About Melissa
In Numbers
A little plotted history
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Melissa kicked off her career with global FMCG giant Gillette (now P&G) in the mid 1990s.
She then headed to the UK, working within months alongside McKinseys to strategically transform supermarket giant Safeway, delivering double NPAT YoY growth (and where she learned systems-design thinking).
She went on to spearhead strategic transformation programs in British Telecom (new media) and Prudential (strategic risk).
Returning to Aotearoa in 2002, Melissa took on the transformation of the product portfolios at global retail bank ANZ, as Head of Product, where she gained global recognition (and was part of the M&A team in the integration of National Bank).
She was then poached by global retail bank Westpac to do the same, finding herself at age 30 accountable for $50B funds, heading up four teams across all retail on/off balance sheet deposits and lending.
Melissa then took a strategic transformation role at The Warehouse to overhaul its marketing as Head of Marketing (with the country’s largest marketing budget), before being part of the design-led transformation of Air New Zealand.
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The second half… came in 2009 when Melissa jumped to the regenerative ‘bright side’.
She strategically transformed Ecostore, from hippy fringe to global cool, delivering lasting global growth and brand pedigree, with world leading bio-science and circular design solutions, before these things were given a name (and winning a suite of awards incl. NZ Transformation of the year).
In 2014 Melissa undertook the strategic transformation of World Vision, recruited to overturn a 30 year org. model for global roll out.
In 2017 Melissa set up her own private practice, working 1:1 to help regenerative businesses disrupt their worlds. Clients include The Icehouse and Miraka to GOs like Auckland Council to start ups like Ārepa, Acuite, Dr Feelgood, Leaderful and Circularity.
And in the last 10 years, Melissa has run a side gig in training exec leaders and entrepreneurs. Directly, and through Academy EX, and The Icehouse.
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In 2020 over lock downs Melissa went deep into 100 years of regenerative research.
In 2021, Melissa curated all the thinking with the models she's used as a practitioner to create the bones of the t.METHOD.
In 2022, she Beta tested it with her private clients and Masters students.
In 2022 she also began her own Masters of Science in Biomimicry.
In 2023 she calibrated the science with the t.METHOD, and synthesized all the thinking.
Now in 2024, she’s taking it public.
In other people’s words
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"Melissa transformed us into marketing-led company with aplomb. She transformed our product ranges, our brand, our design, our communications… that will serve us for years to come. Her winning awards is a testament to this transformation. She is leaving behind a strong platform for future growth."
Malcolm Rands, Founder ecostore
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“Melissa’s expertise in design-led thinking is outstanding. She is challenging, rigorous and super strategic, with an incisive understanding of an organization's un-realized potential. Her process was revelatory. The way I thought the organization delivered value wasn't correct. Both the challenge and the opportunity, were bigger. Her process brought this into sharp focus. Melissa operates at the top of her craft, with the upmost integrity.”
Dr Sandy Callister, Board member World Vision
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“Melissa’s energy, empathy and experience have led me to believe she is a real world walking Wonder Woman! Within a short-time frame Melissa was able to help me craft the right business plan and strong brand positioning to attract investment and move forward into early stage market entry. Without her help I would have struggled to get to where I am now!”
Angus Brown, Founder Ārepa
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“It is hard to express in words just how incredible my experience working with Melissa was. Her structured design-thinking program has given me a solid base to completely redesign my business. It has truly exceeded all of my expectations.”
Sophie Poelman, Founder Lof
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“Melissa is a super power. She serves up gold. Her process is a real gift - she has this amazing way of getting to the core essence of the challenge and building up the process to help you make quality decisions. Her insights and frameworks are world leading. It has led to a change in our agenda forward, and the results speak for themselves. She’s engaging, empathetic, purpose driven and challenging; and she cares deeply.”
Andy Hamilton, CEO The Icehouse
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"Melissa helped me discover potential I hadn’t even thought of. She has the unique ability to help connect the dots using her Regen Method which is a useful and easy framework to follow. This was hugely valuable for my business strategy and I’m so appreciative to her insights and energy.”
Jayne Chater, Founder JC, Altris and Professionelle
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"Melissa design thinking skills have been instrumental in helping us unlock our innovation potential. She has an uncanny ability to cut through big problems to identify what’s broken, what works and what can fly. She can see value potential and knows how to unlock it – both in the business and in people. I’d highly recommend her to any business leader wanting to reset and scale up their business"
Richard Wyeth, CEO Miraka
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"Melissa is the real deal. Bundled in an effervescent parcel of infectious optimism, Melissa has a rare ability to cut through rhetoric and business myths to pinpoint the true strategic, commercial, problems. Melissa settles for nothing less than excellence. She has an enviable know-how on all aspects of modern business practice to add to her capabilities as a stunning marketer."
Helen Carter, CEO Cancer Society
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"Melissa helped us define our place in the world. Where we want to play, the unmet market need and importantly- our superpowers. A powerful, robust and inspirational process. Melissa is a superpower of insight. Highly recommended!"
Dr Sue Watson, Founder Leaderful
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"Melissa is quite simply a world class design practitioner. Her work at World Vision has been critical to exposing core challenges and providing a clear strategic way forward. I'm consistently impressed with Melissa's ability to balance strategic and commercial demands within environments that are rapidly evolving.”
Abraham Gibson, Board member World Vision and tech entrepreneur
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"Melissa is a calm, holistic thinker. She can combine what are typically thought of as 'fluffy' concepts with quite a 'hard' edge of frameworks and outputs. It’s magic combo. She provides our Masters students with a way to see, and move through the complexity of a system. She gives order to the disorder and gets people unstuck. This is the key to momentum - forward motion. It's awesome!"
Sarah Hindle, GM Tech Futures Lab
Businesses Transformed
STRATEGY | INNOVATION | BUSINESS MODEL
In Melissa’s words
I created the t.METHOD in lockdowns, as I got pissed off by the greenwash hijack and this distorted reality field, masking truth. It wasn’t just that it was so wrong ethically, and so very wrong environmentally, it was that it ignored this huge growth opportunity for business innovation.
I wanted to help people see past the mirage. And tap into the opportunity. So I decided to scale up my side gig of training - because upskilling is the most empowering enabler for strategic change.
I utterly believe doing good is good business.
What I find so sexy about playing a disruptive regenerative game, is that it plays in this yummy intersection of biology, tech and innovation. Which means the potential goes exponential. And the hardwiring is built on abundance. Which I friggin love. Because, in this crazy arse world of ours, it feels like hope in a bowl for breakfast.
On the personal side
I live in Tāmaki Makaurau, Aotearoa (Auckland, NZ) with two crazy teenagers, one beautiful man, a cat who thinks she’s a dog, and a dog who thinks the cat is a sheep. Aotea, Great Barrier Island is my tūrangawaewae.
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I wish to acknowledge my ancestors whose mana I draw from. To my father Christopher Clement Wragge, second generation kiwi, who raised me as a tree hugger, and died, farewelled as kaumatua on his Waiheke marae for his life’s work fighting to protect the ecology of the Hauraki gulf.
To my great grandfather
, globally renowned meteorologist, botanist, ecologist, cosmologist and theosophist, and one of the first climate scientists. I am privileged to have been bequeathed his glass slides.
I wish to acknowledge my mother Eleanor Cave, first generation kiwi, descendent of Moses Austin, father of Stephen Fuller Austin (the “Father of Texas”). I walk in the footsteps of her wisdom, courage and compassion.
