Stephen Guerin, General Manager, Fruitfed Supplies
I am the General Manager of Fruitfed Supplies, the horticultural business unit of PGG Wrightson Limited. The team I lead operates throughout New Zealand from the Far North to Central Otago. I am responsible for the sales performance, strategy and leadership of the team. The business is focused on our client’s crops having access to international food markets with their quality produce meeting biosecurity regulations. I have been in my role for the last three years, having made the transition to this leadership role over the twenty two years with the business when I started my professional career in an accounting role. While I live in Auckland and love it's diverstiy, I also have the privilege of travelling throughout the country talking to clients and staff working in our rural communities.
The Leadership Programme has this year challenged my thinking as to the role that groups, teams and communities can play at ground level in making a difference in the success of their organisations and communities. The course has allowed me to see clear examples of solutions to problems that come from within the organisation or communities, and owned by these groups, will have a far greater chance of success than anything imposed externally. Leadership is about providing an environment for other people in the group or organisation to shine and achieve their potential to improve New Zealand for the benefit of us all.
Scott McAlister, General Manager, Cleeve Group
As General Manager of the Cleeve Group, my time is spent leading three companies. Cleeve Transport (Auckland) predominately transports steel for our major client Fletcher Easy Steel. Cleeve Transport (Christchurch) has it's activities spread evenly through steel distribution, bulk transport and container handling. Mackley Carriers was acquired in May 2008 and has a wide range of offerings from storage and distribution to Hiab Cranes. With three separate operations, the key challenge is to integrate their operations while maintaining their unique characteristics.
Leadership New Zealand has helped me focus my own thoughts on leadership into a useful package. Hearing the broad range of speakers allows you to judge to approach works best for you.
Hilary Sumpter, CEO, YWCA Auckland
As the Chief Executive Officer of the YWCA Auckland I am in the privileged position of carrying the mantle for this venerable 125 year old organisation. We work with three main strands of activity; our Hostel, which is a social profit venture enabling our activities, our Voice, supporting and advocating for issues relating to women, and our Community Programmes; currently Future Leaders and Encore, programmes which empower women in different stages of their lives. As part of the largest women's organisation in the world we are active in coordinating and collaborating with other agencies to address both local and global issues facing today's world.
The Leadership New Zealand programme is an intensive year of connectedness and values building. This is an opportunity for me to grow more as a leader in terms of self-awareness and to have this reinforced by the calibre of speakers wer are presented with. There are distinct traits appearing as common to the inspirational leaders we have heard from, and as a person who has transitioned from the corporate world, I can see these traits are common across all sectors. For me, the greatest learning will be consolidating long term visioning with day to day proactive to issues local and national. I know too I will be positively enriched by my peers on the programme.
Dr Selina Tusitala Marsh, Poet, Tenured Lecturer, University of Auckland
I am a lecturer at the University of Auckland specialising in Pacific Literature, post-colonial literature and creative writing. Of Samoan, Tuvalu, English and French descent, I was the first Pacific Islander to graduate with a PhD from the English Department (2005) and recently supervised the department's first Fijian PhD to completion (2010). I am passionate about widening educational opportunties for Pacific peoples everywhere and often speak and perform my poetry at schools, both primary and secondary. Poetry is my passion and I believe that everyone has the 'right to write' and have their words heard. My own first (award winning) collection of poetry, Fast Talking PI (Auckland University Press) was published in 2009 and made the New Zealand Best Sellers List. I am currently working on a second manuscript.
My first epiphany occurred on the first retreat. I was a 'minority' on several layers in a workplace traditionally the domain of white, male, middle to upper-class, urban, academics: I was brown, female, a mother, loud and lived on an island! One of my lifelines was Audre Lorde's poetic call to embrace my otherness, to "Be Nobody's Darling/be an outcast". But in doing so, I had inadvertently cut off other lifelines; in fighting off stereotypes about me I had reinforced my own stereotypes about others. I had become combative in my thinking about my position in the workplace. At times there was good reason to be so; at other times, I was missing out on precious connections. Through resurrecting the lost art of deep conversation, the Leadership New Zealand programme allowed me to reconnect with the humanity in others that supercedes race, class or gender. Truly, a gift that keeps on giving within and beyond the workplace.