Mindshop Excellence

In July 2024, Sudburys hosted the inaugural Mindshop Excellence programme in New Zealand. This week-long experience was designed to equip high school students with the problem-solving and strategy tools that Sudburys uses daily with our clients.

The Mindshop Excellence programme, which originated in Australia and has been facilitated worldwide, is part of the Mindshop network that Sudburys has been proudly involved with for over 12 years.

Through an application process, five Year 11 students from Whangarei Girls High School were selected to participate. They immersed themselves in a real-world business challenge, gaining valuable insights that will extend well beyond the five-day programme.

Programme Details
The programme took place over five days, Monday to Friday, during the July school holidays. As the host, Sudburys aimed to provide these students with hands-on experience in applying strategic tools to solve a genuine business problem.

Learning the Tools
The week began with an introduction to our team, followed by an intensive session where the students were trained in key Mindshop problem-solving and strategy tools. Our Mindshop-certified Directors, Steve Sudbury, Nikita Tomlinson and Justin Moore, facilitated the training, ensuring the students were well-prepared to meet their client and tackle the upcoming challenge.

The real-world challenge
Enter the student’s client for the week – Northland Rugby Union. Their task? Develop a strategy to leverage Northland Rugby Union's networks for a NZ Police recruitment drive. The challenge was no small task. Over 500 frontline police leave the force every year due to retirement or a change of vocation. Northland alone is 51 police officers short of where it should be and will need to bridge this gap by the end of 2025. With the government recently announcing a $226m funding boost to recruit staff, Northland Rugby wanted to explore how they could use their reach to help Northland Police hit their regional target.

This challenge required students to think creatively, consider the barriers to recruiting in Northland specifically and apply the tools they had just learned. Over the next three days, the students applied various strategy tools to their project. Each day they checked in with the Sudburys team for guidance but the project remained student led - they brainstormed, strategized, and developed a comprehensive plan.

Final Day: Presentation and Success
The week culminated on Friday with the students presenting their project to an audience, including our Sudburys staff, the client (Northland Rugby Union), their families, and school staff including Principal, Sonya Lockyer. They demonstrated the value of the tools they had learned, providing a thorough plan to address the recruitment challenge and outlining actionable recommendations.

We were heartened to see the next generation of young leaders embrace the Mindshop tools and run with them! It gave us great hope for the future. Given the success of this inaugural programme, Sudburys are excited to continue offering Mindshop Excellence annually.

Our sincere thanks to the Mindshop Excellence team in Australia for their support, Whangarei Girls High School and Northland Rugby Union.