Portfolio / Case study
Hui E! Community Aotearoa
Annual Impact Report · 2025/2026 · Te Whanganui-a-Tara Wellington
Simple online kōrero, plus a year's worth of video, audio, updates and letters... turned into one accessible report in the national sector connector's own voice, with a first draft in under a month.
Jump to the report
The organisation
Hui E! Community Aotearoa connects, amplifies and innovates alongside tangata whenua (people of the land), community and voluntary sector nationally. It is a convener and a broker of relationships, not a service provider or a mouthpiece.
Its name comes from the whakataukī (proverb): Whano, whano! Haramai te toki! Haumi ē! Hui ē! Tāiki ē!, which describes a group united and ready to embrace its purpose.
- Led by: Dr Katie Boxall (CE Tangata Tiriti) and Patrick Gemmell (CE Tangata Whenua), standing side by side since 1 September 2025
- Sector: advocacy and sector infrastructure
- Network: a Community Constellation of 25 member organisations and a new Tangata Whenua Forum representing 13+ iwi and hapū
- Report: Annual Impact Report, 1 July 2025 to 30 June 2026
The challenge
Hui E! had its biggest year yet. Co-leadership began with Patrick Gemmell's pōwhiri (formal welcome) on 1 September 2025, the Tangata Whenua Forum was established, and the Community Constellation grew from 19 to 25 members. All of it needed telling.
But the story lived in a scatter of formats, and it all landed on a small team leading through a hard year, as core government funding fell and the wider sector stretched thin. Last year's report had been made in-house, in a self-made template.
There was a deeper challenge too. Hui E!'s work is relationships and infrastructure, so there is no single whānau (family) story and no simple output count to point to. And Hui E! rarely acts alone, so the report had to honour collective mahi (work) honestly, documenting engagements and participation rather than overclaiming outcomes.
The story was scattered across:
- 3 video interviews
- 1 audio interview
- A 12-part co-leadership video series
- Monthly operational updates
- Letters of support
- Last year's report, in a self-made template
- What Katie and Patrick knew first-hand, and could only share by talking it through
How we helped, step by step
A small team leading through a hard year didn't have hours to spare rereading everything. AI covered the ground quickly; every call on what made the cut, and how to say it, stayed with people.
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Step 1: Data Collection
Conversation
A discovery session and one structured interview with both Chief Executives.
We started the way we always do, with a conversation. With Hui E!'s two Chief Executives, Dr Katie Boxall and Patrick Gemmell, we drew out the shape of the year: what mattered, what was theirs to claim, and what belonged to the wider sector. We kept it short for a stretched team. Relationships and values came first. The tooling came second.
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Step 2: Data Analysis
Sensemaking
AI helped us read across everything. People decided what it meant.
We used AI to extend our reach across hours of interviews, months of updates and a folder of supporting documents, and produced an analysis brief for the humans to test. People made every call about tone, attribution and te reo.
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Step 3: Report Writing
Draft
Written in Hui E!'s own four-pou structure.
We wrote the report in Hui E!'s own structure, built around its four pou (pillars): Give effect to Te Tiriti, Weave, Amplify and Innovate. We added features on co-leadership and the Tangata Whenua Forum, an Our Journey timeline and voices from the sector. Building for digital enabled the Community Constellation map to be embedded directly, along with Co-Leadership video from Hui E!'s LinkedIn series.
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Step 4: Report Design
Deliverables
An accessible microsite in Hui E!'s own brand, plus an AGM deck.
We delivered the report as an accessible, screen-reader-friendly Gamma microsite in Hui E!'s own brand, which they can link from their website and export as PDF or Google Slides, plus a condensed 14-slide Canva AGM presentation. We held onto the nuance of the people and the place, keeping the two-house model and the tangata whenua and tangata Tiriti co-leadership front and centre rather than flattening them into a generic template in the name of efficiency.
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Step 5: Final Review
Review
The Chief Executives reviewed the first draft in one short remote session.
The Chief Executives reviewed the first draft together in a single remote session. Patrick was struck by how much had been accomplished in under a year, and Katie said she really liked what we had made together. Because the main report is built in Gamma, many small content tweaks can be made by the Hui E! team themselves — they have control of the final report.
The result:
Hui E!'s Annual Impact Report 2025/2026
Hui E! walked into its AGM holding a pivotal year's work told in one place — written in its own four-pou structure, every claim traced back to something the team supplied and designed in alignment with the brand guidelines. That's the work of pulling a scattered year together off a small team already stretched by a hard year for the sector.
The report is now live on Hui E!'s own website, and simpact AI were honoured to be thanked by name at their November AGM.
The digital report was designed to be viewed online — see it on Gamma for the best experience.
Working together, in numbers
130+ files
in the folder Hui E! shared with us: documents, photos, recordings and transcripts
170 min
of interviews and videos to work through, across 15 recordings
2 calls
with the Chief Executives: a discovery conversation and a structured interview
<1 month
from interview to first draft review
“Anthea and Jade took real care and time to understand our mahi. The result was an impact report that we are proud to share. Thank you simpact!”
Hui E! Community Aotearoa
Ready to share your own impact story?
Whether you're a community organisation ready to tell your story, or a funder who wants to lift reporting off your grantees' plates, we'd love to talk.