We’re looking for a Kaitohutohu Mātāmua | Principal Advisor to join our passionate, focussed and diverse Network and Customer Team.
This permanent role is based in our central Wellington office on Cuba Street, the city’s vibrant, quirky, creative heart.
About the role:
The Kaitohutohu Mātāmua Principal Advisor will report to the Kaiwhakahaere Matua Senior Manager and work across the three Network and Customer teams: Service Design, Community Engagement, and Customer Experience.
The Network and Customer teams facilitate the design of an integrated regional public transport network. We aim to be trusted by our communities to connect their needs to the design and delivery of bus, rail and ferry journeys throughout the Wellington region. We provide advice to our Metlink and Greater Wellington colleagues and councillors on network changes that balance community needs, maintaining and growing patronage, and cost-effective service delivery. We have multiple roles; leading, supporting and implementing network change and development.
What we do is complex and fascinating.
Our impact is greater than it might seem at first sight and we work hard to get it right. As a team we champion our customers and communities, use our experience, bring in new ideas and knowledge, research, analyse, innovate, collaborate, communicate and support each other. The immediate priority for the Kaitohutohu Mātāmua Principal Advisor will be to coordinate the Greater Wellington cross-organisation response to the Waka Kōtahi New Zealand Transport Agency Roads of National Significance.
These projects have significant implications for the wider Wellington transport network and for the delivery of an integrated public transport system. The Kaitohutohu Mātāmua Principal Advisor will be the main point of contact for the Waka Kōtahi NZTA project teams and will lead work across Greater Wellington to optimise public transport outcomes by influencing proposed designs, and through post-implementation service changes.
We aim to deliver a sustainable and effective integrated public transport system. Also, a high priority, the Kaitohutohu Mātāmua Principal Advisor will work with Network and Customer and across Metlink to lead the continuing development and implementation of a programme of service reviews across the regional network. This will demand a strategic, principled and systematic approach, tempered with an ability to draw on experience, evidence, wisdom, judgement and expertise.
The Kaitohutohu Mātāmua Principal Advisor will be a member of the Network and Customer Leadership Team and the wider team of Metlink Leaders. They will support the Kaiwhakahaere Matua Senior Manager with reporting requirements, involvement in wider project teams, managing and resolving issues, and contributing to improving the performance of the Group through providing peer review, quality assurance and control.
Skills and experience required
To be successful in the role you will have: • Experience in planning or provision of public transport services.
• Extensive experience engaging and being influential at senior management and governance levels and with external stakeholders and community relationships.
• An understanding of why and how partnerships with mana whenua and engagement with Māori are fundamental to being an authentic partner to Te Tiriti o Waitangi and critical to achieve mutually beneficial outcomes.
• Developed strong interpersonal and technical skills through experience leading multi-disciplinary project teams, and be adept at using the capability of team members to deliver high quality project outputs.
• Proven experience working collaboratively to deliver shared and individual outcomes. • A track record of creating practical and pragmatic solutions to complex and ambiguous problems.
What we offer
• Values that reflect what we believe in: Manaakitanga - Care for people, Auahatanga - Embrace ideas, Kōtuitui - Value relationships, and Pono ki te kaupapa - True to our purpose.
• Work to suit your life and whānau with our flexible working policy.
• We’ll encourage you to grow and prosper with a range of learning and development opportunities, internal secondments and career progression.
• Your wellbeing is our priority – we provide access to medical and trauma insurance, support through our employee assistance programme, including Rongoā Māori partner providers, generous annual and sick leave, along with Tangihanga leave and support.
• We want you to have a sense of belonging, where you can reflect your personal and cultural identity in the way that you work.
• Social clubs, staff networks and a friendly and inclusive culture. • Great working environments across our beautiful region.
Come help treasure and grow our rohe together
Our rohe and its lands, waterways, animals, plants and people can only grow stronger if they are nurtured. To join our team is to step up and commit to playing an active part in this important mahi. That means restoring nature, connecting people and places, reducing environmental impacts and helping this rohe and its people prosper.
We are part of a collective movement alongside mana whenua and community members whose hopes for the future of this region are just as high as your own. Our efforts across environmental management, public transport, flood protection, regional parks and water supply are interconnected and integral to treasuring our rohe and growing our future.
How to apply
Greater Wellington is proud to be a member of Te Uru Tāngata Centre for Workplace Inclusion. We value diversity and are committed to an inclusive, flexible, and supportive workplace. We encourage candidates from all backgrounds and welcome the unique talent and experience you will bring to our team. We are passionate about ensuring our recruitment processes are fair and equitable.
Please let us know if you have any accessibility needs or adjustments that need to be made so we can offer a recruitment process that is more accessible to you. If you are invited for an interview, you are welcome to bring people to support you.
All applicants will be required to provide proof of their eligibility to work in New Zealand. For further information, please contact Tamsin Evans, Kaiwhakahaere Matua Senior Manager Network and Customer, 021 192 8620. Applications close 5.00pm, Sunday 19 April 2026.
We will be shortlisting applications as they come in and will interview as soon as possible to secure the right person. Greater Wellington is an accredited Living Wage Employer. We’re committed to making sure our people, including people in our supply chain, earn enough to meet life’s basic needs, support their whānau, and participate fully in their communities.
The remuneration for this position, inclusive of all benefits, is $123,052 to $184,578 with a midpoint of $153,815. Starting remuneration will depend on the skills and experience of the successful applicant.
Agency applications won’t be considered at this time.
