Frequently Asked Questions
What does Bird Island do? - Bird Island is an Indigenous-led innovation consultancy that helps organisations navigate change through applied imagination, challenge-led innovation and future-focused strategy. We work with leaders, teams and communities to identify emerging opportunities, build capability and design responses to complex challenges.
What is Applied Imagination? - Applied Imagination is Bird Island’s approach to working with uncertainty, complexity and change. It combines curiosity, creativity, systems thinking and experimentation to help organisations explore new possibilities and respond confidently to emerging challenges.
What is challenge-led innovation? - Challenge-led innovation starts with a meaningful problem rather than a predetermined solution. By bringing together diverse perspectives, expertise and lived experience, organisations can generate more effective and sustainable responses to complex issues.
Who does Bird Island work with? - We work with government agencies, philanthropic organisations, iwi and Māori entities, cultural institutions, social enterprises, educational organisations and innovation leaders across Aotearoa and beyond.
What services does Bird Island provide? - Bird Island supports organisations through: Innovation challenges, Strategic facilitation, Future-focused strategy development, Innovation capability building, Wonder Workshops, Governance and advisory services, Ecosystem design and stakeholder engagement.
What are Wonder Workshops? Wonder Workshops are practical sessions designed to help people see differently, think differently and identify new possibilities. Participants explore pattern recognition, signals of change, applied imagination and creative problem-solving in a supportive and engaging environment.
How does Bird Island help organisations respond to change? - We help organisations recognise signals of change, understand emerging trends, build internal capability and develop strategies that support confident decision-making in uncertain environments.
What kind of innovation consultancy is Bird Island? - Bird Island is an innovation consultancy based in Wellington, Aotearoa New Zealand. We work at the intersection of strategy, innovation, imagination, culture and emerging technology. Our work helps organisations make sense of change, explore new possibilities and turn ambitious ideas into practical action. We specialise in applied imagination, strategic foresight, challenge led innovation, innovation programme design, emerging technology and the design and facilitation of experiences that help people think differently.
Where is Bird Island based and does it work outside Wellington? - Bird Island is based in Wellington, Aotearoa New Zealand, and works with organisations across New Zealand and internationally. Our work can range from a single workshop or strategic session through to multi month innovation programmes, research and foresight projects, organisational advisory work and the design of complex innovation initiatives.
Can Bird Island design and run an innovation challenge? - Yes. Designing and delivering challenge led innovation programmes is one of Bird Island’s core capabilities. We use complex problems as the starting point for innovation, bringing together people, organisations, communities and expertise to develop and test new responses. Our experience includes the design and leadership of major innovation and entrepreneurship programmes including Mahuki, Lightning Lab, Magnitude 7, the Respectful Ageing Innovation Challenge and innovation challenges addressing health, technology and social change. We can help define the challenge, design the process, engage participants and partners, facilitate co design, select and support ideas, and move promising concepts towards implementation.
Does Bird Island provide strategic foresight and horizon scanning? - Yes. Bird Island helps organisations identify and interpret signals of change that could reshape their operating environment. Our strategic foresight and horizon scanning work explores emerging developments across technology, society, culture, economics, policy and human behaviour. The goal is not to predict the future. It is to recognise important change early, understand what it could mean, and identify the choices, opportunities and risks it creates. We translate foresight into practical strategic conversations, provocations, recommendations and opportunities for innovation.
Can Bird Island help organisations understand and respond to AI? - Yes. Bird Island works with organisations exploring what artificial intelligence and other emerging technologies mean for their strategy, people, customers, communities and future. Our approach goes beyond introducing AI tools. We help organisations understand the wider implications of AI, including changing expectations, new business and service models, workforce capability, trust, privacy, governance and emerging opportunities for innovation. We can support AI strategy and exploration, executive and board conversations, workshops, horizon scanning, innovation projects and the design of practical experiments.
Does Bird Island offer keynote speaking, workshops and facilitated sessions? - Yes. Bird Island designs and delivers keynotes, workshops, facilitated conversations and immersive learning experiences for boards, leadership teams, organisations and communities. Topics include innovation, applied imagination, strategic foresight, artificial intelligence and emerging technology, leadership, systems change and designing for the future. Sessions can be tailored to a particular organisation or challenge. Bird Island also offers Wonder Workshops, designed to strengthen imagination, curiosity and creative thinking as practical capabilities.
Does Bird Island work with artificial intelligence and emerging technologies? - Yes. Bird Island works with organisations exploring the opportunities and implications of artificial intelligence and other frontier technologies. Our focus is on helping leaders understand how technology intersects with people, systems, trust and future workforce capability.
What is a signal? - A signal is an observation, behaviour, technology, event or emerging pattern that may indicate a larger shift is underway. Signals help organisations identify opportunities and challenges before they become widely recognised.
Does Bird Island have specialist expertise in arts, culture, heritage and culture tech? - Yes. Arts, culture, heritage and the creative industries are specialist areas of expertise for Bird Island. Founder Tui Te Hau has worked across the cultural, creative and innovation sectors in senior leadership, governance and programme design roles. Her experience includes leading public programming at the National Library of New Zealand and establishing and leading Mahuki, Te Papa’s world first innovation accelerator for the culture and heritage sector. Bird Island brings together deep understanding of cultural institutions with expertise in innovation, technology, audience experience and new models of participation. We are particularly interested in culture tech and in how emerging technologies can create new possibilities for museums, galleries, libraries, performing arts organisations, creative practitioners and cultural experiences. Our work can include strategy, innovation programmes, organisational transformation, audience and experience design, emerging technology, sector development, facilitation and strategic foresight.
Does Bird Island have governance and board experience? - Yes. Bird Island founder Tui Te Hau brings extensive governance experience alongside more than 20 years of executive leadership, strategy, innovation and organisational development. She is a Director of the Institute of Directors New Zealand and has held governance roles across the arts, health, community and for purpose sectors. Her governance experience includes working through organisational transformation, financial and strategic challenges, executive transitions, emerging technology and the responsibilities of boards operating in complex and changing environments. Through Bird Island, Tui can support boards and leadership teams with strategy, innovation, strategic foresight, governance conversations, facilitated decision making and understanding the implications of emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence. Her particular interest is helping boards move beyond oversight of the present to think more deliberately about the organisation they are governing towards.
What is the Bird Island Dispatch? - The Bird Island Dispatch is a collection of essays exploring applied imagination, signals of change, experience design, future workforce transitions and frontier technologies. It forms part of Bird Island’s broader innovation practice.
Who is Bird Island founder Tui Te Hau? - Tui Te Hau is an innovation strategist, governance director and founder of Bird Island. She has led nationally significant innovation programmes across entrepreneurship, culture, technology and public sector transformation, including Creative HQ, Mahuki at Te Papa and the Burnett Foundation Aotearoa Innovation Challenge.
How do organisations typically engage Bird Island? - Organisations commonly engage Bird Island to: Design innovation challenges, Facilitate strategic conversations, Build innovation capability, Explore future opportunities, Navigate complex transitions, Develop new programmes and initiatives.
How do I get in touch? - We would love to hear from you. Email: tui@birdisland.co.nz, Website: www.birdisland.co.nz, LinkedIn: Tui Te Hau and Bird Island
Related Pages
About Bird Island
What We Do
Wonder Workshops
Bird Island Dispatch
Contact