Julie Raine left school at the age of 16 with basic qualifications. 

A youth training scheme placement in the office of a mining company in her native Yorkshire led to an opportunity to work in the technical drawing office which in turn led her to pursue a degree in engineering, even though she had no idea what engineering was when she signed up to do the course. She just wanted to develop her technical drawing skills and knowledge.

30 years on and after a stint in the Middle East working on some high-profile construction projects, Julie moved to New Zealand where she runs her own engineering consultancy company managing multi-million tenders and bids.

Julie chats about the challenges she's had to overcome and why asking questions and challenging the status quo is so important.

Glenn Marvin has spent his life running, initially running from himself and his formative years in South Auckland. 

He's one of those individuals who's lived a full life and come close to death on numerous occasions. 

He dropped out of university and spent a few years travelling the world, partying hard and learning some valuable life lessons along the way.

Covid has hit the events industry hard and for Aaron Carter, the man behind Total Sport, one of New Zealand’s largest and well-known sports event companies, it put paid to his exit strategy from the business. 

He's just thankful to still have a company and is hoping the events industry bounces back in 2021.

Despite his mistakes, Carter has built a tribe of outdoor enthusiasts with trail running and mountain biking events a speciality. 

"We aim to deliver inclusive events that make people feel like champions," says Aaron. "What we do reminds me a little bit of Fight Club. We offer people an escape from high pressure jobs and take them to some wonderful locations."

Aaron chats about the loneliness of running a business and how he wish he knew about the importance of the 3 P's — Purpose, People & Passion —when he first started out in business. His advice to anyone starting out in business today is to watch Simon Sinek's TED talk , Start With Why to help you understand your purpose.

Aaron started his career at Sport Auckland, where he was employed as an Event Manager. His job was to deliver a portfolio of events but after a couple of years he wandered into his boss’s office, convinced him to make his position redundant, give him a contract to deliver a number of events, and Total Sport was born!

"If there’s a book in me it’d probably be called “How not to start a business – lessons learnt over the years,” Aaron admits. "I did little or no planning and I was a reluctant boss."

In the very first episode of Origin Stories, find out why 'There's Money in Shit' and other lessons Tony Quinn learned from building a global pet food and FMCG business. 

Listen as Tony talks about his childhood in Scotland where he worked in his father's pet food business before buying his first business, a signwriting company. Next came the brave decision to move his family to Australia at the age of 22 and how it all went horribly wrong.

Welcome to Origin Stories with Robert Tighe.

For the last 18 years, I’ve spent most of my working life writing origin stories, in my case, about elite athletes and successful business people rather than men in tights. Whenever I interview someone I focus on their origin story. I want to know about their journey, not the destination.

It may not be as iconic as Spidermans, Batmans or Captain America but everyone has an origin story to tell.

Superheroes are usually orphans or outsiders who don’t fit in.

The best entrepreneurs discover what their superpowers are and make the most of them.

In Origin Stories, I chat with founders and entrepreneurs about how they discovered their superpowers to go from zero to hero and more importantly what you can learn from their mistakes.