Kia ora!
Help shape safer flight operations through investigation, learning, and continuous improvement.
As a Safety Specialist, you'll play a key role in protecting our people, customers, and operation by strengthening safety systems, influencing better decision-making, and driving continuous improvement across the airline.
Working within our Safety team, you'll lead and support operational safety investigations, helping the business understand how and why events occur in complex operational environments and turning those insights into meaningful organisational learning and effective risk controls.
You'll work closely with operational leaders, pilots, subject matter experts, regulators, and safety professionals to identify emerging risks, strengthen safety performance, and support informed, risk-based decisions. While partnering with operational teams, you'll maintain the independence, objectivity, and evidence-based approach needed to deliver credible investigation outcomes.
At Air New Zealand, we're committed to becoming the world's leading digital airline while maintaining the highest standards of operational excellence. Recently recognised as New Zealand's most attractive employer, we continue to be recognised for our culture, customer service, and innovation. Here, your work will make a real difference to the safety of our people, customers, and operation.
How you'll make an impact
- Lead and support operational and flight safety investigations that improve safety outcomes and support regulatory compliance
- Apply recognised investigation methodologies to understand how and why safety events occur, considering human, organisational, operational, and system factors
- Translate investigation findings into organisational learning, practical risk controls, and improvement initiatives that strengthen safety performance
- Provide expert safety advice, education, and training that supports informed, risk-based decision-making
- Monitor regulatory changes, industry trends, operational data, and emerging risks to support proactive safety management
- Build strong relationships across the business and with key aviation stakeholders to identify, manage, and mitigate operational hazards
- Prepare high-quality investigation reports, safety analyses, presentations, and recommendations
- Champion continuous improvement by identifying opportunities to enhance safety systems, organisational capability, and learning.
What we're looking for
- Hold, or have held, an aviation-related qualification, licence, or equivalent operational experience transferrable to aviation safety
- Safety Investigator qualification highly desirable
- Auditor qualification desirable
- Experience working within Safety Management Systems, including hazard identification, risk management, assurance, investigations, reporting, and auditing
- Proven capability conducting operational safety investigations using recognised methodologies, including human and organisational factors analysis
- Understanding of contemporary safety thinking, including systems-based approaches, organisational learning, and Just Culture principles
- Strong analytical, communication, and stakeholder engagement skills, with the ability to influence, challenge respectfully, and build credibility
- Sound understanding of aviation regulatory frameworks and their practical application
- A collaborative mindset, sound judgement, curiosity, and the ability to thrive in a dynamic environment.
We know great safety professionals come from a range of backgrounds. If you bring most of this experience, along with transferable skills and a willingness to learn, we'd love to hear from you. We welcome candidates from operational, engineering, human factors, safety, regulatory, cabin, air traffic management, and other relevant backgrounds.
Why join Air New Zealand?
We want our people to live their best lives and access great benefits that support them both at and outside of work.
- Generous staff travel benefits for you, with opportunities to share travel privileges with friends and whānau
- FlexiLeave, allowing you to purchase up to four additional weeks of leave each year
- A strong learning culture with development opportunities, on-the-job learning, and career growth experiences
- Wellbeing support through our Wellbeing Hub, Employee Assistance Programme, and Peer Support networks
- Discounts on hotels, retail, banking, insurance, gyms, and more through our work perks programme.
Ready for take-off?
If you're passionate about improving aviation safety through investigation, learning, and collaboration, we'd love to hear from you. Bring your expertise, curiosity, and commitment to continuous improvement and help shape the future of safe flight operations at Air New Zealand.
Applications close Sunday, 6th September
Additional Information
At Air New Zealand, we are proudly committed to diversity, equity and inclusion and believe in creating a truly inclusive workplace where everyone can be themselves and thrive. Our people are our greatest asset – because while everything else we do in our operation can be replicated by our competitors, it is our people that truly set us apart. We are firm believers in celebrating the differences and diversity of thought our people bring to their roles.
Whāia te pae tawhiti kia tata. Ko te pae tata whakamaua, kia tina.
"Seek to bring distant horizons closer. Once near, seize them and make them your reality."
