Tony Kane is far more than just a business mentor manager. He’s an interviewer, a psychologist, a strategist. The list goes on.

He’s juggled multiple hats for years and he loves what he does today just as much as ever.

“And next year I’m going to start loving Winston Peters and all those free bus rides,” he laughs.

Tony has no desire to retire. Indeed, his verve and passion are evident when he talks about his background in business and his role as the Waikato business mentor manager for Business Mentors New Zealand.

Tony works with approximately 60 business mentors in the Waikato who are helping drive the region’s business capability and capacity – and those mentors do it all for free. They helped mentor 105 entrepreneurs in the Waikato last year and there are 80 active client engagements right now.

What is Business Mentors New Zealand? It’s a not-for-profit organisation that supports the success and growth of small businesses through the knowledge and experience of its volunteer mentors.

Many of the people who are interested in being a mentee come through the Regional Business Partner Programme, which is administered by the Business Growth Services (BGS) team. That team is based at Innovation Park and now sits within the new Waikato Regional Economic Development Agency.

The Regional Business Partner Programme is contracted by Business Mentors NZ to run their programme.

“If the BGS team is working with someone who doesn’t fit the Callaghan funding requirements or the NZTE Capability Voucher Scheme, it could be that we think a mentor might be right for them. Or they might qualify for funding and the vouchers, but they could need a mentor in addition to that.”

Business growth manager Craig Purcell said aside from helping a business with negotiating their way through issues around marketing, health and safety, compliance, regulations, tax or HR, often a mentor will simply help them “see the wood for the trees”.

“You can easily get sucked into the quagmire of regulations, GST returns etc. It’s almost a counselling-style process where you have that mentor… an independent person… help them to reflect and question.”

Once a potential mentee is identified, Tony sometimes talks to them first before they register to establish where mentoring is suitable for them.

“If it is, they register, pay a small fee that helps run head office in Auckland and then we have a more in-depth conversation.”

That in-depth conversation is where Tony’s interviewing, researching, and psychology skills come in to play.

That discussion is where Tony needs to find out what that person needs. Is it a start-up, an idea still in conceptual stages, or is it an established business? Where are they struggling? Do they need help with marketing? With sales? Staff? Strategy and planning? And what kind of person are they? How will they interact with a mentor? That and more is what Tony must establish to figure out who the best mentor match would be for the mentee.

Once he’s figured that out, he puts the two in touch and it’s up to them to establish the frequency of contact and how the engagement will work.

The first priority though? 

“A lot of these are start-up companies… people who have never been in business before so some of them struggle with communication side of things. The biggest bug bear is them not answering calls or emails. So we often get them up to speed with that first.”

Tony checks in with the mentee after 30 days and again at 75 to find out how things are going.

Sometimes he discovers the relationship isn’t quite working so he will pair the mentee with a new mentor.

Tony’s gotten to know the mentors well and he’s able to pick up a lot from his conversation on the phone with the mentee, so it’s not often that the skill or personality match isn’t quite right.

Mentees are located all around the region from Hamilton to Colville, Whangamata to Pauanui, Pokeno to Putaruru.

Finding mentors in areas with a higher population count isn’t difficult. But it is further out in the region – Tokoroa, South Waikato, for example – it’s trickier to find mentors.

“I’m thankful we have one in Coromandel township and there are a few others scattered around. I’d love to bring on more in those outer areas though.”

Tony would like to see more Maori businesses seeking mentors. And while there’s a good gender balance in the group of mentors, Tony would like to see better racial diversity in the line-up.

Tony has shoulder-tapped many of his mentors.

“I know their experience and wisdom… people like Kiri Goulter, for example. They have to have a very clear ability to transmit experience and knowledge.”

What kinds of businesses do the mentors assist? Generally, Tony says, they are start-ups.

“In the two-and-a-half years I’ve been in this role we’ve only had four or five mentees who’ve had established companies of five years plus. Generally, they already know what they’re doing. We see a lot of artisans trying to turn a hobby into a business. There are some who’ve been on benefit and have an idea that they want to run by someone. There are others who are looking at buying a job – a franchise.”

And some of those ideas don’t always pan out.

“When you talk about outcomes, that depends on the measure. Take an artist, for example, who’s trying to commercialise their work. The best result might be to halt that early, but the mentee may not see that as a great outcome. But we do conduct surveys and the mentors rate very highly in those.”

Tony, himself, also rates highly in the Waikato for the work he’s done and continues to do today.

He has 25 years’ experience as an independent business advisor following a 23-year career in system development and food safety. 

His resume is nothing short of impressive. He’s done capability assessments for business development boards, assessments for the NZTE training voucher scheme and preparing and evaluating research and development grant applications. He advises private companies on business strategy, planning, capital raising, system design and implementation. He has several governance roles on private sector and trust boards.

He has assisted district councils, community groups and industry bodies with preparing independent advisory documents from economic development strategies to strategy implementation plans, from feasibility studies to capital raising.

And Tony has had more than 15 years’ experience in facilitating the development of economic development strategies in the Waikato. In 1999 he wrote the first economic development strategy for Hamilton – that led to the construction of Waikato Innovation Park, where Tony works from as the region’s mentor manager.

“That was during Russ Rimmington’s time as mayor and the vote to go ahead with Innovation Park was his only unanimous vote during his term.”

Tony then helped put the funding and governance group together.

“That really got me involved in economic development and I started doing other strategic work around that with regional councils, feasibility studies and the like.”

So it comes as no surprise that Tony is excited to not only see the launch of the Waikato REDA, but also to be a part of it.

“I was on the board of Opportunity Hamilton years ago. They focused on out-of-work people, trusts, charities etc – it wasn’t business-focused enough to be termed an economic development agency.

“Waikato REDA will also have the social and environmental underpinning. There has been a mindset change – it will be about driving business and investment, but it will also understand community and environment.”

And it’s that social and community lens that Tony has been looking through lately. Wearing his business consultant hat, he’s been working on a social enterprise business case – “taking the economic blinkers off and looking at other ways of doing things” – as well as feasibility study for community hub in Coromandel township.

There’s no slowing Tony Kane down.                        

“I still love this work. I’m certainly not thinking about retirement. I’m having too much fun.”

• The Business Mentoring for Existing Businesses provides 12 months of confidential one-on-one advice for owners of small and medium-sized businesses who want to grow or need help to solve specific business challenges.  The registration fee is $225 plus GST.
• The Start-up Business Mentoring Programme provides six months of accelerated mentoring for people who have a new business idea or are looking for help with starting a new business.  The registration for this service is $300 plus GST.

For more information email tony.kane@wipltd.co.nz, phone 0275 621 060 or visit www.businessmentors.org.nz