KEY POINTS:
African-born Richard de Haast has had a more varied career than most New Zealand CEOs.
He's been a trainee priest, human rights lawyer, hotel executive, recruitment executive, waiter and is now chief executive of property development and retirement business Metlifecare.
De Haast was raised in Zimbabwe where his father Jan was general manager of a large Harare hotel. The family lived in the building, a place he recalls as being exciting and vibrant.
One of the things he remembers most clearly is seeing Hollywood screen siren Sophia Lauren swimming topless in the hotel pool.
"It was great fun, a fantastic opportunity to meet different people, with a lot of different guests coming through and new faces every day. I must have been about 7 or 8 when I saw Sophia Lauren."
De Haast now lives in Auckland and runs a firm with a market capitalisation of about $700 million. His family emigrated from Africa in 2000.
Metlifecare, where de Haast has worked since 2004, is an NZX-listed retirement specialist chaired by former politician Jim McLay. The company owns and operates 15 retirement villages, which include nine care facilities and seven hospitals.
About 3000 residents live in the company's villages which have been developed in Auckland, Tauranga, Mt Maunganui, Palmerston North, Wellington, Wairarapa and Nelson.
Metlifecare's rival is the much larger Christchurch-headquartered Ryman Healthcare which has a market capitalisation of $1.1 billion.
This month, Metlifecare announced it would go ahead with a 246-unit village in Takapuna.
The village will have a four-lane bowling green, indoor heated swimming pool, gym, croquet green, billiard room, library, cafe, hobbies room, a workshop, extensive lounge and dining areas.
De Haast sees big expansion opportunities in the sector, hailed as a sunrise industry due to the high numbers of babyboomers about to retire.
"The concept of an old-age home is dissipating from people's consciousness. People are now prepared to spend their money and enjoy the later years of their lives. Many of our existing residents were born between the two world wars, so their view of money is different from the coming generations of retirees.
"Those existing residents are more cautious with their money and more resistant to change, compared to new retirees."
Metlifecare prides itself in having a substantial land bank.
"About 450 more units could be built on land we already own," he said.
De Haast's journey to New Zealand and his job at Metlifecare has been an eventful one, and even involved a night in jail.
His family left Zimbabwe when he was 12 and in his early teenage years at school in South Africa he felt a calling to become a diocesan Catholic priest. So he spent almost two years at St Peter's Seminary, north of Pretoria.
"As an 18-year-old, it was a very formative experience. In your first year, you are close to around 18 hours of silence a day. It's your formation year and you have a lot of time to spend to think and pray. But it's a seven-year process and I realised that was not where I was meant to be."
So instead, he decided to help the down-trodden and moved to Cape Town to study law.
He worked in hotels to support himself while studying.
His first job was at the St George's Hotel in Cape Town, but his ultimate aim was to help the poor.
"I decided to become a human rights lawyer to battle on behalf of people. Pre-independent South Africa was the right environment. I took witness statements after the police had attacked people and took families to mortuaries to identify those who had been murdered by the authorities.
"I would have been called up for military service but I was a conscientious objector. Fortunately, South Africa's independence came before I finished university so I was not jailed for that but I was prepared to go to jail if I had to.
"In fact, I was jailed once - my current employers might not know this - for being on a protest march. I was one of many people arrested in Cape Town and spent the night inside Cape Town Central which was lots of fun, about 80 of us all singing freedom songs and talking."
The hotel business called him back again, so he studied for a masters degree in international hotel management from the University of Surrey in England, then worked for a large South African hotel chain.
He was appointed national training manager for the Johannesburg-headquartered Southern Sun Hotel Group and was running a career planning course when he bumped into a friend who said she was going to an immigration seminar.
"I was going out for dinner that night, but had some time to spare so decided to go along."
The seminar was filled with people who were in denial about their desire to leave South Africa, he recalls. The seminar organiser was "dying" on the stage, pleading for someone to stand up and be evaluated under the points system, so others could see how the eligibility criteria operated.
At the time, de Haast was also working in the recruitment and training sector, so he empathised with the seminar organiser, and volunteered.
"I discovered I could qualify for permanent residency in Britain, Australia and New Zealand. I'd done the big corporate thing and at 31, I was in a senior management position. So I was looking for an environment that would suit the family. New Zealand was a lifestyle choice."
He was unemployed for his first three days in New Zealand, but then scored a job as a part-time waiter at Eden Park. It was an initial struggle to get into business in Auckland.
"Everyone told me I was too young, too qualified, companies I'd worked for were too large, I had no New Zealand experience."
So he searched for almost two months before joining a recruitment business, a job he won based on his work experience in South African hotels.
He then moved to Ernst & Young, appointed human resources director in 2001. He recalls how he told an E&Y executive that the firm only had foothills to climb, but he was looking to conquer mountains.
He joined Metlifecare in 2004, initially as operations general manager, then a year later became its acting chief executive, after Gavin Aleksich left to become chief executive of Renaissance Lifecare, a British company in which Metlifecare founder Cliff Cook is a major shareholder.
At the time de Haast joined, Cook held a major stake in the company. But a year later there was a shake-up.
Macquarie Bank and FKP Property Group made a $340 million takeover offer for about two-thirds of the company. The two largest shareholders, Cook and Todd Capital, accepted the $3.90 a share offer from the Australian joint venture partners.
According to last year's annual report, the Australians hold 81.96 per cent and Auckland-headquartered Fisher Funds also has a further stake of 11.91 per cent. De Haast said only a tiny portion of the shares were in the hands of small shareholders.
De Haast's parents also emigrated to New Zealand and live in an Auckland retirement village - but not one his company owns.
"It gives me an insight into how others are running their operations," he said.
Richard De Haast
Position: Chief executive, Metlifecare
Age: 40
School: Harare's St Michael's, Cape Town's Diocesan College
Tertiary education: Cape Town University, Stellenbosch University, Britain's Surrey University
Degrees: in law and international hotel management
Family: Married to Katherine, children Rosemary, 12, and Gabriel, 4
Chairman, St Mark's Catholic School board of trustees, Pakuranga
