THE HIGHEST PAYING

IT JOBS IN NEW ZEALAND

2023-2024

New Zealand's tech sector continues to grow rapidly. So much so that the New Zealand Budget 2022 provided an additional $20 million over four years towards the sector. This investment and an ever-increasing demand for workforce transformation continues to create demand for skilled IT professionals, raising salaries across nearly every facet of the industry.  

This has been reflected in the findings from our Salary Guide IT Edition, with many top technology jobs paying over $200K. Here, we reveal the highest paying IT jobs in New Zealand.  

While salary shouldn't be your only consideration when it comes to your future in IT, it helps to know what roles can earn so you can understand where you might like to develop your skills.   

The following are the highest paying IT jobs in New Zealand based on the findings from our research, which you can check for yourself by downloading the Hays Salary Guide IT Edition.  
 
The salaries listed below are based on roles located in Auckland (unless stated otherwise). Below we've covered the highest reported salaries across each of the major verticals in the technology industry.

The highest paying IT job in New Zealand is CIO, earning between $170-280K on average. With all the organisational change that's occurred over the past few years, it's no surprise that talented CIOs who can lead digital transformation efforts are being well compensated for the value they bring.  
 
The highest paid CIOs in New Zealand are those who can effectively complement their extensive IT experience with soft skills like people management and the ability to navigate the often complex politics of their organisation. Top CIOs are deeply ingrained in the world of tech and stay ahead of the latest innovations so that they can apply them for the benefit of their organisation.  
 
CIOs aren't the only tech leaders being well paid, CTOs fall only slightly behind CIOs as the second highest paying tech job in New Zealand, bringing in an average of $170-250K.  
 
Compared to CIOs, CTOs are much more hands-on with the technical aspects of digital transformation efforts. The best CTOs are constantly driving innovation in their organisation.  
 
The third highest paying leadership position belongs to chief information security officers (CISOs), who earn an average of $160-$250K. CISOs are responsible for their organisation's cybersecurity strategy and ensuring that its tech infrastructure is secure. With the increasing sophistication of cybercrime, CISOs have become invaluable members of an organisation's senior leadership team.

Investment in new projects, technologies and ways of working have necessitated the need for strong project management skills within businesses. In the field of projects and change management, program managers have become key to helping organisations successfully execute digital transformation programs. Employers in New Zealand are eager to hire professionals with solid ERP, cloud migration and scrum master experience.  
 
As a result, program manager has become one of the highest paying IT jobs in New Zealand, with professionals earning between $180-240K on average. The next highest reported salary in projects and change management belongs to project directors, earning between $160-220K across Auckland, Christchurch and Wellington.  
 
Other roles earning high salaries in projects and change management are PMO managers and enterprise architects, where the highest earners take home an average of $180K and $190K in Wellington respectively.   

The 'cloud' has become somewhat of a buzzword in the tech industry, but it's here to stay.  
 
So it's not surprising that cloud architect has become one of the highest paying tech jobs in New Zealand, with the top earners taking home between $180-230K on average. Having an experienced cloud architect on the team goes a long way in ensuring an organisation's migration to the cloud goes as smoothly as possible.  
 
Many of New Zealand's leading cloud professionals have returned from overseas, where they enjoyed higher salaries and this has put more pressure on local firms to enhance their offers. This can be seen in the rising salaries of other cloud roles like platform engineers now earning a typical salary of $170K.  

Cybercrime cost $69.8 million dollars in the past five years in New Zealand and in 2022, reports of phishing and credential harvesting have increased by 16 per cent since 2021. 

Suffice to say, every organisation is worried about cyberattacks, especially with the large amounts of sensitive data they are handling and the quick adaptation of cloud technology which opened up a whole new risk landscape that requires appointing dedicated cyber security experts. 
 
IDAM architects, who are responsible for developing and managing an organisation's identity and access management system, are in high demand due to the importance of keeping data secure. Their importance has been reflected in their average salary of $190K across New Zealand.  
 
Cyber security architects have the second highest paying IT jobs in New Zealand's cyber security space, earning $180K on average. This is followed by GRC consultants, who take home $175K. 

IT infrastructure jobs are evolving at a rapid pace, with new technologies and approaches like DevOps and cloud computing changing the way that organisations think about their IT systems. As such, the design and implementation of modern infrastructure is something that organisations are willing to pay top dollar for.  

In New Zealand, the highest paying IT job in infrastructure is the infrastructure architect, earning between $145-200K on average. This is followed by Wellington-based network architects ($145-165K).  

Infrastructure managers are also high earners, with an average compensation of between $120-170K.

In the realm of ERP/CRM, Wellington-based functional consultants are New Zealand's highest paid professionals, with a typical average salary of $160K. Functional consultants are relied on to advise businesses on how to use ERP/CRM systems to optimise their business processes. The value of their consultancy is reflected in their pay packages. 
 
Other high paying ERP/CRM jobs belong to technical consultants ($140-180K) and ERP/CRM architects ($150-180K).

As organisations become more digitised and manage larger amounts of data in an increasing regulatory landscape, it's imperative for organisations to have the capacity to build software to support the business internally or interact with customers.  
 
This can be seen in the high salaries for software development professionals, with development managers earning between $170-200K on average.  
 
Solution architects are on par in Auckland, earning between $170-200K per year. Next, technical leads are making an average of between $150-190K.  

With the gathering, processing, protecting and analysing large data sets and the emergence of data lakes and swamps, the importance of dedicated data professionals has grown. Data is now home to some of New Zealand's highest paying IT jobs, with data architects leading with an average salary of $180K.  
 
Other key data roles are also being well-rewarded, with data modellers earning a typical salary of $140K. Data engineers also sit at $140K, a role that has become increasingly important as organisations going through cloud migrations need to construct new data pipelines between on-premise and the cloud. 

With so much riding on the success of digital transformation projects, it's important for businesses to get quality assurance right. This has resulted in high salaries for testing professionals, with test/QA managers leading the pack with average salaries of $155K.  
 
Following test/QA managers are test leads at $145K. Next, automation test analysts earn a respectable $130K on average.  

Tech professionals have become some of the highest earners in New Zealand. Whether you're a specialist in cloud computing, test automation, or software development or aim to secure one of the highest paying tech leadership roles, there are plenty of opportunities in New Zealand's IT landscape. 
 
If you'd like to learn more about the highest paying tech jobs in New Zealand, download the Hays Salary Guide IT Edition. Within are plenty of market insights and trends for employers and job seekers who want to know more about how different skills and seniorities are compensated in New Zealand's IT industry.