Summer questions: Air New Zealand’s Greg Foran on his biggest success - and failure

Greg Foran says at least four major projects will lead to changes for passengers, aircraft and Air New Zealand staff in the new year. Photo / George Heard

Greg Foran goes into his fifth year with the airline back in profit and rebuilding its network after the pandemic. It has new planes coming into the fleet but faces challenges as some other aircraft will be grounded for engine maintenance and signs the post-Covid travel boom is cooling.

What are your hopes for the new Government, which also holds a 51 per cent share in the airline?

For us, it’s business as usual. We have a clear plan for what we’re doing. We sit down generally about twice a year with our minister and we’ve got a new minister (Finance Minister Nicola Willis) now.

We haven’t had our first meeting, but we’ll share our plans and then we get on with them.

How would you describe 2023?

I think it’s great that we are back up and flying and delivering a service. We’re doing what we’re here to do, which is to help connect people and to move people and to have got through the prior two and-a-half years where it was pretty difficult to get around.

What are the big opportunities for 2024?

We want to make sure we can continue to develop our network. We’ve also got to continue to work through with all parts of the aviation ecosystem so that we get things even better than they have been in this last year.

We’re really now doubling down working with Boeing to get some new planes (Dreamliners later in 2024), to get some retrofits done, working on new uniforms, working on more digital capability, not just for customers but internally within the business.

What’s the most interesting story for 2023?

We’ve now got a new (BETA battery power) airplane that we’ll have to prepare to fly in 2026. It’s a completely new generation plane.

Predictions for 2024?

For us it’s going to be about building more resilience into the offering that we’ve got and then landing a whole number of initiatives, and then continuing to develop some new ones.

What’s the worst mistake in business that you’ve made?

If something like Covid occurred again, I would be slower at taking aspects of the business down. I would wear some costs for a longer period of time because it’s quite hard to restart an airline.

What is your greatest success?

Keeping the enthusiasm of the Air New Zealand team through what has been a difficult four years.

Where are you going on holiday this summer?

I intend to head up north.

Do you have a good book recommendation for summer?

I’ve actually just read Elon Musk by Walter Isaacson.