SUPREME WINNER AND

BOard & Management

Helen Robinson

Helen launched Organic Initiative (Oi) in 2015, and it is now one of New Zealand’s fastest-growing companies, with 2 per cent market share and continuing month-on-month growth. Oi provides healthy, biodegradable, 100 per cent certified organic cotton hygiene products. It is changing the world with healthy sanitary products and helping eliminate plastic from society; its success to date has largely been due to Helen’s commercialisation and leadership skills. 

She is currently the chair of N4L, CLOUD M and Valens Group; she sits on the boards of ATEED and Aktive Auckland Sport & Recreation. N4L is helping transform schools in New Zealand to become modern learning environments and has connected 750,000 users to a managed network. CLOUD M provides a health and safety platform to keep users safe. Valens Group helps build confidence in women in the early to mid stages of their careers. Prior to her role at Oi, Helen ran ICT companies including CEO of Microsoft NZ, and started the TZ1 Registry on behalf of NZX.

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Arts & Culture

Gaylene Preston

Gaylene is a writer, director and producer who has spent more than three decades making feature films and documentaries with a distinctly New Zealand flavour. She has told important stories about New Zealanders in war, captured the lives of influential New Zealanders and made enormous contributions to the country’s film industry. Gaylene was New Zealand’s first filmmaker laureate and was appointed an Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit for services to filmmaking. 

She has served on many industry boards, including the New Zealand Film Commission and New Zealand on Air, and has chaired Creative New Zealand’s Film Innovation and the New Zealand Film and Television Awards Society. Gaylene has won 11 New Zealand Film Awards, a lifetime achievement award for outstanding contribution to documentary from Documentary Edge, a Screenwriters Mentorship Award and a WIFT NZ Award for outstanding contribution to the New Zealand screen industry. 

Business Enterprise

Lisa King

After 15 years working in the FMCG sector, marketing some of the country’s biggest food brands, Lisa decided to channel her energy into making a positive impact in the community. After finding out that 29 per cent of New Zealand children live in poverty and thousands go to school without lunch every day, she launched Eat My Lunch in June 2015. For every lunch you buy, Eat My Lunch gives a lunch to a Kiwi kid in need. 

In 12 months Eat My Lunch has made around 400,000 lunches, with 200,000 of those going to kids in 33 low-decile schools across Auckland and Hamilton. The business is on track to launch in Wellington this year. Eat My Lunch won the Excellence in Social Innovation award at the 2015 New Zealand Innovator Awards, the Communicating Sustainability award from the NZI Sustainable Business Network, a Local Hero Medal at the 2016 New Zealand Local Hero of the Year awards and won three categories at the 2016 TVNZ Marketing Awards.

Community & Not for profit

Catriona Williams

Catriona was one of New Zealand’s most accomplished competitive riders before a riding accident in 2002 which left her a C6/C7 tetraplegic and confined to a wheelchair. She and her husband now run a successful thoroughbred stud farm, and in 2005 she founded the Catwalk Trust to fund support for spinal cord injury research to help people in wheelchairs regain use of their feet. New Zealand has one of the highest rates of spinal cord injuries in the western world, with the majority occurring in men aged 25 to 45 and 40% caused by car accidents. 

In 2010 Catriona was recognised by the Sir Peter Blake Trust as a Blake Leader; in 2014 she was made a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit and was a top three finalist for the New Zealander of the Year. The Catwalk Trust has raised millions of dollars and its patrons include Richie McCaw, Dion Nash, Sir Brian Lochore, Sir Mark Todd, Sarah Walker and Zara Phillips.

Diversity

Sue Kedgley 

Sue Kedgley has been a catalyst for change since founding the Auckland University Women's Liberation group as a 22 year old. It focused on changing attitudes towards women and enabling them to have access to childcare and equal pay. Sue was an active advocate and spokesperson for these changes and has continued to be so throughout her career. The need for gender diversity in the workplace has also been a theme in her five books on women’s issues and the impact of feminism on New Zealand society.

In her role as the Green Party's spokesperson on women's issues, Sue negotiated the establishment of an Equal Employment Commissioner in the Human Rights' Commission and introduced the Employment Relations Flexible Working Arrangements Bill. Since leaving Parliament, Sue has continued as a member of the Capital and Coast District Health Board, Deputy Chair of Consumer NZ and as a Wellington Regional Councillor. Most recently, Sue initiated and helped develop the UN Women's Empowerment Principles National Committee’s Gender Equality Workplace Strategy which was launched on 17 June 2016.

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Global

Lyn Provost

Lyn is New Zealand’s first female Auditor-General and has been a dedicated public servant for most of her career. A trailblazer for professional women, she advocates for accountability and transparency in the public sector and advises developing nations on public auditing and accounting. Lyn is on the governing board of the International Organisation of Supreme Audit Institutions and is Secretary-General of the Pacific Association of Supreme Audit Institutions. She has been instrumental in improving auditing across the smallest Pacific nations and supported co-operation audits across 10 countries on important topics such as solid waste, fisheries and climate change. 

In her seven years as Auditor-General, Lyn has worked to ensure the public sector can deliver quality services to citizens now and in the future. Lyn has worked with auditors-general around the world and hosted several Supreme Audit Institutions. She was awarded the inaugural Chartered Accountants Australia and New Zealand Leadership in Government Award, recognising her outstanding achievements.  

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Innovation, Science & Health

Dr Michelle Dickinson

Michelle is one of the most publicly recognisable scientists in New Zealand and is passionate about the role science plays in our daily lives. She is known widely as ‘Nano Girl’ and specialises in turning complex science and engineering jargon into stories and ideas that everyday people can understand. Michelle set up the country’s first and only nano-mechanical testing lab at the University of Auckland, fundraising to buy the equipment; the research it generates has enabled the local development of cutting-edge nano-technology products.  

In 2015 Michelle was a Sir Peter Blake Leadership winner and she is a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit. She has won the Prime Minister’s Science Media Communication Prize and the New Zealand Association of Scientists Science Communicator award in 2014. She has delivered over 30 keynote lectures around the world as an internationally recognised expert in nano-technology. She is co-founder of the charity OMGTech and her science show ‘Big Bang, Little Bang!’ featured in this year’s Auckland Arts Festival.

Public Policy

Naomi Ferguson

Appointed in 2012, Naomi is the Inland Revenue’s first female commissioner and the youngest person ever to hold this position. She is passionate about delivering public services that meet the needs of New Zealanders and puts this at the heart of Inland Revenue’s strategies and actions. Naomi also serves on the State Sector Leadership Group and the Leadership Development Centre board, both of which focus on developing and promoting future public sector leaders. 

Naomi has been a driving force in the creation of a Women In Government network for senior public sector women and is the CE champion for the Government Women’s Network. In a previous role in Northern Ireland, Naomi focused on diversity and inclusion and worked in a partnership with the University of Ulster to implement diversity legislation in Northern Ireland. At Barclays Bank she was instrumental in creating a diversity strategy for the organisation.

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Rural

Mavis Mullins

Mavis is chair of the Rangitane Tu Mai Ra Trust, a post-settlement governance entity established in 2014. She is also a director of Paewai Mullins Shearing Ltd, the first company in the world in its sector to achieve an ISO 9002 certification. Mavis chairs the Atihau-Whanganui Incorporation, a 42,000-hectare agribusiness with 7,000 shareholders. The Incorporation has created jobs, new skills and an economic boost to Māori in the Whanganui area, in addition to reconnecting young Māori with their land. 

In 2005 Mavis was the first woman to manage a New Zealand shearing and wool handling team, competing in the World Championships in Australia and bringing home two titles. She is a former president of the Golden Shears Society and a former director of Landcorp Farming Ltd. Mavis is the patron of the Agri-Women’s Development Trust and a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit.

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Young Leader

Alexia Hilbertidou

Alexia created GirlBoss NZ to address issues of gender inequality in STEM and C-suite positions. It focuses on developing the leadership potential of young women aged 13 to 18, educating and inspiring them via an online magazine, Facebook group and newsletter. GirlBoss NZ has 650 members and school clubs in six schools and is in the process of establishing clubs in another 24 schools. 

To help reduce food waste and child poverty in New Zealand, Alexia set up KaiShare, an online portal that allows commercial enterprises to log their food waste so agencies that distribute food aid can be notified. In one week earlier this year, dozens of milk crates and 420 frozen family pies were redistributed to the Salvation Army. The KaiShare app won the Unitec 2015 National App competition and Alexia is currently working with Goodman Fielder to implement KaiShare with their merchandisers in over 100 supermarkets across Auckland.