Where Waikato's Leaders Come Together
CELF connects senior leaders from across business and community in a programme built for the real challenges of leadership today. For over a decade, we've been growing leaders who think critically, lead with purpose, and are committed to a thriving Waikato.
Who We Are
CELF - The Community & Enterprise Leadership Foundation is Waikato's place-based leadership organisation. For over a decade, we've been bringing together senior leaders from across business and community to grow their leadership capability and strengthen their impact, on their organisations, their communities, and the region.
Our programme puts people in the same room who wouldn't normally be there. And that's where the magic happens. When a CEO learns alongside a community trust leader, when a construction director hears from an iwi advocate, perspectives shift. New thinking emerges. And leaders leave more connected, more capable, and more committed to the Waikato than when they arrived.
We don't teach leadership from a textbook. We create the conditions for experienced leaders to challenge their thinking, broaden their perspective, and develop the adaptive, critical capability that modern leadership demands.
Leadership Waikato
Leadership today asks more of us than it ever has. The challenges facing the Waikato – and the organisations within it – are complex, interconnected, and constantly shifting. Leaders need more than technical skill. They need the ability to think critically, adapt quickly, and lead with both clarity and heart.
Leadership Waikato is an 8-month programme for experienced leaders who are ready to grow – not just in capability, but in connection. Each year, we bring together a carefully curated cohort of around 22 senior leaders from across the Waikato. Through monthly in-person sessions, online connects, and immersive real-world experiences, participants are challenged to see differently, think differently, and lead differently.
This isn't a course. It's a room full of leaders you wouldn't normally be in – business alongside community, public sector alongside private – and an experience that changes how you see your role, your influence, and your responsibility to the region.
What makes it different:
Curated and cross-sector. Senior leaders from business, community, and public sector, hand-selected for diversity of thought and depth of experience. The mix is the method.
Built for today's challenges. This programme develops the adaptive, perceptive, critical thinking that modern leadership demands. Not theory. Practice.
Place-based and purpose led. Designed for the Waikato, delivered in the Waikato, committed to the Waikato. Our leaders don't just grow capability, they grow connection to the region.
Proven - 10+ years, 200+ alumni, and a track record of leaders who go on to chair boards, launch initiatives, and lead with greater impact in their organisations and communities
The Leadership Waikato Programme will challenge you, inspire you, and ultimately transform the way you lead, ensuring that you are well-equipped to tackle the most pressing cultural, economic, environmental, and social issues facing our Waikato community.
CELFie Testimonial
“The communion between the Commercial and For Purpose sectors within the cohort was truly ‘collabor-active’. I learnt as much from my cohort as from the external leaders and visits to other businesses/entities across the Waikato Region and beyond. This has affirmed for me, the very real and living nature of the key message from a Samoan proverb, “O le ala I le pule o le tautua” the pathway to leadership is through service."
Rachel Karalus - Class of 2019
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