John is a Principal Kaiwhakatere in the Beca Māori Advisory Business – Te Ahi Tūtata. With over 20 years of experience in a range of leadership roles. With a farming background close to climate impacts John remains as passionate as ever about weaving Te Ao Māori both into Beca’s culture and the projects Beca helps deliver. Of Te Ati Haunui-a-Pāpārangi and Pākeha descent John is an advocate of mātauranga alongside western based science models to meet the challenges of climate adaptation. For John mātauranga sits at the hapū, the Marae. It is with those people that live and breath an intrinsic understanding of adaptation with, and not in conflict with te Taiao. Once the expertise is acknowledged the powerful changes needed in our society can occur. John sits on the Beca NZ Ltd Board as a Director and on a number of external bodies and actively shares his thoughts and passion for industry growth in Te Ao Māori through podcasts and other forums.

Cushla is Beca's Business Director for Climate Risk and Resilience and a Technical Fellow of Climate Risk & Adaptation. In her role Cushla provides technical oversight to projects that contribute to enhanced resilience for our clients operations, assets and across our regions and communities. Cushla's Business Director role involves her tracking the dynamic and changing best practice and international trends for the management of climate and natural hazard risks, presenting at industry events, providing thought leadership, strategic advice and leading project teams in the delivery of projects across the Pacific, Australia and New Zealand. Cushla's has almost 25 years of experience in planning and environmental management, particularly within the coastal environment, which has provided her with a strong foundation for understanding the key mechanisms to achieving long-term climate resilience for communities.

Dr Suzanne Phibbs (Kāi Tahu) is a Māori health sociologist and senior lecturer in public health in the School of Health Sciences at Massey University. Suzanne has published extensively in the field of disasters and is an expert on Sociological and Kaupapa Māori research methodologies, Māori community resilience, disaster risk reduction, response and recovery

A member of the Ngāti Haka-Patuheuheu tribe Recipient and Graduand of the Ki te Whare Tū Tonu, ki te Whare Manawaroa Research Scholarship towards a Masters in Applied indigenous Knowledge hosted through the He Waka Hiringa Masters programme, Te Wānanga o Aotearoa.

Member of the Ngāti Haka and Patuheuheu tribe.