Alison Adams - CEO, ChristchurchNZ

My first job was waitressing at Hardwick Hall (a large National Trust house in the UK).

My first career job was as a graduate at Unilever, where I was the Assistant Brand Manager Radion & Surf, Lever Brothers.

It sounds silly, but I loved having my own desk and a phone - I felt so important! I also loved working in a big open plan office with so many people. It was the 90s, money was plentiful and we had a lot of fun whilst working hard.

My biggest lesson was that I am not the expert in everything - there was this incredible lady in our Market Research department, and I remember going to her and asking her to run a certain market research report for me. She very politely told me to outline what problem I was trying to solve, and to then leave her, the expert, to tell me what market research project would be suitable to answer my query. I remember feeling humbled and chastened - a good lesson for a cocky 22 year old.

I have just always seized every opportunity I could to stretch myself. I try and leave a job when I am happy in it, before I get bored and cynical, and that has kept pushing me. And I always just focus on doing my current job as well as I can rather than thinking too much about what comes next.

I was probably around 46 when I first realised I wanted to be CEO. Before I applied for that job to be Regional Director for NZTE in Europe , I had a call with my (male) boss, who asked me what roles I would consider at NZTE if I didn't get the RD job. I said one of the GM roles, and he laughed - it really pissed me off. I thought "why not - you are a GM and I think I could do it better than you" and that kind of spurred me on.

At times I have lost confidence in my leadership style and started to second guess myself. Interestingly I am at my most effective as a leader when I believe in myself, so I tried to move past that self doubt quickly.

I had several jobs at Unilever over 9 years (marketing, strategy, sales), then 4 years in marketing at NZ Cricket, four quick promotions with NZTE (economic development, customer management) and then the CEO job at ChristchurchNZ. It was the first CEO job I applied for.

I did a degree in Chemistry (unusual for a CEO in NZ) and I feel like I am a bit of an accidental CEO as I don't have a finance or law background (which seems more typical). I don't know many CEOs who have a marketing background.

The world really does smell of fresh paint when you are a new CEO - it is both empowering and terrifyingly lonely. It took me a long time to work out how to get advice and feedback from a Board chair rather than a line manager. I think I was surprised by that transition.

Make a bold statement early, let people know where your boundaries are - it will hold you in good stead later. I remember being quite challenging with my leadership team in only my second ELT meeting and it was powerful; not only did I get to see a lot about my direct reports based on their response, but it showed them that I meant business and wouldn't tolerate certain behaviours that had become tacitly acceptable across the business.

I love leading people, if you don't then you can't do this job. Being a CEO is largely about strategy, shielding your team from distraction, and giving people the space to be brilliant.

Be humble, put your ego aside. It's not about you.