The Morgo CEO Leadership programme is a nine-month online and in person programme that enables CEOs of tech or other high growth companies going global to understand the leadership, organisational, marketing, sales and financial requirements of rapid growth and global expansion from New Zealand.
The programme is taught by Dr Jana Matthews, an internationally renowned business growth expert who has had over 1,300 companies go through her programmes and has written 8 bookson leadership. Dr Jana Matthews is assisted by Growth Experts including Jenny Morel of Morgo who has extensive experience as a global tech company director (and sometimes CEO) and other experienced members of the Morgo Community.
The programme includes a combination of online and in-person sessions, including a week in San Francisco, seeing what scale and speed look like by visiting some amazing companies there and talking to domain experts.
CEOs growing globally need to learn how to go very fast, be courageous, be smart, take on competitors many times their size and win. They also need to know how to select a team that’s highly proficient at execution, then delegate effectively. The Morgo CEO Leadership Programme is designed to help you learn how to do all of this...and a whole lot more.
Each course is limited to a cohort of up to ten CEOs.
“The content of this course is game changing. Being able to anticipate the next phase of leadership growth before getting there and plan for it instead of urgently figuring out what change in leadership the business needs when you are already in the middle of that stage - is powerful.”
James Sampson, FileInvite
To be part of the Morgo CEO Leadership Programme in 2024, you need to be the CEO of a tech or other high growth company going global from New Zealand which:
And you need to be ready to learn and to invest this time in yourself and your company
Registration is open now for 2024. Register here >
If you would like to know more about the programme, please contact your NZTE Customer Manager or Morgo.
“The content is tailored for leadership; the growth experts are experienced and insightful and the intimate cohort of other leaders brings a space to be inspired and challenged.”
Jono Jones, BlueLab
The Morgo CEO Leadership Programme is comprised of the following components:
April
Mon 6 & Tues 7 May, Wellington
Mon 1 & Tues 2 July, Wellington
Thurs 29, Fri 30 &, Sat 31(am) August
Curated programme:
Mon 28 & Tues 29 October
Own visits with catch up in the evenings:
30 October – 1 November
Thurs 28 November, Auckland
Throughout
Dr Jana Matthews will teach each session. She will be assisted by Jenny Morel and other Growth Experts who understand the challenges of taking companies global.
“I would absolutely endorse and recommend this programme for other CEOs who are looking to scale up and go global.”
Asantha Wijeyeratne, PaySauce
The two 2-day sessions are the core of the programme. These impart the tools and resources to be applied during the rest of the programme and the work that participants will do between the meetings.
Each 2-day intensive session will have four sessions focusing on specific topics relevant to growing global:
You will receive a Learning Journal with materials and tools that will help you implement the concepts learned in each session.
Small group discussions will be facilitated by Dr Matthews and the growth experts.
You will identify changes that will need to be made in order to grow globally.
You will develop an Action Plan with timelines for you and your teams to achieve before the next part of the programme begins.
“The CEO program has provided me with insights and knowledge on gaps in my understanding, strategy and approach. Being able to network with others going through the same struggles was gold.”
Neil Cresswell, Portainer.io
Dr Jana Matthews has written eight books on leading high growth companies, including the classic “Leading at the Speed of Growth”. She helped to establish the Kauffman Centre for Entrepreneurial Leadership and advised many cities, including Boulder, Colorado on what was needed to become a technology based economy.
After many years working as a consultant with companies all over the world, including Australia and New Zealand, in 2012 she moved from Boulder to Adelaide to direct the first corporate funded accelerator in Australia. Two years later she joined the University of South Australia’s Business School as Professor, ANZ Chair in Business Growth and founding Director of the Australian Centre for Business Growth. Since then she has designed programmes, directed a team of 12, and worked with 15 Growth Experts to deliver growth programmes to nearly 2,000 CEOs and executive team members in Australia.
Jana is a global thought leader, speaker, writer, organisational growth consultant, mentor and coach to business owners, directors, CEOs, MDs, and executive teams all over the world. She has designed programs to enable directors, CEOs and executive team members to understand their roles and responsibilities, identify growth stoppers, manage innovation and commercialisation, choose appropriate growth strategies, finance growth, plan, execute, measure organisational performance, and make the behaviour and organisational changes required to grow. She has helped several companies grow from startup to listing, from 30 employees to global companies which sold for US$2.6bn and everything in between.
Jana owns the background IP and frameworks on which the Morgo CEO Leadership Programmes are built. Morgo is very fortunate to have Jana bring this IP and her knowledge, experience, coaching, mentoring, and skills as a teacher to the Morgo Leadership Programmes.
Jana has been involved with Morgo since 2004, when she ran a 3-hour leadership workshop at MORGO. Rod Drury was there. He calls Xero “a MORGO baby”- see this video.
Jana partnered with Morgo to deliver the first Australian MORGO in 2017 and has presented and run workshops at several MORGOs. In 2023 she was presented with a Morgo Bouquet for her contribution to the Morgo Community.
Jenny’s background is in investment banking, company directorships, and venture capital. She now devotes herself to the Morgo community of leaders of technology companies going global from New Zealand and Australia.
Over 20 years ago, Jenny started a niche investment bank to work with technology companies and, a year later, New Zealand’s first US-style venture capital firm, No 8 Ventures. For No 8 Ventures, Jenny was a director of 10 young tech companies going global and chair of 6 of them. She also did stints as CEO at two of them.
Jenny started the 2-day event known as MORGO 20 years ago to bring together people building tech companies out into the world from New Zealand, most of whom didn’t know each other. She kept this going on the side of her other businesses. 10 years ago she went to live in Singapore for 6 years. While there, with Dr Jana Matthews, she started MORGO in Australia. Covid has led to Morgo activities now being restricted to New Zealand.
After Jenny returned to New Zealand 4 years ago,
With a career spanning GE, Microsoft, and Amazon, John moved to the Bay of Plenty in 2018 with his New Zealand born wife and three children. Prior to arriving in NZ, John led Human Resources for Amazon’s Worldwide Operations organisation and the hundreds of thousands of employees responsible for delivering on customer orders around the globe. John also led HR during the hyper growth of Amazon’s Devices organisation resulting in products like Alexa, next generation Kindles and Kindle Fire tablets, FirePhone, and FireTV.
Today John chairs the board of Groov (a New Zealand start-up focused on mental health) and is a board member at GoGenerosity (a New Zealand start-up focused on helping local businesses pay it forward). He also works with a variety of founders and venture capital firms to scale businesses for growth.
Murray is the co-founder and product visionary of Vista Entertainment Solutions. He was the CEO of Vista until after the company listed in 2014. In 2018 he became the Chief Product Officer of the Vista Group of companies. Now he is an Executive Director – continuing to contribute to the company he built.
Vista designs and develops cinema and studio management solutions for the international film industry. Its software is installed in cinemas and film distributors in over 90 countries. It has subsidiary companies with offices in Los Angeles, Shanghai, Cape Town, London, Amsterdam, Kuala Lumpur and Mexico City and business partners in India and Pakistan to support its customers.
Murray says that the founders of Vista always wanted to build an enduring New Zealand software company and that is what they have achieved.
Once you have completed the CEO Leadership Programme your cohort forms an alumni where you can meet (online or in person), continue the conversations, share ongoing experiences, get further advice and guidance etc. Details will be available at course completion.
“The leaders of every NZTE focus company should attend this programme."
Max Ferguson, Lumin
“This course has been instrumental in helping me think bigger, plan bigger and be a better leader.”
Melanie Spencer, Socialites