Former Telecom chief executive Theresa Gattung's memoir will be published on March 12, the publisher says.Random House says the book, Bird On A Wire, is being promoted as "no-holds barred" in its account ofher 11-year career at Telecom.Ms Gattu
Former Telecom chief executive Theresa Gattung's memoir will be published on March 12, the publisher says.
Random House says the book, Bird On A Wire, is being promoted as "no-holds barred" in its account ofher 11-year career at Telecom.
Ms Gattung was aged 37 years when she was appointed chief executive in 1999, taking over from Roderick Deane, who became chairman.
She headed the company from 1999 to 2007 and once infamously admitted the company had used confusion as a marketing tool to maintain profit.
The job gave her an international profile and she was named by Forbes as one of the world's 100 Most Powerful Women in 2006. Now the chairwoman of Wool International, she has said women need to break into the boards of big agricultural corporates in groups to make a difference.
"Storm the Bastille and get on the shareholders' council, but get in as a group and not one or two because it is too easy to be picked on," she told women in the dairy industry.
Research showed that unless a group had 30% of the seats on the board of a company it was difficult not to be marginalised.
Though in 1999 she called for "bold moves that reposition the company for the next 10 years," Telecom's share price fell from around $9 to less than $5 under her tenure, while shareholders' equity fell by more than a third from $2.16 billion in 2000.
Commentators have said that under Ms Gattung, Telecom could have made huge concessions to the government and still left its shareholders better off, and that her handling of that regulatory relationship was a major factor in the losses suffered by investors.
