#302 'Building Community By Design', Simone Woodland, Co-founder, Circle Living

Welcoming Simone Woodland, Co-founder of Circle Living, toPurposely Podcast. Simone is an architect and the co-founder of Circle Living,a people-first property development company building intergenerational, community-led neighbourhoods across New Zealand, with developments underway inWellington, Christchurch and Nelson. The idea is simple but not common in mainstream housing: design homes so people have their own privacy, while making it easy to connect with the people living around them. Originally from Bristol in the UK, Simone traces herinterest in community back to childhood, when her father ran street parties on their cul-de-sac to bring disconnected neighbours together. At 15 she helped build a house in a co-housing development in Bristol's St Werburgh's, an early,hands-on introduction to what community-built housing could look like. She studied architecture in Brighton and completed a mastersin urban design and planning at Bristol University, but found the traditional architecture industry limiting. Her early career as a social entrepreneur started with Paper Arts, a platform she built for students to showcase their work, which grew into a gallery, studios and a printing service, and eventually into a training facility teaching enterprise skills to young people. A trip around New Zealand's South Island in 2013 convincedSimone this was where she wanted to live. She moved through the Edmund Hillary Fellowship, joining its first cohort of global entrepreneurs focused on people and planet. That move led to Elemental Design and Build, a natural buildingcompany in the Tasman region working with materials like hemp, straw and earth, and eventually to the Takaka co-housing neighbourhood in Golden Bay. Simonetalks through how that first development came together: a 14 hectare piece of land secured with a 10 percent deposit, nine months to find the rest of the funding, and a model built on loans from future residents rather than a traditional developer structure. Circle Living builds on that experience with a differentfinancing model, allowing residents to buy off the plans with a deposit rather than putting large sums at risk upfront. The communities run on Sociocracy, a decentralised decision-making approach where smaller groups hold responsibilityfor specific areas rather than requiring full consensus on every decision.Simone talks candidly about what it takes to build trust within a community, why shared resources like community solar and car share schemes help keep ongoing costs down, and her long-term goal of seeing co-housing become a mainstream choice in New Zealand, in the way it already is in Denmark, where five percent of new homes are built as some form of collective housing. The conversation also gets into what community actuallydelivers day to day, including a moment when a neighbour drove ninety minutes each way to collect Simone's children after she was unable to drive, and what that kind of reciprocity means for the people who choose to live this way.

Welcoming Darrell Wade to Purposely Podcast. Darrell co-founded Intrepid Travel, one of the largestadventure travel companies in the world and a certified B Corp, built on the idea that travel should give something back to the places it touches. He is also Chair of Philanthropy Australia, the peak body working to build a strongerculture of giving across the country. The idea for Intrepid came together in 1988, on a nine monthoverland trip across Africa in a converted truck with a group of friends, including his now wife Anna and university mate Geoff “Manch” Manchester. Back in Australia, a good job with a strong salary was on offer. Darrell was ready to take it and put the travel company idea aside, until Anna told him he would be a pain in the ass unless he started the business. He did, expecting a 90 percent chance of failure. The company was bootstrapped on 20,000 dollars between the two founders, and the first five years were lean. Darrell talks candidly about the slow build, the early days running the entire business from a single desk while Manch led trips in Thailand, and the gradual shift from a lifestyle choice into a genuine company with a plan. A significant turning point came in 2011, when Intrepid solda 60 percent stake to Tui Group. Darrell describes the decision and the four years that followed as oil and water. The cultures were fundamentally incompatible, growth stalled, and in 2015 the founders unwound the deal. Within a month of separating, the business was growing again. He is direct about whathe took from it: financial logic is not enough if the culture does not hold together. Darrell also talks about the moment his thinking on climatechanged. Reading Tim Flannery's The Weather Makers on a family safari in Botswana, not long after Intrepid had won an award for responsible tourism, he realised the company was not the environmental good guy he thought it was. Hedescribes it plainly: they were part of the problem. That reckoning shaped Intrepid's climate work from there on, including taking the entire office and a thousand travellers to see An Inconvenient Truth. The conversation covers the depth of the COVID crash too.Intrepid went from operating in 120 countries to zero almost overnight, and the company had to make significant redundancies to survive. Darrell shares a moment from that day that has stayed with him: a staff member he had just maderedundant stopped him in the office and asked if he was okay. The episode closes on giving. Darrell sets out why Intrepidbuilt structured philanthropy into the business through The Intrepid Foundation, the case for corporate giving as something that benefits customers, staff and the business itself rather than a purely altruistic add-on, and his view on doing philanthropy thoughtfully rather than assuming good intentions are enough. He also speaks to his role as Chair of Philanthropy Australia, and what it means to govern a peak body trying to build a stronger, broader culture of giving across the country rather than leaving it concentrated among high net worth donors. This episode of Purposely is brought to you by Benevityand Trust Investments.Key Themes

In this Purposely Short, we revisit a four-minute segment from our full conversation with Liz Gibbs on how mission-driven organisations can fund and invest in innovation to grow their social impact.Liz points to examples like Eli Care to show what it takes for charities, social enterprises and philanthropic investors to move beyond one-off grants and take an investment-minded approach that still stays true to mission. She talks through how capital can be structured and partnered, so it supports good causes now while helping build sustainable, impact-led enterprises for the future.This one is useful for charity leaders, impact investors and funders working out where philanthropy, investment and innovation meet.Key themes• Why more funders are looking to invest in innovation and commercial models, not just rely on one-off grants• What Eli Care shows about blending commercial discipline with social mission• The capital and partnerships needed to back early-stage, impact-focused ventures• What boards and leadership teams should weigh up on risk, return and mission• How funding strategy can build long-term, community-level impact, not just short-term outputsThis episode of Purposely is brought to you by Benevity and Trust Investments

Welcoming Tara Arnold back to Purposely Podcast. Tara is a fundraising consultant, engaged by grant making charities including Unbound Philanthropy and Lloyds Bank Foundation to help small and mid sized nonprofits strengthen their income generation. This is her second appearance this year on the show, following an earlier conversation about her work in grant making at Sharegift, and this time the focus turns to what she sees from inside the charities she supports.Tara works through a funder plus model, where a grant comes bundled with an offer of consultancy support. With Unbound, that support is light touch and opt in, a follow up email after a grant is confirmed. With Lloyds, charities apply directly for up to six days of support across fundraising, finance, volunteering or governance. In both cases Tara is usually introduced at CEO or director level, working on strategy rather than day to day delivery, and she starts every relationship by listening before she advises.Much of the conversation centres on income diversification. Tara describes charities that dip into difficulty because they lean on a single funding stream, often grants, and never build anything alongside it. She talks through practical, lowcost ways to test new approaches, from a five minute ask at the end of an online event to reviewing untapped supporter bases the charity has never directly asked for money. She is blunt about the discomfort many charities feelaround fundraising itself, describing organisations with long term, loyal supporters who have simply never been asked to give.A recurring theme is the mismatch between expectation and resourcing. Tara has seen new fundraisers hired with no budget and an unspoken expectation that they raise their own salary in year one. She calls it insanity, and argues that if acharity cannot answer a straightforward question about budget and culture in an interview, that is a warning sign for any fundraiser considering the role. She also flags basics that get missed constantly, including no reserves policy, nofundraiser on the board, and donors thanked late or not at all.The conversation closes on stewardship, the unglamorous work of keeping donors and funders engaged after the money lands. Tara's examples are small and human, athirty second video from a charity worker, a short case study, a one line thank you email. None of it costs much. All of it, she says, is what actually keeps funding relationships alive.The funder plus model and how consultancy support gets triggered without being forced on charitiesWhy income diversification matters and how to test new fundraising approaches cheaplyThe real cost of underfunding a fundraiser's role, and what questions to ask before taking the jobGetting buy-in and a genuine fundraising culture across an organisation, not just the fundraising teamStewardship as the quiet, unglamorous work that keeps donors and funders engagedBasics that get missed: reserves policies, fundraiser representation on boards, and simply saying thank youThis episode of Purposely isbrought to you by Benevity and Trust Investments.Key Themes

In this SHORT episode of Purposely, we are back with SimonBowden, Head of Philanthropic Services at Forsyth Barr, on why investment firms are bringing philanthropy into the advisory relationship, and what that means in practice. Simon explains that demand from clients is a big part ofwhat is driving the shift. Generational wealth transfer is bringing people into the conversation who have a strong interest in how their money affects the world around them. Holistic financial advice, the kind that starts with what aperson actually cares about, naturally makes room for that conversation. He talks through how firms like Forsyth Barr handle thepracticalities. A regular distribution to a charity is straightforward. When it comes to larger gifts or capital, partnerships with community foundations anddonor advised funds mean the money can keep working in perpetuity while the advisor stays involved. It is a model that works for the client, the advisor and the organisations being supported. And when the giving conversation opens up, something elsehappens. Clients start talking about their values, what they care about, how their wealth was built and who they want to remember. Advisors who have known clients for years often come out of those conversations having learned thingsthey never knew. It deepens the relationship on both sides. •       Why investment firms are building philanthropicservices teams and what is driving client demand•       How donor advised funds and community foundations fitinto the advisory relationship•       Keeping capital working in perpetuity while supportinggood causes•       Generational wealth transfer and the shift in whatclients want from financial advice•       What opening up the giving conversation does for theadvisor-client relationship This episode of Purposely is brought to you by Benevity and Trust InvestmentsKey Themes

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Welcoming Shruthi Vijay Kumar, coach, facilitator andeducator based in Aotearoa New Zealand, to Purposely Podcast. Shruthi works with leaders and organisations trying to shiftfrom extractive to more regenerative ways of working. She draws on indigenous, eastern and western knowledge traditions to do it. She holds an MBA from Oxford, has worked with the World Economic Forum, taught at AUT, and foundedthe Fire Circle, a space for cross-cultural wisdom bringing together indigenous elders from around the world with leaders in business, education and community. This conversation starts with pain. Shruthi was a highachiever who found her way into a blue chip consulting firm in Melbourne, only to be sat down by a senior partner and told her performance was not where it needed to be. She talks openly about what that did to her, the tears, thecollapse of external validation, and the long process of rebuilding a sense of worth that did not depend on how a company reviewed her every few months. Thatexperience, she says, set her free. Rather than waiting for conditions to change or for someone to give her permission, she left and went to India to work for a small education startup trying to reimagine curriculum throughstorytelling. It was, she says, the most aligned she had ever felt. From there, a career took shape that sits at the intersection of inner work and outer impact. Shruthi trained as a coach fromher mid-twenties, drawn to a discipline that holds space for people to find their own answers rather than being told what to think. She is clear that the most important thing she has brought to that work is her own inner journey, including time in ashrams in India, with a mindfulness community in theCoromandel, and with spiritual teachers whose presence, she says, has helped her meet the grief and pain that clients bring. The Fire Circle grew out of the COVID period, when Shruthiand three colleagues from Australia, New York and Arnhem Land asked what it would look like to elevate indigenous and pre-colonial wisdom in conversations about business, leadership and how to build back differently. The circle nowhas eight or nine elders from around the world. It has run online gatherings, retreats with climate leaders, and guest lectures at business schools. The animating idea is that nature is not one priority among many. It is the foundation on which everything else rests. This episode of Purposely is brought to you by Benevityand Trust Investments.

In this SHORT episode of Purposely, we are back with HelenHughes, Chief Executive of Sanctuary Mountain Mangatautari, on what she found when she lifted the bonnet on one of New Zealand's most remarkable conservation organisations, and what she did about it. Helen was the seventh CE in twelve years when she arrived.Three months in, she started asking basic questions about how the place was funded, and the answers were not good. The sanctuary had been running at an operating loss of around $50,000 a month, masked by grant funding landing atirregular intervals. At its lowest point, there were two weeks of cash flow left. On top of that, Helen had inherited a team that had grown disconnected under a previous leader who was working remotely and part-time. Her response was to go to media. She sat with her teamfirst, told them what she was about to do, and went public with the financial reality. It was not an easy call, and it was the right one. Philanthropic funders responded with around $250,000, which bought time and breathing room.But Helen was clear that a rescue was not a strategy. The sanctuary needed to stand on its own feet. Since then, she has been building new revenue streamsalongside the core grant funding. Tourism is the biggest opportunity: 300 visitors a day at full capacity would bring in $3.5 to $4 million annually. An education programme now brings 6,000 students a year through the sanctuary,with global virtual tours being explored. On-site accommodation generates $40,000 a year through Airbnb. A native nursery, recently taken commercial, is expected to add $90,000 to $100,000 annually, growing rare trees most nurseries cannot access. And then there is the biodiversity credit programme, builton work started by a previous CE and developed with Sean Weaver at Ecos. It is the only accredited programme within the International Biodiversity Credit Alliance, listed on a major international carbon trading platform within a weekof applying. The model turns the sanctuary's annual operating costs into priced units of conservation work that can be sold to the market. It is early days, but it is genuinely new ground. •       Walking into a funding crisis: what Helen found threemonths into the role•       The decision to go public with financial difficulty,and why it was the right call•       Why grant dependency is not a strategy, and what to doabout it•       Tourism, education, accommodation and nursery: buildingdiversified revenue•       Biodiversity credits: how the sanctuary became theworld's only accredited programme•       What it takes to turn an operating loss of $700,000into near break-even in one yearKey Themes

Welcoming back Tara Arnold, Head of Grant Making at ShareGift, to Purposely Podcast. Sharegift is a UK charity built around an idea most people have never heard of: collecting donated shareholdings that are too small to sell, pooling them together and distributing the proceeds to good causes. The model was created thirty years ago by founder Claire McIntosh, a stockbroker who noticed the waste sitting in small, unwanted share parcels. Today, a team of five has given away close to 70 million pounds, with all grants unrestricted and no impact reports required. When Tara rings a charity to let them know money is coming, she hears the relief in their voices. Tara also works as a fundraising consultant, supporting small charities through Unbound Philanthropy and Lloyds Bank Foundation. It means she understands the funding relationship from both sides, and that perspective runs through everything she talks about in this episode. Her fundraising career started in 2001 with face-to-face fundraising, moved through trusts and legacy roles, and sharpened into a specialism around compelling grant applications. Her thesis has always been that good proposal writing is part craft and part alchemy. You collect everything you need, you speak to the people whose lives the work touches, and then you bring it all together into something that reads as human. That last part, she says, is what most applications get wrong. If it does not feel human, you will not get a look in. This episode is full of practical insight for anyone working in fundraising or grant making. Tara talks about how Sharegift actually finds charities to support, and it is not always through traditional channels. She describes discovering organisations through Google searches, LinkedIn and even maps. She talks about the reality of pitching to funders, including a memorable moment in a room at St James's Place Foundation where she clocked that her ten-page proposal had been reduced to a single paragraph, and had to think fast. Her advice: always recap your project at the start of a pitch, regardless of what you think the panel has already read. She is also candid about the state of the UK charity funding environment right now. She started fundraising just before the 2008 financial crash, and says that felt like child's play compared to what smaller organisations are facing today. Frontline charities are dealing with rising costs, shrinking grant rounds and funders changing criteria mid-cycle. Against that backdrop, the unrestricted, no-application model that Sharegift runs feels more valuable than ever. The conversation closes on the funder-plus model, where grant makers offer capacity building alongside financial support. Tara's consulting work sits squarely in that space, helping small charities strengthen their income generation, review applications, sharpen their storytelling and think harder about stewardship. Her recurring observation from across all of it: most charities just need to do the basics well. Read what the funder has asked for, and do that. Key Themes - How Sharegift works and why unrestricted, no-application funding matters more than ever - The alchemy of a great grant application and why human writing beats polished writing - How Sharegift finds charities, and what that tells fundraisers about their digital presence - Pitching to funders: what really happens to your proposal before it reaches the room - The UK funding crisis and what it feels like from inside a grant making charity Funder-plus models and the case for investing in fundraising capability This episode of Purposely is brought to you by Benevity and Trust Investments.

In this SHORT episode of Purposely, we are back with Gary Stannett, CEO of the Rio Ferdinand Foundation, on the realities of setting up and running a charity attached to a famous name, and why getting it right matters far more than most people realise.Gary is direct about something the sector doesn't always say out loud: putting a well-known name on a charity is a brave thing to do. Charities are more publicly exposed than most organisations. Anyone can look up the finances, the governance, the trustees. When the name above the door belongs to someone famous, that scrutiny goes up considerably.He talks through how the foundation came together. Gary had crossed paths with Rio Ferdinand when Rio was playing at West Ham and Gary was running programmes in nearby Elephant and Castle in South London. When Rio started exploring the idea of setting up a charity, Gary found himself in the room helping explain how it would actually work, including pushing back on assumptions about government funding that weren't going to materialise. The introduction was informal, the process was long, and what Gary told Rio at the start turned out to be true: the foundation would look very different in the long run from what anyone imagined at the beginning.A lot of athlete-led charities, Gary explains, either go quiet or wind up fairly quickly. Often it comes down to the athlete not fully understanding what running a charity actually involves, or not having the right people around them from the start. The Rio Ferdinand Foundation took a deliberate approach to building its board, reviewing trustee skills every year and making sure key areas are covered: legal, financial, youth and community development, civil rights, business, and higher education. It is not the most glamorous part of the work, but Gary is clear it is the foundation that makes everything else possible.The broader point Gary makes is one that applies well beyond celebrity charities. Setting up a charity sounds straightforward. It rarely is. The governance responsibilities, the public scrutiny, the financial oversight, and the ongoing need for care and momentum, none of it switches off once you start. Anyone thinking about it needs to go in with their eyes open.Key Themes• Why putting a famous name on a charity raises the stakes for governance and scrutiny• How the Rio Ferdinand Foundation came together, and what Gary told Rio at the start• Why many athlete-led charities struggle or close, and what makes the difference