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Job title: General manager, Ngati Porou Whanui Forests

Managing a Maori corporate involves wider scope than the usual - alongside the commercial challenges are social ones as Maori aim to turn assets into a better quality of life for all.

"Commercial objectives need to be satisfied, but there are long-term social and economic objectives that need to be managed for," says Chris Insley, who started his forestry career nearly 20 years ago with the former New Zealand Forest Service.

Insley, 40, who is of Te Whanau a Apanui and speaks te reo, describes the new post as "exciting" with its opportunity for him to marry his Maori background with his commercial nous.

The 10,000ha of trees that anchor Ngati Porou's joint venture with a Korean company sit on many pieces of Maori-owned land.

Plans are to increase what is now a medium-sized company into a giant of some 40,000-50,000ha, says Insley.

Patience and a long-term view is required: "Once you put a tree in the ground, you don't get any money until you harvest it 25 years later".

Insley leaves Fletcher Challenge in Rotorua to take up the new post, and will eventually relocate his family to Ruatoria, the centre of Ngati Porou's forestry resource.

Insley has a Massey bachelor of business studies degree, and a Lincoln postgraduate diploma in marketing and logistics. He is part-way through a Waikato MBA.