Christchurch-raised Sarah Russell, who moved from Sydney to begin the job this week, says "I feel energised and excited".
"I’m just so pleased to see how much activity’s actually going on in Queenstown, and there’s a lot of really smart people doing really interesting things.
"And I find that energising and exciting, so I don’t feel like I’m arriving to a blank piece of paper.
"And everyone’s just been so friendly and welcoming and willing to share and help me get up to speed as well."
Russell, who had senior leadership roles at Commonwealth Bank of Australia before co-founding anA1 software company in 2017, says she had imagined staying in Sydney for her working career.
"But this was too good an opportunity to pass up," she says.
She certainly wasn’t the only person to have their interest piqued — more than 200 people applied for what TQ founding chair Roger Sharp called "the best job on the planet".
Russell says "I’m looking forward to getting to know everybody, seeing what is here, working out what the biggest opportunities are for us in the short term".
"Some of those things will be short-term things, and some of them are going to take a lot longer to get going.
"And then, yeah, personally, just really looking forward to exploring this beautiful part of the world and making it home."
Russell, who’s not lived in New Zealand for 19 years and is not over-familiar with Queenstown, says she’s already bought a Jack’s Point pad with the help of local Sotheby’s agent Olivia Owen.
"You can actually sort of settle in quickly, and that was important for me and the family as well."
Her two boys, who both started at Wakatipu High this week, are both mad-keen mountain bikers.
"I’ve spent quite a bit of time at the bottom of Skyline already," Russell says.
