The Distillery was engaged by the University of Auckland to help plan and facilitate two national strategy workshops with key stakeholders to help build energy and engagement around a CoRE (Centre of Research Excellence) in manufacturing and design in New Zealand. The first workshop was held on the 16th June 2016, and involved 25 people. The second workshop was held on 31 August 2016, and involved 65 people.

These sessions involved participants from all tertiary institutions in New Zealand, key representatives from government (MBIE & Callaghan), and industry (manufacturing and design).

The work comprised:

• Working closely with senior staff at UoA to plan the workshop approach;
• Developing the workshop structure, guiding presentation, participant exercises and collateral for both sessions;
• Facilitating the workshops themselves;
• Capturing all outputs;
• Setting up a Slack channel, and driving ongoing engagement with the outputs via this medium.

Both workshops were well received, have kickstarted the UoA IMM CoRE process, and built clear energy and commitment amongst a wider network of stakeholders keen to contribute to the CoRE.