Kanoa is a bright light in New Zealand broadcasting. Having made her name in children’s television, she successfully transitioned to primetime, first as weather presenter for Newshub and now known as former host of The Project, weeknights at 7pm on Three.

With thousands of live broadcasting hours behind her Kanoa is unflappable, equally at home reading from a script, ad libbing her way through a gap in proceedings or interviewing special guests.

Nadine Gray (Te Whakatōhea)  is the National Chief Nursing Officer for Health New Zealand | Te Whatu Ora, commencing the inaugural role in July 2024.

Formerly Chief Nursing Officer at Te Aka Whai Ora | Māori Health Authority, Nadine brings strategic leadership, clinical expertise, and a deep commitment to advancing Māori health outcomes.  She highly values nurses in leadership maintaining clinical credibility by working on the frontline of healthcare.  Nadine enjoys working in a community-based palliative care practice setting. The primary purpose of the National Chief Nurse role is to provide strong professional leadership for our highly valued nurses across the system, ensuring the delivery of safe, high-quality care. This includes developing and maintaining the nursing workforce as well as increasing the proportion of Māori and Pacific nurses. As a member of the National Clinical Leadership Team, Nadine ensures that clinical advice and expertise underpins strategic decisions, especially for health service design and delivery.

Nadine’s previous experience includes roles as Clinical Chief Advisor Nursing at Manatū Hauora | Ministry of Health, and as Māori Clinical Nurse Specialist in Cancer Care at Capital & Coast DHB, supporting whānau Māori in cancer care pathways. She holds a Master of Health Sciences with First Class Honours and a Bachelor of Nursing and is currently an adjunct teaching fellow at the School of Nursing, Midwifery and Health Practice at Victoria University of Wellington.

Emma is an experienced Nurse Practitioner, currently working in rural Primary Care. Emma has a special interest in Palliative and End of Life Care.  Emma has held previous roles as a Nurse Practitioner in Aged Care and Specialist Palliative Care.  Prior to becoming a Nurse Practitioner Emma worked in Oncology, Haematology and Community Hospice for much of her career. Emma is on the executive for Nurse Practitioners New Zealand and is a member of the Te Whatu Ora National Palliative Care Steering Group.

This presentation is designed to provide healthcare professionals with the essential tools to offer compassionate and comprehensive care for older people with life-limiting illnesses. We will delve into key aspects of managing older people with chronic and life-limiting conditions. Focusing on the benefits of early palliative care interventions, including Advance Care Planning.  Strategies for integrating palliative care will be discussed, focusing on communication skills, symptom management, enhancing quality of life, and providing psychological support. This holistic approach empowers healthcare workers to provide individualized and culturally appropriate care that aligns with the person and whānau goals and values. The presentation will also cover end-of-life care, including how to recognize when a person is dying and the role of specialist palliative care services. We will finish with an overview of Assisted Dying in Aotearoa, outlining legal responsibilities and the role of healthcare providers in facilitating access to this service.

With an award-winning career ranging from diplomat and international keynote speaker to business and public sector leader, Ziena has helped some of New Zealand’s largest businesses build their reputation and revenue, advised Ministers, led large-scale change and transformation programmes, and supported Māori, Pacific and ethnic women and young people into leadership roles. Her current portfolio includes leadership and governance roles across the public, private and not-for-profit sectors including as Commissioner for the Natural Hazards Commission Toka Tū Ake and Deputy Chief Executive at Te Pūkenga – New Zealand Institute of Skills and Technology. Recognised by Campaign Asia Pacific as part of its 2020 Women to Watch, a group of 40 outstanding women in the Asia Pacific, Ziena has received several international awards for her work promoting New Zealand trade, investment and education in Asia, where she was based for ten years including as Education New Zealand Regional Director for South and Southeast Asia, New Zealand Trade Commissioner to Singapore and Head of North Asia Marketing and Communications for New Zealand Trade and Enterprise. She holds a Master of Arts (First Class Hons) in International Relations and Politics from the University of Auckland, a Bachelor of Communication Studies, and Diploma of International Trade.

With significant demographic changes and a highly pressured workforce in New Zealand, rapid technological advancements and a volatile, complex global environment, strong leadership has never been more important. In this keynote, Ziena will share how to build a thriving aged care workforce which meets our needs today and into the future.

Katherine Ravenswood is a professor in the Faculty of Business, Economics and Law at AUT. She is an employment relations expert, focusing on macro and workplace issues for the care and support workforce. In addition to roles on working groups and committees for the Ministry of Health and Human Rights Commission, she has provided expert evidence to government agencies in Australia, think tanks in the UK and to the OECD. Her research is funded the NZ Health Research Council, the Royal Society Marsden Grant and the MBIE Industrial Relations foundation.

We often think about workplace violence in relation to particular events or incidents and frame it as an issue between individuals. This perspective limits the way in which we can prevent and mitigate WPV and opens it up for a ‘blame game’. This is significant in healthcare organisations because of the complexity of relationships between co-workers, clients, community and healthcare systems. This presentation gives an overview of some recent data on WPV, introduces the ‘socio-ecological’ framework for understanding and assessing workplace violence, and concludes with some suggestions for best practice workplace violence prevention in care and support work.