Fresh talent will join the Reserve Bank (RBNZ) at the executive leadership level of the organisation.
It has appointed three Assistant Governors - Sarah Owen, Kate Kolich and Greg Smith.
Owen and Kolich are new to the Bank, while Smith has been there since July.
All three appointments have experience working in corporate roles in New Zealand.
Owen worked with RBNZ Governor Adrian Orr when he headed up the New Zealand Superannuation Fund.
The appointments follow a restructure, which has seen the leadership team expand from six to eight, and reporting lines and roles beneath this level change.
The restructure has courted public and political attention, as it has seen staff, with decades of experience at the Bank between them, leave. Since June, 10 of the RBNZ's 26 Tier 2 and 3 staff members have either left, or committed to leaving.
Two roles in the new eight-person leadership team are yet to be filled.
The new appointments are:
Greg Smith - General Manager of Finance and Commercial Operations
Smith is a chartered accountant, who joined the RBNZ in July 2021 and is currently Acting Head of Risk.
In his new role he will be responsible for leading the Bank’s Finance and Commercial Operations Group. He will also oversee the framework for commercial procurement, the deposit insurance scheme, asset management, and the bank’s property and facilities strategy.
Smith was formerly Chief Financial Officer and Company Secretary of Steel & Tube Holdings Limited and CFO at Wellington Electricity. He also held a senior role at Opus International Consultants, after starting his career at KPMG.
Smith will replace the RBNZ’s current CFO, Mike Wolyncewicz, who leaves in May.
Sarah Owen - General Manager Risk, Compliance and Legal Services
Owen will join the RBNZ in March from the NZ Super Fund, where she's been since 2007 - most recently as General Manager Corporate Strategy and General Counsel.
At the RBNZ she will be responsible for overseeing the risk, compliance, and legal services functions of the Bank.
Prior to joining the Super Fund, Owen had a senior legal role at Westpac/BT Funds Management. Owen has also worked as a Senior Associate at law firms Minter Ellison and DLA Phillips Fox, and at the Commerce Commission.
Owen was a Director of Datacom Group between 2018 and 2021 and is a Director of the International Centre for Pension Management.
Kate Kolich - General Manager Information, Data, and Analytics
Kolich join will the RBNZ in February from the Energy Efficiency and Conservation Authority, where she led the Evidence, Insights and Innovation team.
In her new role, she will be responsible for setting the RBNZ’s information and data strategy, policy, developing processes for the collection, storage, manipulation, and dissemination of data.
She was formerly the Director of Data Systems and Analytics at the Social Wellbeing Agency.
Kolich also held a number of data leadership roles at BNZ, including Head of Enterprise Data and Information Services.
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Smith was formerly Chief Financial Officer and Company Secretary of Steel & Tube Holdings Limited and CFO at Wellington Electricity. He also held a senior role at Opus International Consultants, after starting his career at KPMG.
Wellington Electricity - We need to talk about that red carpet rollout
You'd laugh if it wasn't so infuriatingly tragic. Tax? Who pays it! Oh, that's right - you and me.
On a cash basis, it appears that the business paid no actual tax at all....presumably (it) pays tax in its local jurisdiction, right? Er, no. Wellington Network is owned by an entity in the Bahamas, where, like BVI, the tax system is a warm bath for companies to float in the dark and listen to the sound of money - no company tax, no withholding tax, no capital gains tax, nothing.
As I've noted before, the smartest of the smart don't work for a Central Bank. Maybe Adrian has decided to fight fire with fire? We'll see.
A few years ago, 10 or so, Wellington Electricity was owned by an Ozzie network which in turn was wholly owned by a Hong Kong Infrastructure (maybe electricity only) company. Something must have happened in the interim for them to be directly owned by some company registered in the Bahamas.
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