Steve, both my wife and I are senior management/IT management types so we may have not had any exposure to opportunties for programers and designers etc. But I would encourage and suggest to anyone who is serious in consieration of working in any tecnology field in NZ to go there on a vacation and bang on the doors. Use the internet first to determine who and what kind of companies are in the areas, try to establish some good contacts, but don't expect to find a "job" before going there. Most hiring outfits, be they employers or recruiters are suspect of off shore folks who say they want to come but won't invest the time to visit first, as these people feel you may not "like" the place and leave after a short time. Then everyone is unhappy!

New Zealand is a fabulous place for a holiday. And we did not feel taking about half of our vacation time to look for work a waste of time. We learned a lot, made some good friends, and it will be much easier to actually leave the US later because we took the first step.
Chuck