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This week on Unbreakable Ventures, we welcome Brenden Winder who joins us to share his experiences and advice from his extensive career in New Zealand emergency management, particular in the public sector and national level.
Brenden started his career in the Royal New Zealand Navy, responsible for keeping his vessel and crew safe at sea. That experience shaped a calm, people-first approach to leadership that’s stayed with him ever since.
After the Navy, he moved into emergency management in Queenstown and was later deployed to Christchurch following the 2010 earthquake. He went on to become a founding team member at the Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Authority, where he helped lead the demolition and recovery work in the central business district and Port Hills region of Christchurch, safely clearing more than 1,800 sites in total.
Brenden has also worked internationally, leading a small team to Nepal after the Kathmandu earthquake, and more recently, Vanuatu, and he’s a member of New Zealand’s Emergency Management Assistance Team. He also supported the regional COVID-19 response.
Today, Brenden leads emergency management in Christchurch City, focused on one simple thing: helping communities be safer, stronger, and better prepared for what comes next.
It is our pleasure to bring you this wide ranging, fascinating discussion about all things emergency management in the public sector.
In this interview, we cover:
Community leadership is the single biggest resilience factor.
Well-connected, trusted local leaders matter more than any technical plan.Most people do not panic in emergencies. Many do nothing.
Planning must address apathy and delayed response, not just fear.Preparedness before an event determines recovery after it.
Roughly 10% of effort before an emergency shapes 90% of recovery outcomes.Tsunamis are fast, horizontal, debris-filled, and deadly.
They are not “high tides” and cannot be ridden out, early movement to high ground is critical.Timing and context radically change emergency outcomes.
Night vs day, winter vs summer, school hours vs holidays all alter response feasibility.Civil defence is small, but response is collective.
Police, fire, health services, iwi, community groups, and volunteers are civil defence.NZ is respected internationally, but under-leverages its experience.
Christchurch earthquakes, Pike River, mosque attacks, Whakaari, and COVID form a strong global case study.National standards and shared technology remain a gap.
Local autonomy helps recovery, but fragmentation weakens national-scale response.Exercises need to be bigger, harder, and more realistic.
Systems must be stress-tested to failure, not rehearsed politely.The hardest part is behaviour change for unseen risks.
Preparing for hazards people have never experienced (e.g. tsunamis) is the toughest challenge.
Important timestamps:
00:00 – Introduction & why this conversation matters
Setting the context for emergency management, recent disruptions, and Brendan’s background.01:09 – Career origins: Queenstown, earthquakes, and learning under pressure
How early roles and the Christchurch earthquakes shaped a practical view of resilience.03:24 – Christchurch earthquakes as a global inflection point
Why the response put New Zealand on the international emergency-management map.05:21 – Community as the real “first responder”
Student Volunteer Army, community mobilisation, and why locals arrive before uniforms.07:40 – Leadership beats stockpiling: what actually saves lives
Why social leadership and trust matter more than checklists and emergency kits.10:30 – Media fear vs real risk: understanding likelihood and consequence
How to prepare properly without panic, and why risk literacy matters.13:25 – Public preparedness myths and behavioural realities
Why most people don’t panic—and why apathy is the bigger planning challenge.17:46 – Tsunami risk explained: timelines, complexity, and hard truths
Regional vs distant tsunamis, warning times, and why there is no single “plan.”21:50 – Evacuation reality: managed vs self-managed responses
What happens when there isn’t time for emergency services to help—and why parents will still drive into danger zones.28:05 – Training at scale & lessons from overseas
Why NZ needs larger, more intense exercises, and what Taiwan, Japan, and others do better.
Brenden’s book recommendation, Thinking, Fast and Slow, by Daniel Kahneman.
You can connect with Brenden on LinkedIn here.
