As more Kiwis emigrate to Australia in search of opportunity, those who have achieved success stand out at the top.
More and more Kiwis are making the move to Australia in search of better opportunities and higher pay.
StatsNZ’s most recent data shows that there was a net migration loss of 30,000 people to Australia in the year ended March 2024, and with the state of New Zealand’s economy, this number is set to remain high.
For the lucky few, the move can lead to successful careers in charge of influential businesses.
Although considering the differences economically and culturally between Australia and New Zealand, rising to the top of the corporate ladder may be more difficult than it seems.
The Herald highlights some of New Zealand’s most successful expats to Australia and the path they took to the top.
Cam Wallace has had a storied career, with almost two decades spent at Air New Zealand rising to revenue boss when the airline earned $6 billion a year. The pandemic hit, the executive at the airline was transformed and he then had a brief stint at Mediaworks. He now runs the international and freight arm of an Australian institution, Qantas.
Wallace, who grew up in Tawa, a small suburb 15km north of Wellington, believes it’s deceptive to look at Australia and its businesses and say they are similar.
“I actually think they’re quite deeply different, different, probably because it’s, it’s culturally a different market,” Wallace said.
He said that some Kiwis look at the Australian market as larger and with more opportunities, therefore meaning more chances for success, but really it means more competition.
“The way that I compare it is in New Zealand, it’s small and it’s a village and it’s a very relation based business environment and that’s because you’re bumping into people all the time.
“I think one of the consequences of that is there’s probably less focus or less challenge. Whereas in Australia, you might go and see someone from the West or from Queensland and never expect to see them again.”
Wallace also emphasised how the separation between state and territory governments in Australia causes a cultural divide.
“New Zealand is a very, consolidated market ... it’s [Australia] quite different in terms of the regional challenges that exist in those states,” Wallace said.
Wallace joined Air New Zealand in 2001 and held a number of senior positions in the airline including group general manager New Zealand, and Pacific Islands and general manager Australia.
He was also the airline’s chief customer and commercial officer between 2016 and 2020.
Wallace completed business management programmes at the Darden School of Business, Kellogg School of Management - Northwestern University Chicago, and the London Business School. Most recently he studied at INSEAD, France, where he completed the advanced management programme.
Following his time at Mediaworks, he served as the chairman of the Radio Broadcasters Association from late 2020 to 2023.
For Wallace, he thinks the Australian connections he made early on in his career gave him a sense of the operating rhythm across the Tasman.
“I think there are ways of working, which are quite deeply different and you got to kind of understand quite quickly how to amend your ways of working,” Wallace added.
Ian Narev is the youngest of three children born and raised in Auckland. Born in a Jewish family, his parents, Freda and Robert, are Jewish Holocaust survivors who met in New Zealand after World War II.
Narev graduated from Auckland Grammar School in 1984 and went on to claim a senior law prize from Auckland University - a scholarship to continue his studies at Cambridge.
He graduated as the top LLM student in 1994 and went on to gain a second Master’s degree at New York University in 1998.
In the same year, Narev joined high-powered management consultants McKinsey and began working with some of the United States' largest financial institutions.
He shifted to the firm’s Sydney and Auckland offices in 2002 before becoming the head of McKinsey’s New Zealand operations in 2005.
Currently, Narev is the chief executive and managing director of job search platform Seek and has been in the role since 2021.
However, he is most well known for his tenure at ASB parent Commonwealth Bank Australia as its chief executive between 2011 and 2018.
His tenure was marred by breaches of anti-money laundering laws, resulting in a record A$700 million fine.
Narev was forced to apologise to shareholders and shouldered the blame, eventually stepping down from the role.
Jane Hastings has more than 25 years of diverse experience within the travel, finance, retail, media and entertainment industries.
Hastings grew up in a family of four in Papatoetoe. She studied at Papatoetoe High School before studying a Bachelor of Commerce at the University of Auckland with a double major in marketing and Japanese.
She began her management career working for Air New Zealand in senior marketing and product roles.
Hastings was general manager of group sales, marketing and international business at SkyCity Entertainment Group and also spent over eight years in executive roles in Asia, including managing director at Tequila Asia - the leading integrated marketing agency.
Hastings is most well known for her tenure as chief executive of The Radio Network, in which she merged the business with two others - APN News and Media, and GrabOne, into media company New Zealand Media and Entertainment (NZME).
She is currently the chief executive of Entertainment, Ventures and Travel (EVT) and has been in the role since July 2017.
EVT is an ASX-listed top 200 company with over A$1 billion annual turnover, a $2b-plus market cap and a team of over 9000 people across Australia, Germany, and New Zealand.
Alongside her role at EVT, Hastings is currently serving as chairwoman of the Global Cinema Federation and was previously a New Zealand Film Commission board member.
She is also a director of Les Mills International and Cinema Association Australasia.
Shayne Elliott is the former chief executive of ANZ Bank, one of the “big four” in New Zealand and across the ditch.
Elliott is the son of a builder and grew up in Te Atatū South in West Auckland.
He was a student at Waitākere College, before earning a Bachelor of Commerce, management studies and finance from the University of Auckland’s Business School.
Elliott joined ANZ as chief executive institutional in June 2009 and in 2012 was appointed chief financial officer, before ascending to the role of chief executive in 2016.
Elliott has more than 30 years of experience in international banking including in Australia, New Zealand, the US, UK, Asia Pacific and the Middle East.
Prior to ANZ, Elliott held senior executive roles at EFG Hermes primarily as chief operating officer covering technology, risk, marketing, operations and HR.
He was previously with Citigroup for 20 years where he held various senior positions across geographies and business sectors including chief executive of global transaction services Asia Pacific, country head for Australia/New Zealand and country head for Egypt.
Elliott is a director of the Financial Markets Foundation for Children and the Sydney Marae Alliance and a member of the Business Council of Australia, the Australian Banking Association and the Customs Advisory Board. Elliot is due to step down from the ANZ CEO role mid-way through this year after resigning in late 2024.
Former Goldman Sachs NZ deal maker Clark Perkins now heads Mercury Capital – one of Australia’s most savvy mid-market private equity firms.
Mercury has other heavy hitters on its board including Sky TV co-founder Craig Heatley and New Zealand-American businessman Tom Sturgess.
Perkins, who is notoriously media-shy, has built a strong reputation among the investment community with Mercury regarded for its canny investments and quiet exits resulting in high-multiple returns.
The 2021 sale of a stake in Kiwi office products supplier NXP, which housed Staples’ NZ operations, was one example with Mercury reportedly exiting at 10 times its investment - made in tandem with Tom Sturgess’ Tiri Group. However, that was small fry compared to some of the bigger deals Mercury has done in Australia.
Mercury specialises in buying into distressed assets with a rapid turn-around strategy. The firm has four separate funds with about A$2b in committed capital.
Its New Zealand investments include Are Media, which owns brands such as the Australian Women’s Weekly, Woman’s Day, New Idea and the New Zealand Listener.
Mercury also has an 89% stake in Tamaki Health, the largest primary care operator in New Zealand with 950 employees and contractors, including around 350 doctors.
In January 2024 Mercury’s MCF 1 fund sold out of Blue Star, which was also a joint investment with Tiri Group made back in 2013.
In New Zealand, Perkins studied at the University of Auckland, achieving a Bachelor of Commerce.
He lives in a $30m mansion on the Vaucluse waterfront, one of Sydney’s most affluent suburbs.
Michael Chisholm, who joined the finance industry in 1992, is the head of Crestone.
Chisholm attended the University of Wellington and achieved a Bachelor’s degree in commerce and administration, before later joining the Chartered Accountants of Australia and New Zealand.
In an amusing coincidence, growing up Chisholm attended the same school as Qantas’ Cam Wallace.
Crestone provides private wealth management services to high-net-worth and ultra-high-net-worth families, family offices and for-purpose organisations.
LGT, one of the largest wealth management firms worldwide owns Crestone. LGT itself is owned by the Liechtenstein royal family.
Chisholm told the AFR in November 2024 that the firm has about A$6.5b of clients’ money in private equity and other alternative assets (venture capital, hedge funds, unlisted infrastructure).
That figure has grown from about A$150m when it was spun out of UBS in 2016, where Chisholm previously worked.
In his 19 years with UBS, Michael held a series of key positions in London, Sydney, Stamford and New York -encompassing finance, chief risk officer, chief operating officer, and most recently, managing director and head of UBS Wealth Management.
Tom Raynel is a multimedia business journalist for the Herald, covering small business and retail.
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