Systematics is a synthetic science which focuses on species delimitation, taxonomy, classification, and phylogeny, with an additional aim of understanding underlying evolutionary and biogeographic patterns and processes. Systematic research has many downstream benefits including underpinning conservation management, biosecurity and health. In this short overview article, I will give a brief synopsis of integrative systematics, in which multiple data sets are used to robustly test species limits in a statistical framework, and illustrate why I think we need integrative systematics in New Zealand. I will then discuss examples from my own systematics research, especially on the flowering plant families Plantaginaceae (Ourisia, Plantago, Veronica) and Boraginaceae (Myosotis), as well as from other vascular plant systematics research being done by colleagues in New Zealand and elsewhere. Through these examples, I will show how using an integrative systematics approach to analysing morphological, molecular, cytological and other data sets can aid species delimitation and new species discovery, and allow inferences into questions regarding such diverse themes as diversification, variability and conservation of threatened species, polyploidy (whole genome duplication) and biogeography of New Zealand vascular plants. I will also argue that the future of systematics should not only be integrative, but also next-generation and collaborative, and that such forward-looking, cooperative research – and the institutional and governmental investment to support it – is essential for New Zealand.