About Us

Our Purpose

To create leaders who inspire through story, to help organisations and individuals navigate change and to connect people with purpose.

Who is Whakaaro?

Whakaaro comprises professionals experienced in achieving leadership excellence, having delivered exceptional outcomes for the people and organisations we serve.

We are not theoreticians, but leaders still operating ‘in the fire’.

We provide programs founded in the unique culture of Aotearoa New Zealand, weaving the values of Te Ao Māori together with proven leadership development. We aim to demystify the pathway to greater connection between leaders and those they lead, through experiential learning, shared vulnerability, and enhanced understanding.

We believe:

1. Leadership is not a title or position; it is a behaviour.

2. Knowledge dispels fear.

3. Great leaders do not create followers; they create other great leaders.

Why Whakaaro?

As true leaders, we have chartered our own unique path for transforming leadership development for the future of New Zealand. 

We know the academic approach to leadership development; bound in a theoretical manual has significant limitations and even less sustainability.

Whakaaro utilises uniquely designed, immersive experiential journeys that accelerate the adoption of self-directed, self-sustaining learning processes for developing leadership.

We are diverse and inspirational leaders with experiences that will provoke the emergence of new thinking.

Whakaaro understands changing the world starts with changing the way we think.