Five years as the chief of the world's fourth biggest iron ore miner has not zapped any of Nev Power's chutzpah.

After steering Fortescue Metals Group through a massive operational expansion, steadying it when a heavy debt burden pushed it perilously close to the brink in 2012 and lowering its cost of production to an ambitious target its critics would have scoffed at just a couple of years ago, Power is looking to the future.