Working Together
Not a service menu.
An open-handed invitation.
The problems I care about most — the ones worth spending a working life on — are too large and too entangled for any one person, any one discipline, or any one organisation to solve alone. That's not a limitation. It's the nature of complex systems. And it means the only viable response is a complex, adaptive one: people across these systems, working together.
I'm not looking for work. I have active ventures and meaningful projects that keep me fully engaged. But I'm always open to collaboration with people who share a sense of what matters — whether that's a consulting engagement, a joint venture, a research partnership, or something we haven't named yet.
Over the past decade I've developed a way of working that integrates things that are usually kept apart.
I facilitate
Helping groups think together, navigate disagreement, and find ways forward that no one could have found alone. Trained in complexity facilitation and grounded in Elinor Ostrom's Nobel Prize-winning work on how groups successfully manage shared resources — and what conditions make that possible.
I advise
Bringing strategic perspective to complex projects and organisations, particularly where technical, social, and ecological dimensions are entangled — which is to say, everywhere that matters.
I lead
Stepping into hands-on project leadership where needed — not as an outside expert, but as someone willing to get into the work alongside a team and see things through.
I coach
Supporting individuals navigating leadership in complex environments. Not as a standalone service, but woven into the work where it adds value.
I build
The most convincing argument I can make is the things I've been involved in building. From Passive House cohousing communities to iwi housing joint ventures — the work speaks.
"Ben's blend of experience working with large organisations and lone individuals gives his approach a versatility that was really helpful to my team. He understood both the macro context we were working in, as well as the micro of each individual's learning and growth journey to get us where we wanted to go. Ben's coaching of our team was informed by industry-leading models, backed by experience, and communicated in a way that got our whole team excited and engaged."
— Lindsey Brown, Australia Water Sector Lead, GHD