November 28, 2023 • 25 mins
Hayley Gourley joins us on the Black Heels and Tractor Wheels Podcast this week!
Hayley hails from a dairy farm on the West Coast, and has had roles in Skellerup, Pāmu, Rabobank and Environment Canterbury to name a few.
Hayley has spent her career in the food and agribusiness sector, and is extremely passionate about all things Agri.
Hayley talks to us about selling yourself, acknowledging your weaknesses, being calm under pressure, and the changing face of the sector.
#blackheelsandtractorwheels #podcast #ruralwomennz
Thank you so much for joining us Hayley!
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to season six. So the Black Heels and tractoriis
podcasts brought to you by us in Real Women, New Zealand.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
This season, on the podcast, we are interviewing the ogs,
the badass ladies of the agricultural world, the ones who,
in my case, you might see at a conference get
all nervous and flustered, might embarrass yourself in front of them,
because that's that amazing.
Speaker 1 (00:26):
The theme of this season is the big stuff, the
juicy topics, like how they got into leadership positions, what
it means to be a CEO, how you add value
around a board table, and has the agricultural industry actually
changed does it even like females? All these things and
more this season and these ladies do not hold back.
Speaker 2 (00:45):
Look, we would love to hear from you, and even more,
we would love for you to sign up as a
member of Rural Women New Zealand. So check us out
on my socials, give us a Google hit, the join
better and help us make more of a difference for
rural women across New Zealand.
Speaker 3 (01:01):
The I Guess the first of the stot.
Speaker 2 (01:03):
The founding question here is what should we know about
you that has made you or shaped who you are today.
Speaker 3 (01:10):
What's a bit of your background.
Speaker 4 (01:12):
The biggest thing that's shaped me as being a West Coaster.
I'm proud of being a West Coaster, and although I
haven't lived there for more decades than I care to remember,
it's still actually what I think is the foundation of
who I am because it's shaped my affinity with agriculture.
Speaker 5 (01:32):
It shaped the way that.
Speaker 4 (01:34):
I think about things in terms of I think being relatable,
and it's just that grounding I mean to me, I
come from the West Coast.
Speaker 5 (01:43):
I'm proud of it.
Speaker 4 (01:44):
But it does mean you never forget you know where
you come from, that small town syndrome piece, and that
doesn't matter whether you're in a big city or you
have what's perceived as being a big job or whatever.
Actually I'm a dairy farmer's daughter from the West Coast.
Speaker 3 (01:59):
That's it.
Speaker 2 (02:00):
That's such a great point that you make around the grounding,
and I guess having that affinity with others from all
walks and shapes of life that comes in really handy obviously,
and in terms of so your career highlights, if you
just want to give us a quick snapshot really of
where you started, so we grew up on the West coast.
Speaker 3 (02:21):
First job right through to where you are today.
Speaker 4 (02:24):
Sure, I'll make it a potted history. First job was
an accidental banker. I was a bank teller, and that
was I really needed a job because otherwise I was
going to have to go back home and work on
the farm, and unemployment was really high when I left school,
and university fees had just been introduced, and I actually
wanted to be an Air Force pilot, and that particular
(02:46):
year the government shutdown pilot training as well.
Speaker 5 (02:49):
So I couldn't join the Air Force and be a pilot.
Speaker 4 (02:51):
So I needed to get a job, and I needed
to get one quickly, and I thought banking sounds really good.
They gave you a uniform, it was a nice clean job,
so it was better than milking cows.
Speaker 5 (03:01):
And that was where I ended up.
Speaker 4 (03:04):
Which was actually great because I learned all sorts of
things about how people manage their finances or don't manage
their finances, you know, some of those basics in life
that I just learned through banking, which was great. Also
obviously dealing with people in the general public, and so
from that point of view, it was a really.
Speaker 5 (03:23):
Good introduction to the workforce. Until we got robbed.
Speaker 4 (03:27):
That really then changed my view of banking and I
decided that actually being so public facing wasn't such a
good idea and moved more into management roles and more
analytical roles, and in particular that was where I first
started dealing with farmers from a banking perspective, which was
(03:47):
just wonderful.
Speaker 5 (03:48):
It blended a whole lot of things that I enjoyed about.
Speaker 4 (03:50):
Working tired in really well with obviously my how had
grown up and the people that I'd associated with there.
Speaker 5 (03:58):
So I've worked my.
Speaker 4 (03:58):
Way through a number of you know, banking roles, found
out what I enjoyed, and really found out that I
liked working with the primary industries in particular, and then,
like most people, eventually, although a little bit later than most,
decided I wanted to go overseas. So heading overseas was
really out into the big wide world and was really fortunate.
(04:19):
Never thought that this would happen. That ended up working
for an agricultural bank in the middle of London, which
was with Rubbobank, and that was like everything just sort
of happened then. That was great and a fortunate series
of events that exposed me to post farm gate business,
commodity trading in particular, international finance, a lot of you know,
(04:42):
a lot of things that frowned upon a little bit
in the banking world today that's sort of gone out
of the vernacular, things like structured finance and leveraged finance
and all these transactions that are not not really done
these days anymore.
Speaker 5 (04:56):
So that was really good.
Speaker 4 (04:57):
But it was from there that I realized the analytical
side was really what I enjoyed, as well as the
people aspect and the opportunity to come back to New
Zealand sort of in a.
Speaker 5 (05:06):
Similar role to what you have now, Emma.
Speaker 4 (05:09):
That's evolved a lot in the last fifteen years or so,
almost twenty years, but that was really my happy place
in terms of enabled me to have a lot of flexibility,
a lot of autonomy, engaging from one end of the
value chain to the other, while also having my children.
So that was ten years that a career advisor would say,
(05:33):
don't do ten years in the same job. I didn't
think it was the same job because it wasn't. It
evolved so much over that period of time and grew
so much that it wasn't the same role. But I
didn't want to give up something I enjoyed doing so
much just for any role and the opportunity to then
move into the commercial side of the business, and as
general manager of Country Banking was blending all of those
(05:55):
things and more. But wait, there's more. You know, managing
a profit and loss and managing the commercial side of
the business and leading the commercial side of the business
was great, but you reach an agent stage of Korea
where you get pigeonholed potentially as a banker for life,
and I realized that that was a very real danger
(06:16):
for me. So branching out, you know, from banking, and
never would have thought I'd end up in manufacturing, but
again blended a number of things that I was looking
for in terms of the role I now have at
Scaler Up, where I can run an international business from
a New Zealand home base of manufacturing and some key
(06:36):
brands here in New Zealand as a great blend of
a whole lot of things and being a very steep
learning curve for me, but one that I've enjoyed a lot.
Speaker 1 (06:46):
I'm really interested if you don't mind sharing a little
bit with us about these kind of the things that
you've been able to take forward into your new role
at scaler up and how they compare what's different to
what you were doing in your role as country manager
at rather Bank, Because you're right in that it's kind
of a similar industry but you're actually doing similar things.
(07:08):
I'm interested in those transferrable skills and kind of what
you need to be successful in that new role.
Speaker 4 (07:16):
Yeah, communication and relating to people as fundamental, and from
that point of view, understanding those differences is key. I
mean bankers and particularly the relationship bankers at Rabobank has
different ways of working and different needs from for example,
(07:40):
people who work in the factory here making very good
products you know, every day, but actually they still need
to understand why they're doing it, why it's important, you know,
what can be improved upon. Those things are all common
and similar, So it's just that relatability and communication. And
I'd say the other key critical thing from my perspective
between the two roles has been that understanding of the
(08:02):
agricultural value chain, particularly right back to the farmer and
actually how farmers make decisions by business people, but they
do have a different set of considerations when they're making
decisions whether animals people, you know, the list is very
long for farmers, but how they make decisions is really
(08:23):
critical to the businesses who are trying to service them.
Speaker 3 (08:26):
What do you think would be your one pivotal moment
across your career that has led you to the biggest opportunity.
Speaker 4 (08:33):
There's probably be a few pivotal moments, but I don't
know that one particularly stands out more than the others.
Because I'm an opportunist, there's no grand plan. So the
first one I mentioned was when I was working in
a retail branch that got robbed, because you know, that
(08:53):
made me decide, actually, I don't want to be across
a counter from the general public, and that led me
to go down on the sort of analytical and the
relationship management route with farmers and agricultural businesses. So I'd
say that was pivotal deciding to come back to New
Zealand into a newly created role that probably certainly provided
(09:14):
the greatest opportunity because it was a blank canvas and
I could shape that within reason how I wanted to
shape it, so in terms of the biggest opportunity. But
then the bank giving me the opportunity to move into
people leadership in such a big way was a risk
for them, but moving into the commercial side of the
(09:37):
business was certainly one that provided the biggest step probably
in my career.
Speaker 1 (09:42):
Yeah hmm, that's really interesting. It's funny how some of
those seemingly small moments could actually really change the face
of a career or where you decide to go. Find
that really interesting. Pivoting slightly. I understand that you've had
several governance based roles, so one of them PAMU Landcorp.
(10:03):
In the past, and I'm really interested in this pathway
into governance because obviously people refer back to commercial experience,
they look at pros and cons of different people, but
also we know that women are still a little bit
underrepresented in some of those bigger governance roles, and I'm
(10:23):
really interested in your journey in terms of how you
got into those positions and just a little bit of the.
Speaker 3 (10:33):
Yeah, just a bit of the journey really.
Speaker 4 (10:35):
So initially, I first became involved with the catchment groups,
the zone committees within Canterbury from a land and water
use perspective, and that was as a community representative, which
was in an area that I lived in that was
of interest and felt that it would give me a
(10:55):
different perspective than the purely commercial.
Speaker 5 (11:00):
Career i'd had up until that point, and it certainly did.
Speaker 4 (11:03):
It opened my eyes to particularly local government, regional government,
the various hard working people that are part of those
types of organizations that are often if they remunerated at all,
that's typically you know, they don't they don't do it
necessarily for the accolades and remuneration that comes. So that
(11:25):
gave me a bit of a taste for it. But
I also then found that from a career development point
of view, I was thinking about what would I do next,
and that was before I took on the general management role,
and that was when I started looking at different boards
and where I thought I could add value and certainly
the opportunity was PARMU and land Cork came came up,
(11:47):
and that that was something that other people and part
of my networks had said to me. You know, everyone's
got an opinion on PARMO, and that's partly what makes
the organization so great, but it's also what makes it
very challenging, because it's very easy to have an opinion
from the outside looking in. But that was what encouraged
(12:08):
me to first to have a look and consider could
I add.
Speaker 5 (12:10):
Value to that board, and it was. It is a
great organization.
Speaker 4 (12:16):
I enjoyed it a lot and had the opportunity, but
it's not it's not typical because the Crown appointments process
and the process of being appointed is very different to
an elected position, for example, either publicly listed or through cooperatives,
and and very different to the appointed process for independent
directors onto boards. So from that point of view, I
(12:40):
guess learning the distinction between those and actually the pros
and cons of each, but also therefore the requirements to
be in a position to be part of those boards
are all differences that need to be taken into accounts.
So that's probably one of the biggest things I've learned
through that experience.
Speaker 1 (13:00):
Yeah, I'm also interested in this idea of establishing a
value proposition when you're looking at a governance journey and
building skills and becoming attractive I suppose to.
Speaker 3 (13:14):
Being able to be appointed on a board.
Speaker 1 (13:16):
And I'm just wondering if you have any way in
which you elevator pats yourself or how do you go
you know what, this is my value, this is going
to add and you know, get me on here.
Speaker 5 (13:32):
Yeah, I wouldn't say I'm very good at that.
Speaker 4 (13:35):
I think what happens as you gain experience and particularly
in different roles, is I think you develop clarity around
it is where you add value, but it's also what
what trade off you're willing to make as well. And
I think there's also an element of particularly people who've
(13:56):
come and I put I'm putting from my own perspective,
people who've come through management careers and particularly into executive careers,
you do end up becoming somewhat of a generalist in
some respects depending on the roles, but particularly in general management,
and therefore actually realizing that from a governance perspective, being
(14:19):
a generalist may not be that helpful because you want
the board to actually provide everyone wants.
Speaker 5 (14:25):
Everyone needs to be able to provide a different perspective
and an area of speciality or several areas of specialty.
So actually not.
Speaker 4 (14:32):
Being afraid to hone in and say, well, yes, I'm
a specialist in that, but actually I have very limited
knowledge of this is actually not a weakness, depending on
the skill set that that particular organization might be looking for.
And I think it takes a while to sort of
get to that point of realizing you don't have to
wear all the hats yourself.
Speaker 3 (14:53):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (14:53):
True, And that's quite a mindset shift, doesn't it, particularly
when you're called upon to do that in your day
to day role.
Speaker 3 (15:01):
Thinking and switching gears slightly.
Speaker 2 (15:05):
One of the things I've most admired about you being
one of the leading women that has shaped or how
to shape my career is the fact that you have
been working in a very male dominated environment and quite
often you've been the only female at that top level.
(15:27):
And whatever shape or form that might look like, how
have you how have you dealt with this in terms
of some of the challenging aspects and what advice would
you give to someone who is just starting out and
might find themselves in that position.
Speaker 4 (15:42):
Yeah, you're making me feel old now, Ema, But I
don't know when it changed, and it's changed quite significantly.
And I think one of the mindsets I adopted early
on was actually it helped to stand out because people
remembered who I was. Oh yeah, there was a blonde
(16:03):
woman there, and it's like, okay, so maybe I can
help this to my advantage because at least people remember
that I was at some conference or that I was somewhere,
but that was after quite a period of actually just
blending in because you had to sort of fit in
with the men effectively, and there were so few women
(16:26):
and that's changed significantly, which is fantastic. So now I
look at it and think, well, actually, there are now
so many great women in the industry, and that's fantastic
to see.
Speaker 5 (16:39):
And I then think, well, how would I try and
make my presence felt.
Speaker 4 (16:43):
Now if I was a young woman coming into agribusiness.
And in some respects it's the network's wider, so that's great,
But then the ability to stand out is probably more challenging,
or to actually find the right connection for whatever it
is you know someone is trying to achieve. And from
(17:04):
that point of view, I think there is still that
ongoing challenge for all of us, doesn't matter whether it's
me or woman, is trying to figure out how do
you add value and where can you add value and
how do you make those connections? And that really comes
down to the networks. And therefore I think ensuring that
the networks are broad based is still really important because
(17:26):
I think there could be a danger of just focusing
in one area and you still find you missing out
on this whole other piece over here.
Speaker 5 (17:32):
That's actually where the action is. So finding a way
to blend.
Speaker 4 (17:36):
Those networks is really the challenge. I think now if
I was, you know, if it was twenty or thirty
years ago, and trying to figure out how to do that,
achieving the blend would be what I would recommend to people.
Speaker 1 (17:48):
Yeah, I think that makes a lot of sense, especially
I think as people are moving around a lot more
in their career as well, and potentially they might be
only in one role for a couple of years and
in there looking for the next opportunities. So I think
that makes a.
Speaker 3 (18:03):
Lot of sense.
Speaker 1 (18:05):
I'm interested in how you deal with challenge, so not
just in the environment we've been speaking about with being
in a mile dominated space, but also in what do
you do when stuff goes wrong? What techniques do you have?
Your LinkedIn profile, I loved you said I'm known for
(18:25):
remaining car under pressure, and I thought, yeah, that's good.
I want to hear about what techniques you've got to
do that.
Speaker 4 (18:33):
I don't know that it's a technique, but it I
tend to actually not exactly slow down, but become very
deliberate and very focused and I've only known that through
being in those situations and then people either reflecting that
back to me, and I've been fortunate enough some people
(18:55):
have done that very directly to me, so that I
know now that it is actually what happens, and so
I've become better at recognizing that that's what I do,
become very deliberate, very focused on particularly the important things,
because it's usually when you're in that crisis situation that
(19:16):
you know, you can just end up sort of spinning
out at the share volume and breadth of things that
are coming flying at you, and being able to shut
out the ones that actually aren't going to matter, or
that are actually not as important as some other people
might think they are. It is actually really critical in
those times. So I know that that is a behavior
(19:39):
that somehow is how I operate. But I wouldn't say
it's a technique. But it be difficult to do that
because it's in some cases it's almost a singular focus.
Speaker 5 (19:54):
But you can only do that for a limited period
of time.
Speaker 4 (19:56):
So then recognizing when you actually need to switch from that,
you know, come back up for a start looking at
the bigger picture again is the other key element of
being able to shift that and in some case, particularly
through the early onsets of COVID, in some cases that
all happened with bast of a couple of hours and
(20:17):
then the next thing that needed dealing with. So I
think it taught us all how to do that a
bit better.
Speaker 3 (20:24):
God, that was a hectic time, wasn't it. Now we
think about COVID, and certainly.
Speaker 2 (20:30):
Your ability to deal with some of those more challenging
moments is stuck in my mind, having had the pleasure
of working with you as well, and it's given me
something to aspire to when you know, everything's happening at once,
like today when we're talking and the GDT has dropped
quite significantly, and I've just got a message here saying
that news how I want to do an interview.
Speaker 3 (20:50):
So I'm channeling my inner Haley right now in terms
of I guess the way forward for agriculture.
Speaker 2 (20:59):
I've always valued and admire your opinions and where you
think things are going. And I guess the reflection just
a reflection on how agriculture broadly has shifted in the
time that you've been working in this space. But where
do you think we're going as a broad industry?
Speaker 4 (21:21):
I think from a particularly from a New Zealand perspective,
the foundations to me actually haven't changed a lot.
Speaker 5 (21:28):
What tends to distract.
Speaker 4 (21:30):
Us as an industry, particularly in New Zealand are the
trends that come and go and trying to figure out
which ones are those are lasting, which ones do we
actually need to take seriously, and which ones do we
just need to manage through. I think that's been particularly
challenging because the speed of information is just incredible. The
amount of information coming at people just gets more and
(21:53):
more and more all the time. So therefore, trying to
see through all that to actually make good decisions if
anything's become harder, and it shouldn't. It should have become
easier because we've got better information and more of it,
but it just clouds the judgment and sometimes distilling it
down to those. To me, those basic fundamentals that I
(22:13):
still think provide us a great foundation for the future
is what we need to remember. And the thing that
sticks out of my mind recently, because I'm you know,
I've been out of that analytical space now for quite
a long time, is to see what's happened around you know,
alternative proteins for example, and and and the fact that
(22:33):
you know, they they were going to be the future,
and it was going to be the ruin of farming.
It was, you know, they were going to take all
this market share, and maybe they still will, and they've
certainly taken some market share that actually many of those
alternatives are now struggling to find the space as people
have reverted back to basics. You know, nutrition and the
(22:56):
wholesomeness of naturally produced products is still actually what people want.
So it's just one example of you know, things that
come and go a little bit. We should still take
good notice and think long and hard about the implications
for those things, but shouldn't automatically assume that it spells
a negative outcome.
Speaker 1 (23:15):
That's very interesting. I think there's been a few times
in farming's history in this country an.
Speaker 3 (23:21):
Artist sunset industry.
Speaker 1 (23:22):
Now, and I don't think that that's really the case.
Probably is the last question from us, and without being
too direct or up front, but I'm just interested in
what might be next for you. So where are you
strip me as someone who's quite dedicated to learning and
growing and taking your opportunity, so I'm kind of interested
(23:46):
in what the next step and that space might look
like for you.
Speaker 4 (23:50):
So am I. I've never had the grand plan so
and I still don't so my aunt to their questions,
I don't know. And it is interesting because I think,
like many people and organizations, the more you learn, the
(24:11):
less you know. And all I see is that there's
still plenty of opportunity. I'm not worried about not being busy.
In fact, I'm more worried about the opposite, and still
haven't found.
Speaker 5 (24:21):
Enough time to ride my horse. So that's about all
I've got for you, I'm afraid.
Speaker 4 (24:27):
Yeah, I actually don't know, and I'm assuming that at
some point an opportunity will come along that I think,
you know, it looks really interesting, and whether that's in
conjunction with what I'm already doing or whether it's something different, Yeah,
it'll happen.
Speaker 3 (24:44):
Yeah. Nice.
Speaker 2 (24:45):
It's a nice reminder as well, like not everything has
to be really planned out or set. There are different
ways to achieving success, whatever that looks like. And for
some people, yeah, it can just be going with the
flow until the appropriate opportunity presents itself. So yeah, thank
you so much for your time, Hailey. I love chatting
with you, and as always, you haven't failed to deliver
(25:07):
some good gems. So really, thank you for your time
and looking forward to whatever that next opportunity might be
and where you might go to next, and thank you
for being such a trail blazing person within our industry
and yeah still being a bit of a mentor for
me as well.
Speaker 5 (25:26):
My pleasure. You're very generous. Thank you. Well, that was it.
Speaker 3 (25:30):
That's the podcast. That's us for today.
Speaker 1 (25:34):
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We would love to hear from you.
Speaker 3 (25:40):
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Speaker 2 (25:43):
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Speaker 3 (25:48):
Member of Real Women of New Zealand. We promise you
you'll have some fun.
Welcome to season six. So the Black Heels and tractoriis
podcasts brought to you by us in Real Women, New Zealand.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
This season, on the podcast, we are interviewing the ogs,
the badass ladies of the agricultural world, the ones who,
in my case, you might see at a conference get
all nervous and flustered, might embarrass yourself in front of them,
because that's that amazing.
Speaker 1 (00:26):
The theme of this season is the big stuff, the
juicy topics, like how they got into leadership positions, what
it means to be a CEO, how you add value
around a board table, and has the agricultural industry actually
changed does it even like females? All these things and
more this season and these ladies do not hold back.
Speaker 2 (00:45):
Look, we would love to hear from you, and even more,
we would love for you to sign up as a
member of Rural Women New Zealand. So check us out
on my socials, give us a Google hit, the join
better and help us make more of a difference for
rural women across New Zealand.
Speaker 3 (01:01):
The I Guess the first of the stot.
Speaker 2 (01:03):
The founding question here is what should we know about
you that has made you or shaped who you are today.
Speaker 3 (01:10):
What's a bit of your background.
Speaker 4 (01:12):
The biggest thing that's shaped me as being a West Coaster.
I'm proud of being a West Coaster, and although I
haven't lived there for more decades than I care to remember,
it's still actually what I think is the foundation of
who I am because it's shaped my affinity with agriculture.
Speaker 5 (01:32):
It shaped the way that.
Speaker 4 (01:34):
I think about things in terms of I think being relatable,
and it's just that grounding I mean to me, I
come from the West Coast.
Speaker 5 (01:43):
I'm proud of it.
Speaker 4 (01:44):
But it does mean you never forget you know where
you come from, that small town syndrome piece, and that
doesn't matter whether you're in a big city or you
have what's perceived as being a big job or whatever.
Actually I'm a dairy farmer's daughter from the West Coast.
Speaker 3 (01:59):
That's it.
Speaker 2 (02:00):
That's such a great point that you make around the grounding,
and I guess having that affinity with others from all
walks and shapes of life that comes in really handy obviously,
and in terms of so your career highlights, if you
just want to give us a quick snapshot really of
where you started, so we grew up on the West coast.
Speaker 3 (02:21):
First job right through to where you are today.
Speaker 4 (02:24):
Sure, I'll make it a potted history. First job was
an accidental banker. I was a bank teller, and that
was I really needed a job because otherwise I was
going to have to go back home and work on
the farm, and unemployment was really high when I left school,
and university fees had just been introduced, and I actually
wanted to be an Air Force pilot, and that particular
(02:46):
year the government shutdown pilot training as well.
Speaker 5 (02:49):
So I couldn't join the Air Force and be a pilot.
Speaker 4 (02:51):
So I needed to get a job, and I needed
to get one quickly, and I thought banking sounds really good.
They gave you a uniform, it was a nice clean job,
so it was better than milking cows.
Speaker 5 (03:01):
And that was where I ended up.
Speaker 4 (03:04):
Which was actually great because I learned all sorts of
things about how people manage their finances or don't manage
their finances, you know, some of those basics in life
that I just learned through banking, which was great. Also
obviously dealing with people in the general public, and so
from that point of view, it was a really.
Speaker 5 (03:23):
Good introduction to the workforce. Until we got robbed.
Speaker 4 (03:27):
That really then changed my view of banking and I
decided that actually being so public facing wasn't such a
good idea and moved more into management roles and more
analytical roles, and in particular that was where I first
started dealing with farmers from a banking perspective, which was
(03:47):
just wonderful.
Speaker 5 (03:48):
It blended a whole lot of things that I enjoyed about.
Speaker 4 (03:50):
Working tired in really well with obviously my how had
grown up and the people that I'd associated with there.
Speaker 5 (03:58):
So I've worked my.
Speaker 4 (03:58):
Way through a number of you know, banking roles, found
out what I enjoyed, and really found out that I
liked working with the primary industries in particular, and then,
like most people, eventually, although a little bit later than most,
decided I wanted to go overseas. So heading overseas was
really out into the big wide world and was really fortunate.
(04:19):
Never thought that this would happen. That ended up working
for an agricultural bank in the middle of London, which
was with Rubbobank, and that was like everything just sort
of happened then. That was great and a fortunate series
of events that exposed me to post farm gate business,
commodity trading in particular, international finance, a lot of you know,
(04:42):
a lot of things that frowned upon a little bit
in the banking world today that's sort of gone out
of the vernacular, things like structured finance and leveraged finance
and all these transactions that are not not really done
these days anymore.
Speaker 5 (04:56):
So that was really good.
Speaker 4 (04:57):
But it was from there that I realized the analytical
side was really what I enjoyed, as well as the
people aspect and the opportunity to come back to New
Zealand sort of in a.
Speaker 5 (05:06):
Similar role to what you have now, Emma.
Speaker 4 (05:09):
That's evolved a lot in the last fifteen years or so,
almost twenty years, but that was really my happy place
in terms of enabled me to have a lot of flexibility,
a lot of autonomy, engaging from one end of the
value chain to the other, while also having my children.
So that was ten years that a career advisor would say,
(05:33):
don't do ten years in the same job. I didn't
think it was the same job because it wasn't. It
evolved so much over that period of time and grew
so much that it wasn't the same role. But I
didn't want to give up something I enjoyed doing so
much just for any role and the opportunity to then
move into the commercial side of the business, and as
general manager of Country Banking was blending all of those
(05:55):
things and more. But wait, there's more. You know, managing
a profit and loss and managing the commercial side of
the business and leading the commercial side of the business
was great, but you reach an agent stage of Korea
where you get pigeonholed potentially as a banker for life,
and I realized that that was a very real danger
(06:16):
for me. So branching out, you know, from banking, and
never would have thought I'd end up in manufacturing, but
again blended a number of things that I was looking
for in terms of the role I now have at
Scaler Up, where I can run an international business from
a New Zealand home base of manufacturing and some key
(06:36):
brands here in New Zealand as a great blend of
a whole lot of things and being a very steep
learning curve for me, but one that I've enjoyed a lot.
Speaker 1 (06:46):
I'm really interested if you don't mind sharing a little
bit with us about these kind of the things that
you've been able to take forward into your new role
at scaler up and how they compare what's different to
what you were doing in your role as country manager
at rather Bank, Because you're right in that it's kind
of a similar industry but you're actually doing similar things.
(07:08):
I'm interested in those transferrable skills and kind of what
you need to be successful in that new role.
Speaker 4 (07:16):
Yeah, communication and relating to people as fundamental, and from
that point of view, understanding those differences is key. I
mean bankers and particularly the relationship bankers at Rabobank has
different ways of working and different needs from for example,
(07:40):
people who work in the factory here making very good
products you know, every day, but actually they still need
to understand why they're doing it, why it's important, you know,
what can be improved upon. Those things are all common
and similar, So it's just that relatability and communication. And
I'd say the other key critical thing from my perspective
between the two roles has been that understanding of the
(08:02):
agricultural value chain, particularly right back to the farmer and
actually how farmers make decisions by business people, but they
do have a different set of considerations when they're making
decisions whether animals people, you know, the list is very
long for farmers, but how they make decisions is really
(08:23):
critical to the businesses who are trying to service them.
Speaker 3 (08:26):
What do you think would be your one pivotal moment
across your career that has led you to the biggest opportunity.
Speaker 4 (08:33):
There's probably be a few pivotal moments, but I don't
know that one particularly stands out more than the others.
Because I'm an opportunist, there's no grand plan. So the
first one I mentioned was when I was working in
a retail branch that got robbed, because you know, that
(08:53):
made me decide, actually, I don't want to be across
a counter from the general public, and that led me
to go down on the sort of analytical and the
relationship management route with farmers and agricultural businesses. So I'd
say that was pivotal deciding to come back to New
Zealand into a newly created role that probably certainly provided
(09:14):
the greatest opportunity because it was a blank canvas and
I could shape that within reason how I wanted to
shape it, so in terms of the biggest opportunity. But
then the bank giving me the opportunity to move into
people leadership in such a big way was a risk
for them, but moving into the commercial side of the
(09:37):
business was certainly one that provided the biggest step probably
in my career.
Speaker 1 (09:42):
Yeah hmm, that's really interesting. It's funny how some of
those seemingly small moments could actually really change the face
of a career or where you decide to go. Find
that really interesting. Pivoting slightly. I understand that you've had
several governance based roles, so one of them PAMU Landcorp.
(10:03):
In the past, and I'm really interested in this pathway
into governance because obviously people refer back to commercial experience,
they look at pros and cons of different people, but
also we know that women are still a little bit
underrepresented in some of those bigger governance roles, and I'm
(10:23):
really interested in your journey in terms of how you
got into those positions and just a little bit of the.
Speaker 3 (10:33):
Yeah, just a bit of the journey really.
Speaker 4 (10:35):
So initially, I first became involved with the catchment groups,
the zone committees within Canterbury from a land and water
use perspective, and that was as a community representative, which
was in an area that I lived in that was
of interest and felt that it would give me a
(10:55):
different perspective than the purely commercial.
Speaker 5 (11:00):
Career i'd had up until that point, and it certainly did.
Speaker 4 (11:03):
It opened my eyes to particularly local government, regional government,
the various hard working people that are part of those
types of organizations that are often if they remunerated at all,
that's typically you know, they don't they don't do it
necessarily for the accolades and remuneration that comes. So that
(11:25):
gave me a bit of a taste for it. But
I also then found that from a career development point
of view, I was thinking about what would I do next,
and that was before I took on the general management role,
and that was when I started looking at different boards
and where I thought I could add value and certainly
the opportunity was PARMU and land Cork came came up,
(11:47):
and that that was something that other people and part
of my networks had said to me. You know, everyone's
got an opinion on PARMO, and that's partly what makes
the organization so great, but it's also what makes it
very challenging, because it's very easy to have an opinion
from the outside looking in. But that was what encouraged
(12:08):
me to first to have a look and consider could
I add.
Speaker 5 (12:10):
Value to that board, and it was. It is a
great organization.
Speaker 4 (12:16):
I enjoyed it a lot and had the opportunity, but
it's not it's not typical because the Crown appointments process
and the process of being appointed is very different to
an elected position, for example, either publicly listed or through cooperatives,
and and very different to the appointed process for independent
directors onto boards. So from that point of view, I
(12:40):
guess learning the distinction between those and actually the pros
and cons of each, but also therefore the requirements to
be in a position to be part of those boards
are all differences that need to be taken into accounts.
So that's probably one of the biggest things I've learned
through that experience.
Speaker 1 (13:00):
Yeah, I'm also interested in this idea of establishing a
value proposition when you're looking at a governance journey and
building skills and becoming attractive I suppose to.
Speaker 3 (13:14):
Being able to be appointed on a board.
Speaker 1 (13:16):
And I'm just wondering if you have any way in
which you elevator pats yourself or how do you go
you know what, this is my value, this is going
to add and you know, get me on here.
Speaker 5 (13:32):
Yeah, I wouldn't say I'm very good at that.
Speaker 4 (13:35):
I think what happens as you gain experience and particularly
in different roles, is I think you develop clarity around
it is where you add value, but it's also what
what trade off you're willing to make as well. And
I think there's also an element of particularly people who've
(13:56):
come and I put I'm putting from my own perspective,
people who've come through management careers and particularly into executive careers,
you do end up becoming somewhat of a generalist in
some respects depending on the roles, but particularly in general management,
and therefore actually realizing that from a governance perspective, being
(14:19):
a generalist may not be that helpful because you want
the board to actually provide everyone wants.
Speaker 5 (14:25):
Everyone needs to be able to provide a different perspective
and an area of speciality or several areas of specialty.
So actually not.
Speaker 4 (14:32):
Being afraid to hone in and say, well, yes, I'm
a specialist in that, but actually I have very limited
knowledge of this is actually not a weakness, depending on
the skill set that that particular organization might be looking for.
And I think it takes a while to sort of
get to that point of realizing you don't have to
wear all the hats yourself.
Speaker 3 (14:53):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (14:53):
True, And that's quite a mindset shift, doesn't it, particularly
when you're called upon to do that in your day
to day role.
Speaker 3 (15:01):
Thinking and switching gears slightly.
Speaker 2 (15:05):
One of the things I've most admired about you being
one of the leading women that has shaped or how
to shape my career is the fact that you have
been working in a very male dominated environment and quite
often you've been the only female at that top level.
(15:27):
And whatever shape or form that might look like, how
have you how have you dealt with this in terms
of some of the challenging aspects and what advice would
you give to someone who is just starting out and
might find themselves in that position.
Speaker 4 (15:42):
Yeah, you're making me feel old now, Ema, But I
don't know when it changed, and it's changed quite significantly.
And I think one of the mindsets I adopted early
on was actually it helped to stand out because people
remembered who I was. Oh yeah, there was a blonde
(16:03):
woman there, and it's like, okay, so maybe I can
help this to my advantage because at least people remember
that I was at some conference or that I was somewhere,
but that was after quite a period of actually just
blending in because you had to sort of fit in
with the men effectively, and there were so few women
(16:26):
and that's changed significantly, which is fantastic. So now I
look at it and think, well, actually, there are now
so many great women in the industry, and that's fantastic
to see.
Speaker 5 (16:39):
And I then think, well, how would I try and
make my presence felt.
Speaker 4 (16:43):
Now if I was a young woman coming into agribusiness.
And in some respects it's the network's wider, so that's great,
But then the ability to stand out is probably more challenging,
or to actually find the right connection for whatever it
is you know someone is trying to achieve. And from
(17:04):
that point of view, I think there is still that
ongoing challenge for all of us, doesn't matter whether it's
me or woman, is trying to figure out how do
you add value and where can you add value and
how do you make those connections? And that really comes
down to the networks. And therefore I think ensuring that
the networks are broad based is still really important because
(17:26):
I think there could be a danger of just focusing
in one area and you still find you missing out
on this whole other piece over here.
Speaker 5 (17:32):
That's actually where the action is. So finding a way
to blend.
Speaker 4 (17:36):
Those networks is really the challenge. I think now if
I was, you know, if it was twenty or thirty
years ago, and trying to figure out how to do that,
achieving the blend would be what I would recommend to people.
Speaker 1 (17:48):
Yeah, I think that makes a lot of sense, especially
I think as people are moving around a lot more
in their career as well, and potentially they might be
only in one role for a couple of years and
in there looking for the next opportunities. So I think
that makes a.
Speaker 3 (18:03):
Lot of sense.
Speaker 1 (18:05):
I'm interested in how you deal with challenge, so not
just in the environment we've been speaking about with being
in a mile dominated space, but also in what do
you do when stuff goes wrong? What techniques do you have?
Your LinkedIn profile, I loved you said I'm known for
(18:25):
remaining car under pressure, and I thought, yeah, that's good.
I want to hear about what techniques you've got to
do that.
Speaker 4 (18:33):
I don't know that it's a technique, but it I
tend to actually not exactly slow down, but become very
deliberate and very focused and I've only known that through
being in those situations and then people either reflecting that
back to me, and I've been fortunate enough some people
(18:55):
have done that very directly to me, so that I
know now that it is actually what happens, and so
I've become better at recognizing that that's what I do,
become very deliberate, very focused on particularly the important things,
because it's usually when you're in that crisis situation that
(19:16):
you know, you can just end up sort of spinning
out at the share volume and breadth of things that
are coming flying at you, and being able to shut
out the ones that actually aren't going to matter, or
that are actually not as important as some other people
might think they are. It is actually really critical in
those times. So I know that that is a behavior
(19:39):
that somehow is how I operate. But I wouldn't say
it's a technique. But it be difficult to do that
because it's in some cases it's almost a singular focus.
Speaker 5 (19:54):
But you can only do that for a limited period
of time.
Speaker 4 (19:56):
So then recognizing when you actually need to switch from that,
you know, come back up for a start looking at
the bigger picture again is the other key element of
being able to shift that and in some case, particularly
through the early onsets of COVID, in some cases that
all happened with bast of a couple of hours and
(20:17):
then the next thing that needed dealing with. So I
think it taught us all how to do that a
bit better.
Speaker 3 (20:24):
God, that was a hectic time, wasn't it. Now we
think about COVID, and certainly.
Speaker 2 (20:30):
Your ability to deal with some of those more challenging
moments is stuck in my mind, having had the pleasure
of working with you as well, and it's given me
something to aspire to when you know, everything's happening at once,
like today when we're talking and the GDT has dropped
quite significantly, and I've just got a message here saying
that news how I want to do an interview.
Speaker 3 (20:50):
So I'm channeling my inner Haley right now in terms
of I guess the way forward for agriculture.
Speaker 2 (20:59):
I've always valued and admire your opinions and where you
think things are going. And I guess the reflection just
a reflection on how agriculture broadly has shifted in the
time that you've been working in this space. But where
do you think we're going as a broad industry?
Speaker 4 (21:21):
I think from a particularly from a New Zealand perspective,
the foundations to me actually haven't changed a lot.
Speaker 5 (21:28):
What tends to distract.
Speaker 4 (21:30):
Us as an industry, particularly in New Zealand are the
trends that come and go and trying to figure out
which ones are those are lasting, which ones do we
actually need to take seriously, and which ones do we
just need to manage through. I think that's been particularly
challenging because the speed of information is just incredible. The
amount of information coming at people just gets more and
(21:53):
more and more all the time. So therefore, trying to
see through all that to actually make good decisions if
anything's become harder, and it shouldn't. It should have become
easier because we've got better information and more of it,
but it just clouds the judgment and sometimes distilling it
down to those. To me, those basic fundamentals that I
(22:13):
still think provide us a great foundation for the future
is what we need to remember. And the thing that
sticks out of my mind recently, because I'm you know,
I've been out of that analytical space now for quite
a long time, is to see what's happened around you know,
alternative proteins for example, and and and the fact that
(22:33):
you know, they they were going to be the future,
and it was going to be the ruin of farming.
It was, you know, they were going to take all
this market share, and maybe they still will, and they've
certainly taken some market share that actually many of those
alternatives are now struggling to find the space as people
have reverted back to basics. You know, nutrition and the
(22:56):
wholesomeness of naturally produced products is still actually what people want.
So it's just one example of you know, things that
come and go a little bit. We should still take
good notice and think long and hard about the implications
for those things, but shouldn't automatically assume that it spells
a negative outcome.
Speaker 1 (23:15):
That's very interesting. I think there's been a few times
in farming's history in this country an.
Speaker 3 (23:21):
Artist sunset industry.
Speaker 1 (23:22):
Now, and I don't think that that's really the case.
Probably is the last question from us, and without being
too direct or up front, but I'm just interested in
what might be next for you. So where are you
strip me as someone who's quite dedicated to learning and
growing and taking your opportunity, so I'm kind of interested
(23:46):
in what the next step and that space might look
like for you.
Speaker 4 (23:50):
So am I. I've never had the grand plan so
and I still don't so my aunt to their questions,
I don't know. And it is interesting because I think,
like many people and organizations, the more you learn, the
(24:11):
less you know. And all I see is that there's
still plenty of opportunity. I'm not worried about not being busy.
In fact, I'm more worried about the opposite, and still
haven't found.
Speaker 5 (24:21):
Enough time to ride my horse. So that's about all
I've got for you, I'm afraid.
Speaker 4 (24:27):
Yeah, I actually don't know, and I'm assuming that at
some point an opportunity will come along that I think,
you know, it looks really interesting, and whether that's in
conjunction with what I'm already doing or whether it's something different, Yeah,
it'll happen.
Speaker 3 (24:44):
Yeah. Nice.
Speaker 2 (24:45):
It's a nice reminder as well, like not everything has
to be really planned out or set. There are different
ways to achieving success, whatever that looks like. And for
some people, yeah, it can just be going with the
flow until the appropriate opportunity presents itself. So yeah, thank
you so much for your time, Hailey. I love chatting
with you, and as always, you haven't failed to deliver
(25:07):
some good gems. So really, thank you for your time
and looking forward to whatever that next opportunity might be
and where you might go to next, and thank you
for being such a trail blazing person within our industry
and yeah still being a bit of a mentor for
me as well.
Speaker 5 (25:26):
My pleasure. You're very generous. Thank you. Well, that was it.
Speaker 3 (25:30):
That's the podcast. That's us for today.
Speaker 1 (25:34):
We hope you enjoy with the Yarns and please do
let us know if you have any comments or questions.
We would love to hear from you.
Speaker 3 (25:40):
Look, it really does make all the difference.
Speaker 2 (25:43):
Please hit the button to follow us like the podcast,
click on the button to join as a.
Speaker 3 (25:48):
Member of Real Women of New Zealand. We promise you
you'll have some fun.
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