The cover of IN-Business Wellington was a toss-up between Kiwibank chief executive Sam Knowles and Bob Jones. Everyone knows who Jones is, but who is Sam Knowles? NADINE ISLER finds out.

Sam Knowles

He sits opposite us in a stylish Kiwibank meeting room with one bright trademark-green wall, tidily dressed in black suit, black shoes, and light blue striped shirt.

From his initial behaviour you could be forgiven for thinking Sam Knowles holds any old position in the company…but he doesn’t.

He happens to be The Boss. The big guy, top dog, head honcho, chief. Whatever you want to call it, he is the CEO of Kiwibank. But he sure doesn’t act like it. He politely asks his secretary if he may use the room and whether she would have a clue where his “award-thing” is located.

The “award-thing” is, of course, a Supreme Gold Award. Established to recognize the finest businesses in the city, Wellington’s Gold Awards celebrates its 10th anniversary this year and Kiwibank took out the coveted supreme prize at this year’s ceremony, as well as topping the award category for professional services and infrastructure. For an ‘upstart’ bank, people are sure beginning to sit up and take notice.

As if leading an award-winning bank isn’t quite enough, Knowles has been involved in a diverse range of work and other pursuits. He’s had an interesting life so far, including two degrees from different universities (BSc in Physics and Psychology from Waikato University and a Masters in Resource Management) a five-year OE and a post with the Treasury and BNZ, the latter in Melbourne. He has looked at buying an orchard and has worked as a science teacher in a secondary school in Kenya.

Now that he has helped start a successful New Zealand bank from scratch, he is getting involved with the community in other ways. He is a director on the St James Opera House Board, which supports Wellington businesses and encourages local productions as a non-profit organisation that actually breaks even. Knowles is quick to point out that this is unusual – losing money is the more common scenario with such organisations.

He is also a member of the advisory group for Angel HQ, a Grow Wellington initiative set up to help connect promising Wellington businesses with investors. He speaks quietly about these rather impressive posts, merely suggesting them as possibly of interest to IN-Business Wellington magazine.

Speaking of Wellington, Knowles makes his feelings clear. He has no plans to move the bank or himself anywhere else. Only after a stint in Melbourne was he truly able to appreciate living in Wellington. “It’s an easy place to live,” he says. “And it’s easier to get good people here.”

The competition is also easier and, of course, he has family here. Almost as an afterthought he muses that it seems as though “Auckland is going backwards, while Wellington is going forwards”.

Knowles also demonstrates a mature attitude on being eco-friendly. He says it’s “the way we do things, not what we do” and 

Kiwibank’s website doesn’t shout about sustainability. He chuckles while pondering the origin of vegetable dyes: “Where does the colour come from? There must be some colourful vegetables…” But he is pragmatic about how fashionable it has become to be green, and that it is important to do things right, not because it’s desirable to ‘be seen doing something’.
He has a similarly cheerful attitude when it comes to the ‘doom and gloom’ of recent economic forecasts. While difficult times for business are widely forecast, Knowles remains optimistic. “Good business can survive any time, it’s just harder. There is always opportunity, especially for good businesses. Consumers don’t adjust as fast as businesses. Businesses are better at making those hard decisions.”

Back to Kiwibank now, he says growth is fun and the most exciting part of his job is the “new things”. “It’s hard but nice to be the challen

ger. Winning isn’t as much fun when you are the big guy – it seems a bit unfair.”
Kiwibank opened the doors to its first branch in Palmerston North in 2002 and now holds 5 per cent of the market share. The big banks still have 15-20 per cent and he says it will be a few years before Kiwibank can challenge their supremacy.

There are about 300 Kiwibank branches located in 18 centres around New Zealand, with two business banking branches in Wellington city. Success, Knowles says, is bringing customers over to Kiwibank and in time seeing those customers return with all their new business. As with anything, he says setting goals is important.

One of Kiwibank’s goals is to grow its share of the market by 1 per cent every year. And so far, it has done it.

Finally, we put the big question to Knowles: Should the big banks be scared? “The big Australian-owned banks ignored us when we first started, as I rather expected they would do,” he says. “They then started to react to our fees, longer opening hours and better interest rates. We can now justifiably claim that Kiwibank has made a positive difference for all banking customers in New Zealand. Should they be worried: Perhaps. But they certainly won’t be ignoring us.”

And through all his soft-spoken Kiwi down-to-earth-ness, we think our Knowles is rather hard to ignore too.