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Water
Holding a Mic

Our Guests

Here is some more information about the wonderful people who have graced our Podcast. 

 

We are truly inspired by all of these people and humbly thank them for their generosity and their time.

Click on the image and be taken to Spotify so you can listen to their interview.

Cheers!!

Episode 001 - Simon Hawkes (Hawkes)

In today's episode AD interviews Hawkes one-on-one to get an understanding of what makes him tick. It gives me great pleasure to introduce my co-host and good friend Simon Hawkes. I have known Hawkes for approximately 13yrs, and I can honestly say you won’t find a better man, and I am privileged to work with him on this podcast.

Simon comes from regional NSW - and is a qualified Environmental Engineer. Despite being from NSW, a majority of his engineering career has involved worked closely with water utilities in South Queensland, such as Logan Water and Gold Coast Water. He has recently started with AECOM as a Principal Civil Engineer in their Brisbane Water office. He is heavily motivated and passionate about contributing to the betterment of the water sector and its growing attempt to ‘go circular’- in general attempting to reduce the consumption and waste of the water industry and focus on the renewable and reusable elements of our industry. He loves working in an industry that can take ‘waste streams’ and make them ‘revenue’ streams, and how the industry can reduce the stresses that humankind place on our planet. He is committed to encourage this focus to grow now and evermore into the future. On a personal front, he is a great family man, and is father to one daughter.

He is a self-proclaimed a “sporting-tragic”, who loves his Canberra Raiders and cricket in all forms.

He is also a made keen DIY-er, although I haven’t seen any sign of too many photos of his skill in this area.

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Simon Hawkes

Episode 002 - Anthony Domanti (AD)

Today we gain an insight into Anthony's background in Water, his passions and inspiration, and motivation for the The Good Drop. Hope you enjoy listening! I'd like to introduce to you my fellow co-host and good friend Anthony Domanti, aka AD. As AD has mentioned earlier, we've known each other going on 13 years, of which we spent about 11 1/2 working together on a long term project. For anyone who's met AD you'll appreciate he's a guy who wears his heart on his sleeve. He's very passionate about everything he does, whether it his day-to-day engineering, his passion for wine making, barbecuing or playing a round of golf.

He's also a fiercely proud Italian, which is often on display through his love for all things food and wine, barracking for the gli Azzurri or keeping alive memories of youth on his Vespa (although I think it's been a little while between rides).

What stands out most for me with Anthony is his love of a good story, and his desire to hear one, which brings out his inquisitive nature. There's been too many times to count when AD has started a conversation with 'Did I ever tell you about... ' leading into a long and colorful story, and I think he's really going to bring this out of our interviewees.

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Anthony Domanti

Episode 003 - Steve Posselt

In today’s episode, Hawkes and AD sit down with Climate Activist and Sustainability Champion – Steve Posselt.

Steve’s water journey has been truly amazing.  He started his Civil Engineering career at Sydney Water before working in the UK and Libya. After returning to Australia, he made his mark establishing a successful penstock manufacturing company at Ipswich.

Following that venture, at the age of 54 after a life changing moment, he decided to save the world by raising awareness about climate change via kayaking. He has travelled on his kayak throughout Australia, USA, UK and France. He has also written two books on his kayaking journey’s “Cry Me a River” and “Tough Is Not Enough”

He is also the Immediate Past Chair of the Sustainable Engineering Society which have been working with Engineers Australia to come to grips with the urgency for climate change action.

His passion for doing whatever he can to provide a better world for his grandchildren, truly inspires us.

We hope you enjoy the podcast.

Steve Posselt

Episode 004 - Maddy English

This interview is with Maddy English, who has a dual management role at KPMG in Sydney.  She is a Manager in the Engineering Assets and Project Delivery team, and a Divisional Environment, Social and Governance (ESG for short) Manager for Infrastructure.

Maddy is an active member of AWA’s Young Professional committee in NSW who has championed the mentoring program and developed a Sustainability Action Plan, both of which have shaped the committee’s focus. She regularly promotes activities such as Plastic Free July, Women in Engineering, and World Ocean Day.

Maddy is a dynamic professional and loves collaborating with people of all different backgrounds and skills. Through this collaboration she is committed to promoting circular economy actions as part of the Environmental Social and Governance (ESG) agenda.

Madeline English

Episode 005 - Todd Battley

Todd Battley is AECOM’s Chief Strategy Officer and former Chief Executive Officer of AECOM’s Australia and New Zealand (ANZ) region. This was somewhat of a reunion for AD and Todd, having been classmates at James Cook University in Townsville, which they both attended for their University studies – 25 years ago! 

Hawkes & AD sat down for a conversation with Todd to learn a little bit more about himself and his career at one of the world’s largest consultancy firms and asked him about topics such as Leadership and his own personal experience, championing Equality and Diversity in the workplace and the challenges involved in bringing the world into the digital age (in the engineering context). 

Todd Battley

Episode 006 - Ian Cameron

This episode of The Good Drop is a conversation with Ian Cameron, a retired Civil Engineer with 34 years experience in the Water Industry. Hawkes & AD wanted to have this conversation with Ian largely because of the impact Ian has had on our individual water journeys, and to highlight Ian’s amazing contribution back to the industry through his Mentoring and Volunteering work that he still continues today.

Ian has had a long involvement with Engineers Australia as a mentor through their formal mentoring program, as a Rotarian Ian has been involved with provision of essential water schemes in Papua New Guinea (and still is) and has also had involvement with the charity Bridges to Prosperity in providing critical access to remote communities. On top of this Ian is part of a weekly Bushcare group providing native species regeneration and is a keen apiarist (of native bees). Ian has great stories to share about his professional, volunteering and mentoring experience which we hope you enjoy listening to as much as we enjoyed having Ian as our guest.

Ian Cameron

Episode 007 - Sally Prosser

Sally Prosser is a Voice and Public Speaking Coach, a qualified speech and drama teacher, former TV news reporter, former media spokesperson and Host of ‘That Voice’ podcast (phew!). 

Hawkes & AD had a conversation with Sally about some of the ideas that have probably haunted us all at some point in time – the ability to communicate clearly and concisely. 

As engineers we’ve both experienced the pressure of speaking to crowds of different levels of technical proficiency, and the difficulties of being able to perform under the pressure of the spotlight and get the message across to our audience without things going completely pear shaped! (no expert claim here whatsoever!). 

Given Sally’s background as Voice and Speaking coach, along with a dash of Water Industry experience as a former media spokesperson for Urban Utilities, we thought Sally would be a fantastic guest to give us some practical pointers and talk to us about some of the things that may plague us when it comes to communicating. We weren’t wrong – Sally has a wealth of tips and interesting stories, it was fantastic to chat with her and get a crash course on improving some of our communication skills.

We were thrilled to have Sally as our 007 Undercover Agent, we really hope you enjoy this conversation.

Sally Prosser

Episode 008 - Dr Tom Connor (AO)

Dr Tom Connor is a retired Structural Engineer, former Vice President of Technology in KBR’s Infrastructure and Minerals Unit, Former National President of the Institution of Engineers Australia (now Engineers Australia), Recipient of Officer of the Order of Australia (AO), 1999 Queensland Engineer of the Year, Recipient of the Peter Nicol Russell Medal (EA’s highest award for technical contributions to the engineering profession), former Chair Of the Queensland Sustainable Energy Advisory Council and former Chair of the Australian Building Energy Council, to name just a few of the things Dr Tom has been recognised for over the course of his illustrious career. 

AD was fortunate to have worked under Dr Tom during a time earlier on in his career at Kinhill (now KBR), and we were able to have a wide-ranging conversation with Dr Tom regarding his many professional undertakings, from his credentials and work overseas, contributing as Director to several appointments to ventures for International Aid addressing Disaster and Flood Recovery. He was responsible for the development of some of the earliest approaches to 2D flood modelling of river and floodplains in Australia, developing one of the first 2D flooding modelling softwares which was used as one of the only of its kind during the early advent of the field of computational finite element analysis for this modelling approach. 

Dr Tom was also at the forefront of some of the industry’s earliest approaches to advancing renewable energy, and energy and emission minimisation, and was responsible for development at the strategic level on climate change adaptation and sustainability when they were barely new buzzwords in the industry. Dr Tom was undertaking research and publishing papers as far back as 1988 urging sensible and reasoned considerations to an adaptive approach towards climate change so as to minimise the impact of climate change influences, and plan and design for implementation of projects to directly address this.

Dr Tom has also been involved in major initiatives for energy efficiencies and clean energy sources in Australia. He has been Chair of the Australian Building Energy Council which had its mission to reduce the energy requirements in Australian buildings. He was invited by the Queensland Government in 2000 to chair its Environmental Protection Agency’s Sustainable Energy Innovation Fund (QSEIF).

Dr Tom has achieved some unbelievable successes throughout his career which both Hawkes & AD felt extremely fortunate to be able to speak with him about and share with you. We hope you enjoy listening, Dr Tom is an inspirational yet extremely humble person, and one whose success is unparalleled. 

Dr Tom Connor AO

Episode 009 - Natalie Muir

Natalie (Nat) Muir is Cardno (now Stantec)’s General Manager for Water & Environment. Hawkes & AD sat down with Nat to get her take on things that are important to us all, such as how to eke out a Work / Life balance (is it ever?) and how to handle Leadership. We discussed some of these important aspects with Nat, including her personal journey in Water, how she manages the everyday juggle, her successes and her challenges.

Natalie Muir

Episode 010 - Noel Peters

Our interview guest for Episode 10 is a little different than our previous guests (as he is not an engineer nor is he involved in the water industry), but he is someone who really packs a punch and is incredibly motivating – that person is Noel Peters. Noel is 61yrs of age, lives in Hobart, is a bricklayer by day, and 6th Dan Karate instructor and Kyoshi (or Professor) by night.

For over 40 years, Noel has trained in Goju-Ryu (one of the four traditional styles of Karate), and he is now Tasmania’s karate master. AD met Noel on a plane trip to Melbourne a few years ago, and was so impacted by Noel, that he couldn’t wait to reconnect with him and learn more about Noel’s life, especially in relation to his ongoing commitment to Kaizen (Japanese for “continual improvement”). In this episode, Noel talks to us about his early years and upbringing in Hobart, and his karate journey.

He also shares valuable insights (and inspirational messages) on how we all can find self improvement and find our way in life.

We also talk about one of Noel’s special achievements where he converted an old Hobart church to a Dojo (a place to study ‘The Way’). Both of us truly enjoyed our conversation with Noel, I am sure you all will too.

Noel Peters

Episode 011 - Reflections (Hawkes & AD) 

In this episode Hawkes & AD reflected on their first ten podcast episodes. After setting a goal when we commenced to complete 6 podcasts before the end of the year (2022), we have exceeded this, notching up the first 10 episodes several months ahead.

We both wanted to reflect back on the first ten episodes and consider our learnings, what some of the great takeaways were for each of us in speaking to our esteemed guests. Both of us have come across some real pearls of wisdom through these conversations, which we both feel have impacted our lives (personal and professional) and how we look at things now.

We've reflected on what some of these key takeways were for each of our guests. If you're new to the podcast, it might be a good summary of some of the key points we took from the conversations with our respective guests (and our own introductory episodes).

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Episode 012 - Luisa Panuccio

In this episode, Hawkes and AD sit down for a conversation with Luisa Maria Panuccio who is a qualified Civil and Architectural Engineer who graduated from the University of Adelaide.

Luisa is now currently working in Melbourne as a Senior Project Manager with Arup.

Luisa has an Italian background, and like most Italians, she is passionate. In particular, passionate about promoting STEM (which stands for Science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) – and this is was a key theme that we talked to her about. Luisa’s career to date has been so interesting. She has been an Ambassador for Engineers Australia, Engineers Without Borders Australia, Google, Children’s University Australia and the University of Adelaide. Not to mention Luisa also entered Miss Universe Australia as a way of promoting to fellow engineers that you can be and do anything you want, and not be stereotyped. Despite still being in early in her career Lu has already achieved many awards – just a few to touch on:

  • In 2019, Luisa received the National Association of Women in Construction Graduate of the Year Award for her role in managing a complex program of works for the South Australian Department for Infrastructure and Transport.

  • In 2021, Luisa was the recipient of the James McWha Rising Star Award in the University of Adelaide’s 2021 Distinguished Alumni Awards. The James McWha Rising Star Award honours the highest accomplishments and achievements of young alumni who are making a significant contribution as emerging leaders within their profession and community.

Luisa Panuccio

Episode 013 - Andrew Corrigan MW

In this episode, we sat down with Civil Engineer, Master of Wine (MW), and grandfather - Andrew Corrigan MW. Andrew has had an incredible engineering career, but in a way, it has been somewhat overshadowed by his incredible work in the wine industry, in particular his qualification as a Master of Wine.

It is important to acknowledge that MW is a rare qualification - there are currently 416 Masters of Wine world wide and Australia has only 24. Andrew is also the manager and part owner of Hidden Creek Winery in the Granite Belt region which is about 200km outside of Brisbane. He is also the President of the Queensland Wine Industry Association. Andrew is also a wine consultant, educator, writer, and judges in Australian and international wine shows. He has also published a book “Table Talk” in 2012 on the social aspects of wine. As mentioned above, it’s not all just about wine with Andrew. One which is not often discussed and we thoroughly enjoyed learning about.

And that is his engineering career which we were so excited to shine some light on.

Andrew is an accomplished Civil Engineer. Andrew graduated from Sydney University in 1977 and has experience in civil engineering, structural engineering and commercial building construction in both design and construction management. He has also worked in construction both throughout Australia and internationally. He is now currently a Director of Gould Development Solutions Pty Ltd based in Brisbane and a part time sessional Tribunal Member of the Qld Civil and Administrative Tribunal (QCAT). We know this episode is a long one, but when you stop and think about it, we are really interviewing a coin with two incredible sides. We thoroughly enjoyed this interview, and we hope you get a buzz out of it too !! 

Andrew Corrigan MW

Episode 014 - Joseph Tam

Our final guest on "The Good Drop with Hawkes & AD" for 2022 is Joseph (or Joe) Tam.

Joe is currently the Principal Supply Engineer for Seqwater where he leads the development of supply options and securing land to increase water supply certainty for South East Queensland. He also conducts high-level strategic planning for a possible augmentation. Joe’s has had an interesting career that has spanned over 40 years, where half of his time has been on engineering works and half on people engineering. His experience covers a broader spectrum – that is civil, structural, water and control systems from planning, design, construction, O&M, incident management, disaster recovery and asset management and optimisation.

 

He is a real champion of promoting Engineering and has given so much back to the industry via his tremendous volunteer work for Engineers Australia. This commitment to the cause has resulted in Joe being recently appointed as Queensland President, Engineers Australia. Congratulations on the new role Joe !!! It was great to talk with Joe about his amazing career journey and to discuss his new role with Engineers Australia, we hope you enjoy it as much as we did. 

Joseph Tam

Episode 015 - Gus Worland

In their first interview for 2023, Hawkes & AD start their year off by discussing a very important topic - Mental Health.

So, what's the reason behind discussing Mental Health.

Well, the last couple of years have been challenging, COVID-19, home-schooling, floods, fires, job security, rising interest rates, Ukraine etc, all of which have really impacted families and communities.

The pair wanted to shine a light on the importance of having mental fitness in your life. In the episode, the duo spent some quality time with Gotcha4Life founder, and media personality Gus Worland. Gus founded Gotcha4Life in 2017, which is a non-for-profit foundation taking action to promote the concept of, and build, mental fitness in individuals and communities throughout Australia. This foundation proactively encourage Aussies to speak up, express their emotions and ensure they all have a close friend in life that they can go to when times are tough. Gotcha4Life also believes in the power of prevention through connection and champions the idea of proactively building mental fitness. Enjoy the interview with Gus, and be inspired by his incredible work that is saving lives.

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Gus Worland

Episode 016 - Phil Selmes

Episode 016's guest is former engineer Phil Selmes - who Simon & AD worked alongside for many years on the Logan Water Alliance. Phil has worked in the water industry for 25yrs, and has had roles in local government such as Sydney Water, Albert Shire Council, Gold Coast City and also as an engineering consultant (Parsons Brinckerhoff). But despite such an incredible engineering career, Phil left the profession, changed direction completely and followed his dreams – he is now an award winning videographer making independent nature documentaries.

In 2013 (whilst being on a year long sabbatical travelling around Australia with his partner Joan), he won Best Film in the Tasmanian Breath of Fresh Air (BOFA) Film Festival “Essence of Tasmania” category for his documentary Tasmania Look Closer. In 2018, Phil and his partner Joan, created “Into the Wild Films” (http://intothewildfilms.com/). In Phil’s own words “Into the Wild Films has been a decade long journey. A fusion of two passions, the first is a love of Australia’s landscapes and wildlife, the second is a love for the art of film making.”

As a testament to his new craft, his incredible work has been screened on ABC, SBS, NITV, Channel 9, Discovery, Channel 4 UK + commercial TV in Korea and France. We thoroughly enjoyed re-uniting with Phil. It was just so fascinating to hear about his amazing journey. We strongly recommend you check out his Youtube channel @Intothewildfilms. You will love it. Enjoy the interview !!

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Phil Selmes

Episode 017 - Rob Ayre

Our guest is Civil Engineer, and now retired former Technical Director at Aurecon - Rob Ayre.

Rob has worked in flood hydrology for the entirety of his career (almost 40yrs) and has worked in public and private Sectors.

He has been responsible for directing the flood operations (during his tenure with Sunwater) of Ross River Dam, Scrivener Dam, North Pine Dam, Somerset Dam and Wivenhoe Dam all of which are gated dams. Throughout his career, Rob has been involved in the operation of over 60 flood events. Now, one of the big topics, that we discussed with Rob today is the January 2011 flood event (where Rob was part of the team that controlled the operation of dam releases), and the subsequent flood inquiry.

As you can imagine, there was lots to unpack and talk about. We hope you enjoy Episode 017 as much as we did.

 

Hawkes & AD

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Rob Ayre

Episode 018 - Tracey Leslie

In Episode 018 of “The Good Drop Podcast”, Hawkes and AD discuss the C word - Confidence. How do you build it? Can it be learnt?

But also importantly how do you avoid that demon of self-doubt that can easily eat away at your confidence level?

The guest on the podcast is Tracey Leslie. Now, Tracey is a former Civil Engineer who has recently pursued a path as a Life Coach. She spent a career spanning over 20 years within the engineering sector in Water, before recently deciding that helping others was her calling. She is passionate in this pursuit, and is attuned with helping others find their full potential.

AD first met Tracy in Christchurch, New Zealand in 2010, when he presented at New Zealand’s National Water Conference. How time has gone by so fast. Now as fate would have it, Tracey ended up working with both Simon and AD for a couple of years at Logan Water, before she decided to move South to Melbourne, where she now resides.

Simon and AD were so excited to learn about her career transformation and picked up some pearls of wisdom from her on how to become more resilient and confident.

Hope you enjoy the episode !!!

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Tracey Leslie

Episode 019 - Marlon Pritchard

In Episode 019 of The Good Drop Podcast, Hawkes & AD sat down with Marlon Pritchard who works for Downer Group in Brisbane. Marlon is also the Commissioning Lead on the Logan Water Partnership.

 

Marlon's skill-set is amazing. He brings so much to the table - he is literally like a Swiss pocket knife, multiple functions in one, i.e. design input skills, construction know-how and the best commissioning operator who is respected by all who work with him.

 

Marlon has been heavily involved in the commissioning of Logan Water's Biosolids Gasification Facility project, which picked up the National Innovation & Excellence Metro Award at the Australian Water Association's (AWA) Ozwater Conference held in Sydney earlier this month.

 

We hope you enjoy listening to his amazing story, and be inspired by his problem solving and his desire to help people in need.

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Marlon Pritchard

Episode 020 - Louise Dudley

In this 20th edition of The Good Drop Podcast, Hawkes & AD had the great pleasure of speaking with the Immediate Past President of the Australian Water Association - Louise Dudley.

For 10yrs (between 2012 and 2022), Louise was also the Chief Executive Officer for Urban Utilities, Qld’s largest water utility service provider which services over 1.4 million people in South East Queensland.

She is also a member of Chief Executive Women and her contribution to the engineering profession was acknowledged with the Engineering Executive title, conferred by Engineers Australia in 2021. She is also a director on the boards of WaterAID Australia and WaterStart.

We had a wide ranging conversation discussing the topic of change - her recent movement out of her role as CEO of Urban Utilities, change within industry, change as a leader.


Louise gave us an interesting insight into new technologies she has been exposed to in her role as Board Member of the non-profit organisation Waterstart, which provides funding to new water industry technology startups

 

It was also great to hear her perspective on some key water issues being faced by the industry.

Enjoy the episode!!

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Louise Dudley

Episode 021 - Richard Savage

Richard Savage currently works for Aurecon as a Director in their Environment and Planning Section (Brisbane).

 

Richard is well admired and a true gentlemen in the water industry. AD first came across Richard during his time sitting on the AWA Qld Branch Committee.

 

Richard served on the branch committee for almost a decade – which is a wonderful feat.  And as a result of all his great industry involvement and activities, he obtained the Qld AWA Water Professional of the year ward in 2018.

 

We discussed his early years growing up in South Africa, his career journey, and his passion for committing to providing a safer, more sustainable and enjoyable world. It was really a great chat - we learnt so much about this wonderful individual.

 

Enjoy the interview !!

 

Hawkes & AD

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Richard Savage

Episode 022 - Loreline Kerlidou

In this episode, we spoke with Process Engineer and the current Australian Water Association’s (AWA) 2022 South Australian Young Water Professional of the Year – Loreline Kerlidou.

 

Loreline was born in France, just outside of Paris, and has been living and working in Adelaide for over 10 years. She is currently working for the environmental, engineering and strategic consulting company - Ricardo plc.

 

Loreline’s been involved in managing pilot plant operations to assess process innovations, developed industry guidelines for the water utility sector and reviewed the performance and compliance of water assets for municipal and mining water providers all throughout Australia.

 

Loreline is extremely passionate about giving back to the water industry. She has been (and still is) involved in the AWA SA Young Water Professional committee for over 7 years, and was the former Chair of the committee for 2 years.  She was also a dedicated member and the former Vice Chair of the WaterAid SA Committee, who has been committed to raising awareness to enable the world's poorest people to gain access to clean water, decent toilets and good hygiene.

 

It was great to talk with her about her early years and career journey, the importance of promoting Women in Engineering, as well as getting her opinions on the implementation of using gender equality key-performance indicators (KPI’s) to achieve a diverse and inclusive work environment.

 

Hope you enjoy the interview!!

 

Hawkes & AD

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Loreline Kerlidou

Episode 023 - Andrew Larratt

We know it’s very much out of left field, and a real change of pace from our normal engineering or water flavoured focus, but with footy grand finals for AFL and NRL coming up, The Good Drop podcast wanted to delve into the world of sport, specifically, Strategy in sport.

 

But before we go further, firstly our apologies that this episode has been issued a little later than usual due to extenuating circumstances – but its fitting that this episode (our 23rd) pays homage to the importance of the number 23 in sport, most famously worn by Michael Jordan as well as the great cricketing icon in Shane Warne.

 

Our Guest today was Strategic Consultant and CEO of Strategem Holdings, Andrew Larratt. Stratagem Holdings has worked with a diverse client base, with many sporting and non-sporting organisations to  develop and implement a winning strategy, and transform teams and organisations to maximise their potential.

 

Andrew has provided advice to large sporting organisations such as Athletics Australia, the Australian Sports Commission, Rugby Australia and Cricket Australia, and has built a career on understanding an organisation’s needs and a path to success.

 

Our crossing paths with Andrew was, as interesting encounters sometimes are, by pure chance – a serendipitous moment. During AWA’s OzWater conference in Sydney this year, we took time out for dinner to discuss the Good Drop podcast and its future plans for guests.

 

Our discussion points with Andrew were wide reaching. Some of the key issues we discussed was about how he goes about helping sporting organisations be more creative, how he drives change, both of which are aimed at achieving a different future. We also touched on how to measure success, and how to overcome the diversity issue in elite sports.

 

Andrew was an incredible communicator, a big picture thinker – and this resulted in a wonderful conversation.

 

Enjoy his story and be inspired by his genuine, down to earth words of wisdom.

 

Hawkes & AD

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Andrew Larratt
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