Innovation in Action

Innovation in Action explores how people turn ideas into impact. Join design thinking and innovation strategist, educator, and co-author of Innovation in Action book Vaughan Broderick as he sits down with entrepreneurs, leaders, and change-makers to unpack the mindsets, methods, and messy realities of innovation. Each episode unlocks curiosity, creativity and clarity in any organisation. From design thinking and systems change to business strategy and behavioural insights, you’ll hear practical stories and tools that help you create change that sticks. If you want to implement human-centred innovation, you’re in the right place. Get your copy of Innovation in Action here . Work with Vaughan . Follow Vaughan: <a

Innovation in Action is a business podcast hosted by Vaughan Broderick, with 13 episodes on record and a Required Pod Score of 80. PitchCentric scores this show on Booking Probability, Listen Score, and live audience signals refreshed every 24 hours.

Vaughan Broderick hosts Innovation in Action, a business show with 13 episodes published.

Our AI reads these to draft pitches. Use them as grounding for a pitch that cites a real guest and a specific topic.

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  Innovation in Action

  You Don't Have to Build the Thing | Matt Scott

  Jul 6, 202648 min

  Matt Scott has spent his career translating chaos into direction — first as an audio engineer and music producer for 18 years, then as a futures thinker and innovation lead working across agritech, IoT, and energy. After an MBA at the University of Canterbury sent him looking for a new calling, Matt built a career helping large organisations do the thing most of them are worst at: turning good ideas into things that actually ship. He's currently innovation lead inside a major New Zealand state-owned enterprise of 1,800 people, where he's spent the last two years running discovery on projects - one of which turned into a full-time role he now leads. In this conversation, Vaughan and Matt get into why futures thinking beats planning, why "building the thing" is often the easiest part of innovation (and stakeholder buy-in the hardest), and why every project needs a different mix of tools rather than a five-step formula. Matt also tells the story of Surf Locker - a Christchurch surfboard rental startup that started as a van, some old boards, and a hand-written sign - and explains why he left 18 years of music industry experience off his CV before realising it was actually his biggest asset. Takeaways: - Why "futures thinking" beats traditional forecasting — exploring many possible futures instead of predicting one, then working backwards to the actions that get you there - The toolbox mindset: why there's no five-step formula for innovation, and why the right tool depends entirely on the job - Matt's stakeholder engagement framework — mapping influence vs. interest to know exactly who to collaborate with, inform, or manage - Why building the thing is the easy part — and stakeholder buy-in is where most large-org innovation actually dies - The Surf Locker story: how a van, some old boards, and a hardware-store padlock tested a business idea before a dollar was spent on the "real" product - Why Matt runs one-week sprints on early-stage projects, reassessing the biggest risk every Monday and defining success by Friday - Why ideation and delivery are separate muscles Matt's single piece of advice for anyone trying to innovate inside an organisation If you enjoyed this episode, make sure to subscribe for more conversations with the people turning innovation into action. Connect with Matt: https://www.linkedin.com/in/matthewblairscott/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/vaughanbroderick/ X: https://x.com/theVBroderick Website: https://vaughanbroderick.com/ Get Innovation in Action book: https://innovationinactionbook.com/ #FuturesThinking #Innovation #DesignThinking #StakeholderEngagement #Agritech #InnovationLeadership #ExpertInnovators #InnovationInAction #ChangeManagement

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  Innovation in Action

  How Script Sense Used Design to Disrupt

  Jun 22, 20261h 3m

  In this conversation, Kieran and Puneet - co-founders of ScriptSense, share the behind-the-scenes story of how they and third co-founder Rijul Gupta built a product that's reshaping how pharmacy works in New Zealand and the world. Puneet came from pharmacy. Kieran came from hospitality and hotel tech. Neither had built a health tech company before. What they did have was a clear-eyed view of a broken industry, a willingness to sit in pharmacies with a notepad and just watch, and the grit to spend three years chasing a single enterprise customer who finally took their call. We get into what it really looks like to apply human-centred design in a heavily regulated industry and why "minimum viable product" means something very different when your product affects patient health. We also dig into the trade show demo that changed everything, the night Puneet's pharmacist instincts revealed a hidden process Kieran had never seen, and why removing the keyboard from pharmacy might be the most important thing ScriptSense ever does. Takeaways - Why they deliberately avoided rushing to a solution — and how months of observation-only fieldwork shaped the entire product direction - How a prototype that connected to nothing turned a trade show into a product validation session - Why "minimum viable product" in health tech is a contradiction in terms and how ScriptSense navigated a 12-month build to first installation - The Dropbox vs Instagram decision every startup faces and why they started out wanting to be one and had to become the other - How a founding team with three completely different lenses (pharmacist, commercial operator, engineer) meant they could speak the right language to every stakeholder - Why their biggest competitive advantage wasn't the tech — it was entering a one-vendor market with zero customer relationships to protect If you enjoyed this episode, please like and subscribe, share it with your friends, and leave a review. I read every single one. ScriptSense website: https://scriptsense.co.nz/ Puneet on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/puneet-saini-4403a6b8/ Kieran on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kieran-erasmuson/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/vaughanbroderick/ X: https://x.com/theVBroderick Website: https://vaughanbroderick.com/ Get Innovation in Action book: https://innovationinactionbook.com/ #healthtech #startupjourney #pharmacyinnovation #humancentreddesign #designthinking #productdiscovery #startupnz #entrepreneurship #innovation

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  Innovation in Action

  How Play Unlocks Creative Strategy | Azeem Saheer

  Jun 14, 202644 min

  Azeem Saheer is a human capital specialist, facilitator, leadership coach, and podcaster with 17 years of experience helping organisations unlock human potential. A PCC-level ICF coach and emotional intelligence and emotional culture practitioner, Azeem uses LEGO Serious Play as his primary tool for transforming how teams think together, break down silos, and surface ideas that traditional workshops leave buried. In this conversation, we explore why the problem in most organisations isn't a lack of ideas - it's a lack of stories and meaning that connect. Azeem breaks down the neuroscience behind building with your hands, why directing questions at a model (rather than the person who built it) removes ego from strategy conversations entirely, and how asking a team to break the model they've just built is the most important step of all. We also get into two case studies that stick: a supply chain team at Sri Lanka's largest food and beverage company who discovered that they had no idea what their colleagues in other departments were achieving or struggling with, and an ice cream R&D team, labelled by management as non-innovators, who produced ideas for effervescent flavour tablets and QR-coded shelf-life tracking the moment they were given the right environment to think freely. You'll take away: - Why your hands are directly wired to the largest part of your brain's cortex and how LEGO Serious Play exploits that connection to unlock ideas people didn't know they had - The simple shift that transforms a defensive strategy session into an open one: direct your questions at the model, not the person - How placing team models on a single table can expose silo thinking, duplicated effort, and misalignment in a single session - Why the problem is almost never the people and almost always the environment you've given them to think in - The five-step LEGO Serious Play facilitation process - How Azeem uses AI to pressure-test his challenge questions before he walks into the room If you enjoyed this episode, please like, subscribe, and leave a review — it helps us reach more people who are serious about making innovation stick. Connect with Azeem: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/m-azeem-saheer-pcc-837b3759/ Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/nz/podcast/ei-cafe-with-azeem/id1540856792 Connect with Vaughan: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/vaughanbroderick/ X: https://x.com/theVBroderick Website: https://vaughanbroderick.com/ Book: https://innovationinactionbook.com/ #LEGOSeriousPlay #Innovation #DesignThinking #Facilitation #Leadership #HumanCentredInnovation #ExpertInnovators #CreativeThinking #StrategyDesign #EmotionalIntelligence #TeamBuilding #OrganisationalCulture #PlayAtWork #FacilitationTools #ChangeManagement

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  Innovation in Action

  How to Navigate Power and Politics | Eliza Turnbull

  Jun 7, 202648 min

  In this conversation, Eliza Turnbull - strategy, sustainability and culture specialist, founder of Kindred Collective and co-founder of Rewa Solutions — shares what years of working at the intersection of stakeholder engagement, culture design and human-centred strategy have taught her about why well-intentioned initiatives fail. Known for her work helping organisations navigate complex change, Eliza brings a rare combination of marketing rigour, philosophical grounding, and hard-won practitioner experience. She doesn't theorise about power and politics in organisations — she's lived them, including a product launch at Bupa London that was stopped cold by stakeholders nobody had thought to map. We get into why influence rarely lives where the org chart says it does, how consulting and genuine engagement are completely different activities, and what it actually takes to build a culture where innovation can survive contact with reality. We also dig into the parking attendant who held up an entire event, the professional services firm project that took two years instead of six months and why culture will trump your strategy, your process, and your best intentions every single time. Takeaways - Why the people most likely to derail your initiative are the ones you forgot to include — not the ones who disagreed - How to run a stakeholder mapping exercise that surfaces invisible power before it surfaces itself - The difference between high power and high interest — and why conflating them is one of the most common strategic mistakes - Why consulting and engaging are not the same activity — and what happens when you confuse them - How the professional services project that failed on delivery became the one that actually worked - What culture really means — and why it has nothing to do with the values on your wall - Why culture change takes 12 to 18 months of consistent daily practice, not a workshop If you enjoyed this episode, please like and subscribe, share it with someone who's been blindsided by a stakeholder they didn't see coming, and leave a review. I read every single one. Follow Eliza: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/elizaturnbull/ Work with Eliza: https://www.rewa.nz Follow Vaughan: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/vaughanbroderick/ X: https://x.com/theVBroderick Website: https://vaughanbroderick.com/ Get Innovation in Action book: https://innovationinactionbook.com/ #stakeholdermanagement #innovationculture #culturalchange #organisationaldesign #humancentreddesign #designthinking #innovation #strategyconsulting #changemanagement #leadershipdevelopment

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  Innovation in Action

  Customer Research Secrets Behind Spotify, Meta & Walmart | Julie Francis

  May 30, 202658 minS0

  <p>In this conversation, Julie Francis - seasoned UX researcher, founder of BellaVia Research, and one of the foremost practitioners of journey mapping and persona development - shares what five years inside Meta Reality Labs taught her that most consultants never get to see.<br /><br />Known for her work with organisations including Meta, Spotify, and Walmart, Julie brings a rare dual perspective: decades of independent consulting bookended by an in-house stint that fundamentally changed how she works. <br /><br />We get into why research so often fails to drive decisions, how to build genuine buy-in for foundational research, and...

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