Words are how we communicate
I'm a wordsmith and I'm good at it. I’m creative, I think outside the box, and I come up with workable solutions.
Good writing is clear and on-message. It changes or manages perceptions, it adds value to your marketing and communications, and it engages your readers, your clients, your staff and your stakeholders.
I’m motivated, innovative and enjoy building relationships. I’m easy to work with – and I listen.
Whether it’s your website or your media release, your document that needs a dose of plain language or your team's profile, your stakeholder briefing or your magazine feature, your health and safety guidelines or your communication plan, if it’s words and writing, I’m your man.
My skills
- Good WRITING is more than stringing words together. It’s about refining your message and presenting it clearly. It’s focused, effective and engaging. It's about taking the complex and making it accessible. It's about opening the door on you and your work in a way that makes people want to know. I write for the reader.
- Your WEBSITE is your shop window and it must attract your visitors. Will your site inform them or bore them? Will it give them answers or leave them with questions? When did you last update it? I write to engage and make your website work.
- I specialise in EDITING – taking your material and tightening it, refining it or redrafting it. It’s a craft that requires understanding what the writer is saying and editing for tone, style and accuracy – with empathy and an eye for detail.
- With COMMUNICATIONS your message must be clear, you need a strategy and must know the opportunities and the risks. That means understanding the issues and your audience. As a journalist I know what works.
- In the NGO SECTOR you’ve got to engage your audience and stand out from the crowd. Your message must be clear, your direct mails must be persuasive, your media releases must be on-topic, and your website must engage. Your submissions might be a once-in-a-decade chance to influence policy and must be convincing, factual and authoritative. It’s an arena I understand.
My work
Writing is what I do and it features
Writing is what I do and it features
- Copy writing, including
- Reports and analysis both for general use in-house
- Website content
- Briefing papers
- Magazine features and articles
- E-newsletters and other publications
- Profiles
- Advertorials
- Blogs
- Direct-mail letters
- Submissions
- In-house documents including health and safety guidelines
- Brochures
- Editing
- Writing and distributing media releases
- Communications advice
My portfolio
My clients operate in a variety of sectors, and while a lot of my work can be found on their websites, magazines or eNewsletters, other work is confidential – bid documents, submissions or in-house material.
My clients have included
My clients operate in a variety of sectors, and while a lot of my work can be found on their websites, magazines or eNewsletters, other work is confidential – bid documents, submissions or in-house material.
My clients have included
- Ministry of Education – Work with ministry's Analytics and Insights team to identify and write about projects for the wider ministry, edit reports and provide concise writing tutorials. Work separately to produce a summary of the first progress report on the 10-year Action Plan for Pacific Education.
- Ministry for Primary Industries – Review legislation and rules governing farming, horticulture, forestry and other key areas of New Zealand's rural industry and condense each into a brief snapshot - with links to a plain-language source and the legislation, for the proposed GroundRules website.
- Hearing New Zealand – Research and report on 10 key areas affecting New Zealanders with hearing loss and related issues, and with that as the basis, prepare a briefing for incoming ministers of the new Labour government and arrange follow-up meetings with ministers.
- Ministry of Health – Senior adviser publications – a contract role managing the publication of ministry documents.
- Spark New Zealand – Write an award submission for Spark on their Auckland 5G Lab that showcases the potential of the new technology. This involved interviewing and working with key personal who designed and built the project
- Eisdell Moore Centre, University of Auckland – Interview scientists working in three key research areas and write feature profiles of them and their work for publication on their website and elsewhere. Separately, write a feature for the site on the launch of ground-breaking guidelines on identifying and treating auditory processing disorder
- NZ Audiological Society – Rewrite website content, working with the NZAS management to identify relevant material from the existing site and refresh and re-order it
- Wellington Regional Council – Internal and other material for the Wellington Regional Council including summaries of the Wellington Regional Investment Plan and the Wairarapa Economic Development Strategy and Action Plan (www.growwairarapa.nz)
- Educate Plus – 2018 Auckland conference presentations (www.educateplus.edu.au)
- Spark NZ – 5G briefing paper. This involved researching 5G technology and working with key technical and other staff to produce the 28-page briefing for stakeholders (www.sparknz.co.nz/content/dam/SparkNZ/pdf-documents/5G%20Briefing%20document.pdf)
- Babbage Consultants (Auckland, Hamilton, Christchurch, Melbourne) – Website news content, executive profiles, media releases, bid documents (www.babbage.co.nz)
- T-Meeting (Sweden) – English website content, media release and communications material (www.tmeeting.com)
- McKay Knarston surveyors (Auckland) – website content (www.mkk.co.nz)
- National Foundation for the Deaf – Magazine copy, electronic newsletters, media releases and communications, direct-mail fundraising letters, submissions and other material
- Neurological Society – Magazine copy
- Oticon – Advertorials
- Oticon Foundation – Electronic newsletters
- Affordable Accounting – Web content (www.affordableaccounts.co.nz)
- Vision Consulting – Web content (www.vision-consulting.co.nz)
My story
I started as a journalist in Auckland in the 1970s, working on daily newspapers and for the national news agency NZPA in Wellington, before working for three years on papers in England. In the 1980s, I rejoined NZPA as a reporter and copy editor, and was a successful foreign correspondent in Australia for four years.
I joined NZPA's management team when I returned to Wellington; helped drive a restructure of its news operation; set up a successful corporate news service; scoped, selected and managed the installation of editorial computer and phone systems; managed technical and support operations for the agency and associated news-industry organisations; and managed contracts and relationships with service providers.
When a hereditary hearing loss caught up with me I worked pro bono in the hearing disability sector while continuing my full-time management role at NZPA. I became public affairs manager for the Hearing Association in 2003, working as an advocate, developing and implementing communications strategies, and raising the profile of a condition that affects nearly one in five New Zealanders.
Following an outstandingly successful cochlear implant I joined the National Foundation for the Deaf in 2009 in Auckland, before moving to the communications team at ACC and returning to news via Fairfax in 2012.
After subediting Fairfax's Australian newspapers from Wellington, I set up a team to edit news on Stuff.co.nz, and in 2015 I trained Fairfax journalists as the company’s focus moved to the digital news sector, before joining the business-news team in Auckland.
I left Fairfax in 2016 to put my skills and experience to work in my own company, and have worked for a range of clients in the corporate, government and NGO sectors.
I started as a journalist in Auckland in the 1970s, working on daily newspapers and for the national news agency NZPA in Wellington, before working for three years on papers in England. In the 1980s, I rejoined NZPA as a reporter and copy editor, and was a successful foreign correspondent in Australia for four years.
I joined NZPA's management team when I returned to Wellington; helped drive a restructure of its news operation; set up a successful corporate news service; scoped, selected and managed the installation of editorial computer and phone systems; managed technical and support operations for the agency and associated news-industry organisations; and managed contracts and relationships with service providers.
When a hereditary hearing loss caught up with me I worked pro bono in the hearing disability sector while continuing my full-time management role at NZPA. I became public affairs manager for the Hearing Association in 2003, working as an advocate, developing and implementing communications strategies, and raising the profile of a condition that affects nearly one in five New Zealanders.
Following an outstandingly successful cochlear implant I joined the National Foundation for the Deaf in 2009 in Auckland, before moving to the communications team at ACC and returning to news via Fairfax in 2012.
After subediting Fairfax's Australian newspapers from Wellington, I set up a team to edit news on Stuff.co.nz, and in 2015 I trained Fairfax journalists as the company’s focus moved to the digital news sector, before joining the business-news team in Auckland.
I left Fairfax in 2016 to put my skills and experience to work in my own company, and have worked for a range of clients in the corporate, government and NGO sectors.