SUPREME WINNER AND

BOard & Management

Joan Withers

Joan is the chair of Mighty River Power and TVNZ, a director of ANZ Bank New Zealand, a member of the Treasury Advisory Board and Global Women and a trustee of the Tindall and Sweet Louise Foundations. She began her career as a junior bank teller and rose to lead two NZX15 companies – she is the only woman to date to achieve this. 

Joan won the New Zealand Shareholders Association Beacon Award in 2014 and the CAANZ Media Excellence Award in 2009. She is a University of Auckland distinguished alumni and the author of A Girl’s Guide to Business. She is a champion of board diversity and works toward closing the gender gap by encouraging and assisting more women into director and board positions.

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Arts & Culture

Victoria Spackman 

Victoria was, the chair of BATS Theatre Limited, taking the board from a low-level group that met only once a year to a high-functioning, industry-leading board leading a vibrant and in-demand theatre.  She stood down after the theatre returned to its iconic refurbished building at the end of a long and successful campaign.  Victoria was nominated for the NZ Corporate Lawyers’ Association’s In-House Lawyer Community Contribution Award for her work with this board.  

Victoria is also chief executive, director and co-owner of Gibson Group and its associated companies, a board member for both Education New Zealand and Screenrights and a committee member of FirstBoards. She won the 2012 LexisNexis Private Sector In-House Lawyer of the Year Award.

Business Enterprise

Linda Jenkinson

Originally from Palmerston North, Linda is a serial entrepreneur and was the first New Zealand woman to take a company public on the NASDAQ exchange. She has built three multi-million-dollar companies and is currently the chair and owner of LesConcierges (www.lesconcierges.com), the largest luxury corporate concierge company in the world, catering to more than 65 million members. 

She co-founded WOW For Africa, a new model social investment fund focused on building women-led businesses in Senegal, West Africa. Further to this, she has been a five-year chair of the Bay Area Red Cross annual Paint the Town Red Gala, is a life member of World Class New Zealanders, is a member of Global New Zealand Women and was a three-year board member of the New Zealand Trade Board in the United States. In addition, Linda leads the KEA organisation (New Zealand expatriate organisation) in the Bay Area and is a director and secretary of the Massey University Foundation. Linda is also a member of the Icehouse International Advisory Board.

Community & Not for profit

Stacey Shortall

A partner at Minter Ellison Rudd Watts, Stacey has been recognised as a leading lawyer in New Zealand by Chambers, The Legal 500, Legal Media Group and NZ Lawyer. Having worked as a volunteer lawyer in many New York State prisons, Stacey developed a programme that seeks to help mothers incarcerated at Auckland Region Women’s Corrections Facility maintain meaningful connections with their children.  

Stacey also developed a weekly homework club at a decile one school in Wellington where primary school children are assisted with their homework and provided access to different role models.  She continues to develop other initiatives intended to help stop violence against children in their homes.  An advocate for preventing violence against women and children, Stacey also looks to provide thought leadership by writing and speaking on topics such as diversity and women’s rights. Stacey seeks to promote the retention and promotion of female lawyers, and runs health and safety sessions on a pro bono basis for certain organisations and groups which are seeking to drive cultural change around workplace safety in New Zealand.

Diversity

Karyn Thompson

Karyn is a Colonel in the New Zealand Defence Force and the Chief Human Resource Officer (Army) and chair for the New Zealand Defence Force Women's Development Steering Group. This group was launched by the Chief of Defence in March 2013 to provide strategic advice to Defence Force leaders to increase women’s participation across the NZ Defence Force, and to advocate for women’s development initiatives in the Defence Force. 

Karyn is an executive member of the Army Leadership Board and a member of the Veteran's Advisory Board. She is also on the Board of Trustees of Fergusson Intermediate School. 

She has had a distinguished military career, having served in Sinai, SFOR (former Yugoslavia) and East Timor, and in June 1994 was awarded the Chief of General Staff’s Commendation for resuscitating a drowned child.

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Global

Dame Judith Mayhew Jonas

Judith is a lawyer who has worked in academia, the private sector, local government, the arts and the voluntary sector. She has been an advisor to the Mayor of London and a board member of the London Development Agency. She was the first female chair of the Royal Opera House and the first female leader of the City of London Corporation. She has served on boards for Merrill Lynch, Birkbeck, Imperial College London and the University of London. She has been Provost of King’s College, Cambridge and Bishop Grosseteste University. 

As a lawyer in private practice she was special advisor to the chair at Clifford Chance, the world’s largest law firm. Judith was made a Dame of the British Empire in 2002 for services to the city of London. She was the UK’s New Zealander of the Year in 2004 and in 2002 Management Today magazine put her 15th on its list of the most powerful women in Britain.

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Innovation, Science & Health

Frances Valintine 

Frances is an education futurist and chair and founder of Mindlabs, which she began in 2013 after realising that education was on the cusp of a fundamental reshape due to the introduction of new digital technologies across every aspect of our lives. The Mind Lab is a 21st century digital and creative learning facility for students with a focus on science, technology and discovery. It is now established in four locations, employs over 30 people and has taught over 20,000 students. In addition, 800 teachers have undertaken a postgraduate programme in digital and collaborative learning to transform and enhance their teaching practices. 

In 2014, The Mind Lab by Unitec won Excellence in Social Innovation at the Innovators Awards, Engaging Youth in ICT at the CIO Awards, and Best Start-Up in Asia Pacific in the Talent Unleashed Awards (judged by Sir Richard Branson and Steve Wozniak). The Mind Lab was also named one of New Zealand's top 10 most innovative companies and Frances one of NZ's top 10 most innovative people by Idealog magazine.

Public Policy

Vicky Robertson 

Vicky is Secretary for the Environment at the Ministry for the Environment, focused on ensuring the Ministry for the Environment engages widely in the course of its work, and identifies opportunities to collaborate, as it pursues its mission of environmental stewardship for a prosperous New Zealand. 

She previously worked for the New Zealand Treasury as deputy chief executive, with lead accountability for commercial/operational and corporate areas of the Treasury. Key achievements in this time include chairing the steering group for the Government’s Mixed Ownership Model for State Owned Enterprises, establishing and chairing an advisory board to bring external perspectives on the Treasury’s monitoring of commercial entities owned by the Crown, and making work on Māori economic and social aspirations one of the Treasury’s key strategic priorities. Vicky was instrumental in making the Treasury a much more outward-facing organisation, building new relationships with key influencers in the export industry and Māoridom. She is also a board member for the Sir Peter Blake Trust Board of Trustees.

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Rural

Katie Milne 

Katie is a Rotomanu dairy farmer on the West Coast, and a Federated Farmers’ board member. Katie was most recently awarded the Dairy Woman of the Year Award this year. With her partner, Ian Whitmore, she farms 125 hectares, milking 200 Jersey cows on a farm purchased in 1992. Katie is also the chair of TB Free West Coast Committee and sits on the National Animal Welfare Advisory Panel, a statutory body that advises the Minister for Agriculture on issues relating to animal welfare and recommends regulations prescribing animal welfare standards or requirements. 

She is vice chair of the Rural Health Alliance Aotearoa NZ Council, which aims to improve rural health research, rural connectivity, and rural mental health outcomes. Her leadership in the health and safety space collaborating with WorkSafe has led her to be the poster woman for the Safer Farms campaign. Katie also travels the country talking to farmers about how they can achieve better health and safety compliance. She was influential in the establishment of the Sustainable Farming in the Lake Brunner Catchment Project and was at the helm of the formation of the Lake Brunner Community Catchment Care Group.

Young Leader

Parris Goebel

Parris is a dancer and international choreographer who has worked with Jennifer Lopez, Nicki Minaj, Korean K-pop sensation Big Bang, Michael Jackson’s tribute show (Cirque du Soleil) and, most recently and currently, Janet Jackson. She pioneered Polyswagg, her own unique style of dance which incorporates Māori and Pacific dance styles with worldwide influences including American, Latin and African styles. 

Her innovative approach has led to her roles in films such as Step Up 5 and the success of her own dance collective, The Royal Family. Within her company, The Palace Dance Studio, there are seven crews of varying ages and Parris is a mentor and leader to these young people. Request Dance Crew, her all-girl dance crew formed in 2007, was placed first at the 2009 and 2010 World Hip Hop International Championships, as well as winning the 2009 World Supremacy Battlegrounds in Melbourne. Parris also works as a DJ and is working on an album with acclaimed local DJ and producer P-Money.