving wellbeing by strengthening integrity of the public, non-profit and business sectors. She was a joint Co-Director with Murray Petrie of the comprehensive Integrity Plus 2013 New Zealand National Integrity System Assessment. She is now leading the TINZ Financial Integrity System Assessment (FISA) that provides an opportunity for accounting, legal, audit, risk management and strategic development knowledge to be applied to demonstrate the strengths and advise on ways to enhance the integrity of New Zealand’s financial system. See www.transparency.org.nz for further information.

Previously a Partner at PricewaterhouseCoopers for nearly 15 years, she specialised as an economic strategist.

Suzanne has been a company director for over 30 years, often chairing Boards. Her extensive governance experience includes former Directorships of the Reserve Bank of New Zealand, of R A Hannah and Co, of Wellington City Council's Capital Holdings (which included being a Director of the Wellington Airport Board), of Whitireia and Weltec Polytechnics and of Otago and Wairarapa Crown Health Entities, the Health Research Council, the Army Leadership Board and the Whanau Ora Commissioning Agency. She chaired Fulbright NZ, New Zealand’s first FM radio company (Cosmopolitan FM), Mary Potter Hospice, the National Advisory Council on the Employment of Women (NACEW) and Whitireia NZ Limited.

She is now the Deputy Chair of the Turnbull Endowment Trust, a Director of New Zealand Opera and a Trustee of the NZ Opera Foundation. Suzanne is currently an external advisor on the internal audit / risk management committees of several central government agencies. Suzanne chaired Phase 1 and is currently the Chair of Phase 2 of the Review of the 1989 Reserve Bank Act. Having progressed the RBNZ Institutional Act, work is underway now to progress the Depositor Takers Act.

Rachel Taulelei

Alumna of Te Herenga Waka, Rachel Taulelei (Ngāti Raukawa ki te Tonga, Ngāti Koata, Ngāti Rārua).  Rachel just this week jumped full time into her own business – Oho…a business design and brand strategy start up.

Prior to this Rachel was CEO of Kono, a Māori-owned, food and beverage company, founder of sustainable seafood company Yellow Brick Road, and was US Trade Commissioner for New Zealand Trade and Enterprise.

Rachel is a champion for New Zealand’s primary industry and the country’s position as a world-class producer of food and beverages. She is passionate about the Māori economy, international trade, and about supporting the potential and growth of others.

Rachel is a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit for services to food and hospitality. In 2018 she was named Māori Woman Business Leader at the prestigious University of Auckland Aotearoa Māori Business Leaders Awards.

She presently chairs the APEC Business Advisory Council and her governance experience includes the Prime Ministers Business Advisory Council, The Warehouse Group, and the Wellington Regional Stadium Trust, which she now Chairs.