• "I had formed a good relationship with the foreman and just turned up to work the next day at 7:30 AM and worked for nothing. I kept turning up, and after about three or four days, he called me and offered work until Christmas. I never left. I worked my a** off, and they gave me a job and my apprenticeship. I was qualified at 19."

  • "Interestingly, I was qualified at 19, and a couple of my friends who told me I was an idiot for leaving school, went to university, quit after a year, and did apprenticeships. They were starting at 19 when I was already qualified."

  • "I didn't know how to claim or pay GST, or anything, to be honest. I was googling invoice templates. I didn't know how to put money away for taxes. I was building the plane as I was flying it."

  • "Everything felt positive until COVID started disrupting things, which was a really stressful time. We couldn't get on-site to build houses, and if we're not building, we're not making money. Yet, we had overheads in excess of a million dollars a year."

  • "Where I'm at now, those business challenges pale in comparison to some other things. I lost a close family member a couple of years ago and went through a divorce in the last two and a half years. Those things are harder than anything you'll face in business. It's all perspective."

  • "One thing that's been really good for me is reframing stress in that way, to see that stress is a privilege. I asked to be here. It's stressful, but that's what I asked for, I deal with the stress because I'm growing and doing the things I wanted to do."

  • "I talk about building a trellis. The analogy is, your trellis is what everything can grow around, and if it's strong, it can withstand the wind and weather. For me, the trellis is my daily habits: exercise, food, sleep, all of these are now non-negotiables."

  • "I also live by the mantra: "Do hard stuff by choice." If you choose to do hard things, then actual hardship becomes much easier to cope with."

  • "Our egos are our enemy. The minute a leader thinks they've cracked it as a leader will be the minute they're a s*** leader."

  • "The more steps you can take, the more steps you will take. It's about not procrastinating and doing the hard stuff. A quick s*** outcome is better than a long s*** outcome, and a quick no is better than a slow no."

  • "We don't have any skip bins on any of our sites now. All our waste gets diverted to a yard we lease, and we repurpose it, turning it into cabins and all sorts of things and it's becoming its own entity."

  • "My grandfather passing away was a real eye-opener for that; he didn't have two cents to rub together, but he wasn't alone once in the last three months of his life. I know people with more money than they can count who die alone. So, what do you want to leave behind?"

  • "Be a small fish and try to get into rooms with high performers."

  • "I say, "Better people make better builders." Therefore, I read books on childhood trauma, racism, stories of the human spirit, as well as marketing, communications, negotiation, and leadership. Learning is a real pillar for me; I love it."

  • "We have 67 building consent authorities in New Zealand for 5 million people, while New South Wales in Sydney has one for the same amount of people. Those 67 authorities have 67 different heads of building and 67 different interpretations. We're based in Hamilton and build with 11 different councils that interpret the building code 11 different ways."

  • "What I wish I'd known earlier was probably that smooth seas never made a skilled sailor. It took me a long time to understand that the hard stuff is the good stuff. Every hard thing I've had to go through has made me better. "