Waikato Business News May/June 2018

WAIKATO BUSINESS NEWS May/June 2018 51
Former Momentum
boss wins Edmund
Hillary Fellowship
Waikato woman Cheryl Reynolds is one of
only nine Kiwis who has been accepted
into the Edmund Hillary Fellowship (EHF),
alongside 30 others from around the world.
The EHF is a lifelong fellowship
that starts with
a three-year programme.
The aim is to build a community
of visionary entrepreneurs,
investors and startup teams to
create positive global impact
from New Zealand by helping
them bring their purpose-driven
ventures to life.
“It is very much focused
on challenging the status quo,
building new paradigms, solving
pressing global problems,
and impacting the course of
humanity,” says Cheryl.
“New Zealand is a country
where you can incubate ideas
and then launch them to the
global stage.”
The programme began in
April where the 39 fellows met
for the first time and spent seven
days “glamping” together in
Aroha Valley, near Upper Hutt.
Cheryl says they spent their
days learning in a geodesic
dome and spent nights around
the campfire sharing stories,
knowledge, experiences and
wisdom from all the different
cultures and backgrounds
among them.
“It was very grounding, and
such an extraordinary experience.”
For many of the international
fellows, it was their first
time to New Zealand, so as a
group they were introduced to
Tikanga Māori, learnt about
Māori history, and were taught
the haka. Cheryl says that even
though she has lived here for 15
years, she learnt a lot and that
it was a wonderful experience.
“It was an important way to
begin the fellowship, it was the
right way and values-driven,”
she says.
After the week-long retreat,
they all attended New Frontiers,
a three-day conference
where the group kicked things
off by performing the haka they
had learnt, to welcome the 300
guests.
Each fellow shared their
story and heard from other
global thinkers and change
makers.
The fellowship will meet up
again in November however
they connect with each other
almost every day online and
regularly catch up in person.
Cheryl says the timing of the
fellowship could not be more
Successful trading
debut for NFX
The inaugural Natural Fibre
Exchange (NFX) trading
event in May attracted
strong participation with 96 percent
of the wool on offer sold.
The newly launched NFX
is an innovative independent
online trading platform for natural
fibres, with an initial focus on
New Zealand wool.
NFX shareholders Wools
of New Zealand (WNZ) and
Alliance Group are working
with CRA International, a
global leader in online trading
platforms which designed the
NFX platform and manages the
trading events as NFX Trading
Manager.
Rosstan Mazey, WNZ chief
executive and NFX spokesperson
said the first trading event
on May 22 attracted a good
cross section of New Zealand’s
major wool buyers, while six
significant sellers provided lots
for sale. “It’s a new platform
for wool buyers and sellers, it’s
intuitive and initial feedback has
been positive. We are excited
perfect as she begins the journey
for her next entrepreneurial
venture. She currently has 11
successful ventures under her
belt and has 15 years’ experience
in the New Zealand’s
start-up scene.
Her entrepreneurial journey
began in her 20’s with her first
project – Focal Point Gallery,
a highly energised contemporary
public art gallery, which
is thriving to this day in the
United Kingdom where Reynolds
grew up.
After several successful
ventures in the UK including
a number of social enterprises,
Cheryl moved to New Zealand
in 2003. She calls Waikato
home and says living in Raglan
is her “paradise on Earth”.
She has since established
herself as a leading entrepreneur,
founding SODA Inc as
an entrepreneurship hub and
award-winning start-up business
incubator programme.
From SODA Inc, she also
co-founded Innes48, named
after the pioneering 1900s
Waikato entrepreneur, Mary
Jane Innes. Innes48 is a 48-hour
high energy start-up competition,
which is the largest event
of its kind in New Zealand with
$15,000 in prize money up for
grabs.
More recently, Cheryl
founded Momentum Waikato,
a philanthropic foundation
that pools donor funds and
about the potential for adding
efficiency and value to the buying
and selling process - we look
forward to additional industry
support as we progress.”
Brad Miller, CRA vice president
and auctions & competitive
bidding practice leader
said the first live event had gone
smoothly with bidders bidding
actively round by round. “Similar
to CRA’s other trading platforms
for agricultural products
including GlobalDairyTrade
and CranberryAuction, NFX
provides a trusted and transparent
selling and buying marketplace.”
Cheryl Reynolds
distributes grants strategically
to projects that can achieve
transformational intergenerational
change in Waikato.
Momentum’s projects include
the Waikato Regional Theatre,
and the three social enterprise
projects selected to share the
Foundation’s first $1 million
distribution through the Vital
Impact Programme.
During her time at Momentum
Waikato, Cheryl began
participating in the Community
and Enterprise Leadership
Foundation (CELF) programme,
which brings together
businesses and community
not-for-profit organisations to
increase the leadership capital
of the Waikato region.
“CELF is a wonderful programme,
and I am very grateful
for my sponsor support
from Foster Construction. The
co-founders of CELF, David
Irvine, Bernie Crosby and John
Cook, have designed a truly
brilliant model that matches
for-purpose with for-profit
leaders who go on a shared
learning journey together. I’ve
never seen anything like it in
the world, it’s unique and it’s
brilliant that it’s happening here
in Waikato,” she says.
Cheryl says being a part of
the 2018 CELF Elevate programme
has been a “personal
revolution” due to learning
about her own strengths through
the Gallup strengths finder tool.
“I’ve spent my career looking
outwards at problems,
solutions, and impacts, but I’ve
never really looked inwardly at
myself, except when looking at
my own weaknesses.”
“What the strength finder
tool enabled me to do in a way
that I’ve never understood
before, was to focus on my
strengths, and the strengths of
others, and how to leverage and
optimise them.”
It is something that resonated
with her, so much so that
she introduced this learning
technique to her former team
before leaving Momentum
Waikato, as well as speaking
about it at a recent workshop.
“If you know your top
strengths, you can work with
them and amplify them, but
if you don’t know them then
you’re likely to be stumbling
around in the dark in many
ways, because you’re unaware
of what your full potential is.
“And because we’re all
humble leaders, we don’t tend
to really look at ourselves other
than to look at our own weaknesses.
We pay far too much
attention to those, whereas we
really should focus more on our
strengths.”
Cheryl left Momentum
Waikato in December 2017,
to begin start-up venture number
12, which will combines
her love of creativity, strategic
philanthropy and social entrepreneurship.
The aim is to build a new
philanthropic foundation as a
creative social enterprise that
generates smart capital and
makes it easy and rewarding for
people to contribute to building
a better world. She is currently
in development mode and is
looking for potential co-founders
and digital platform partners
for her new venture.
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