Dame Theresa Gattung is a New Zealand business leader, entrepreneur, author, philanthropist and investor. Her best-selling autobiography Bird on a Wire was published in 2010.
Perhaps best known for her role as CEO of Telecom New Zealand, she was the first female CEO of an NZX listed company. Since leaving Telecom, she divides her time between professional governance, entrepreneurial projects, and philanthropic work.
She has held multiple governance positions; Chair of AIA Australia and AIA New Zealand, Chair Telco Technology Services, Chair CoOfWomen, Chair of the Wellington Board of the SPCA and then on the Royal New Zealand SPCA (RNZSPCA) National Board. She is a member of the National Advisory Council on the Employment of Women and on the board of Global Women.
As co-founder of My Food Bag, alongside Cecilia Robinson and Nadia Lim, she helped take the start-up to a nationwide company with a turnover of over $130m.
Theresa introduced Coralus (formerly SheEO), an international community that supports, finances, and celebrates female entrepreneurs to New Zealand in 2017 and was the New Zealand Lead for five years successfully achieving the goal of creating a perpetual fund that will continue to support at least five ventures per year in perpetuity.
In 2019 she became Chair of Tend, a primary healthcare provider with a mission to put digital healthcare in the hands of all Kiwis.
In 2021 she funded the Theresa Gattung Chair of Women in Entrepreneurship within the University of Auckland Business School and also launched the Gattung Foundation whose main charitable purposes are to support the relief of poverty, the education and advancement of women, Māori and Pasifika to reduce inequality and the care, support and protection of animals.
In 2024 she launched Compatico, a premium, personalised and private matchmaking service designed for those of us aged 40 and above.
Theresa is involved with a number of not-for-profit and philanthropic interests, including being on the Global Board of World Pulse, being co-founder of the World Women Charitable Trust and Patron of the Cambodia Charitable Trust.
In the 2015 New Year Honours, Theresa was appointed a Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit, for services to business and philanthropy and in the 2024 King’s Birthday Honours, she was promoted to Dame Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit, for services to women, governance and philanthropy.
She lives in New Zealand between Auckland and the Bay of Plenty.