Final pair round out RBNZ's top team

Simone Robbers will take up the new role of assistant governor and general manager of governance, strategy and corporate relations. Photo / Greg Bowker

Simone Robbers and Christian Hawkesby will round out the Reserve Bank's senior leadership team, joining as assistant governors, says the central bank's governor, Adrian Orr.

Late last year Orr said he was creating a new senior leadership team of seven, including the governor, instead of the previous 13.

Robbers, at present with the Financial Markets Authority, will take up the new role of assistant governor and general manager of governance, strategy and corporate relations on February 18. She will be responsible for the bank's strategic planning and performance, communications, legal, risk and audit teams, and the board secretariat.

The strategic planning and performance unit is new and will be responsible for ensuring world-class benchmarks are identified, measured and managed across all the bank's activities.

"The role will ensure bank-wide strategies and relationship management have central co-ordination, such as our Te Ao Māori strategy, our climate change strategy, and the many regional and international relationships we must manage in the normal course of business," said Orr.

Robbers was the FMA's director of strategy, risk and assurance and has also been at the Securities Commission.

Hawkesby is leaving Harbour Asset Management, which he helped to set up, to become assistant governor and general manager of economics, financial markets and banking on March 18.

He will be responsible for monetary policy formulation and research; monetary policy implementation and liquidity management, and foreign reserves management; and all matters relating to currency creation and distribution, including responsibility for the management of the payment and settlement system.

"Bringing these activities together provides end-to-end management of all of the monetary policy activities ... from currency creation and distribution through to the setting of the official cash rate."

Hawkesby was also at the Bank of England for nine years.

The new structure saw the departure of Sean Mills, head of operations, Mark Perry, head of financial markets, and Klarissa Plimmer, chief information officer.

John McDermott accepted a role as chief economist and a department head, but has since left to join the economic research institute Motu as an executive director.

Bernard Hodgetts, head of macro-financial, was to leave when his secondment to Treasury for its Reserve Bank review ended.