The first step on Tania’s path to Ockham was tech drawing at Avondale College. She loved the precision and creativity of the subject – she was drawing up imaginary houses at 13 – and subsequently studied architecture at the University of Auckland.

She landed her first job out of Uni in Vancouver, measuring and drawing up community colleges. Tania returned to New Zealand for her graduation and started work at Stephenson and Turner in the CAD department. One of the directors, Geoff Land, swiftly recognised Tania’s talent and drafted her onto his projects. “I learnt a huge amount from him,” Tania admits. After a couple of years, she moved back to Canada, living in Toronto, and working for a graphic designer before the bright lights of London lured her to the UK. There, she focused mainly on renovations of venerable London buildings for City North Group. She completed her registration back home at MGA Innovation, working on industrial and commercial developments.

In 2009, Tania started at Ockham and her distinctive, beautiful designs have been an integral part of our success. Tania loves living in Auckland. “I love the beaches and I love Rangitoto and it's steadily becoming a multicultural city, which is fantastic.” In her spare time, Tania tears up the tennis court at Dunholme or relaxes on Kawau Island. She enjoys taking underwater photographs and is a keen diver and fisher.

Ben’s love of construction was sparked while working school holiday jobs on Auckland building sites. After school, he completed a Bachelor of Construction Economics while also working at Kingston Partners in quantity surveying.

In Ben’s final year of study, he was in the audience when Shane Brealey delivered a lecture on vertical integration of construction companies. “That was what I was doing my thesis on,” says Ben, “So I grabbed the chance to chat to him and he offered me the opportunity to work for his company, NZ Strong.” 

Ben spent the next six years learning the ropes of contractor quantity surveying from Shane. “I was really lucky to spend heaps of time with him. He was more of a mentor than a boss. My career accelerated much faster than most people just because of the exposure I got to his level of thinking.” 

After two years working on high-end apartment buildings in London, Ben returned to New Zealand and applied to work at Ockham because architecture, project management and construction are all in-house. “The construction industry can be very adversarial and very contractual,” says Ben. “At Ockham, there is way less aggro. Being vertically integrated lends itself more to collaboration, so it’s a more enjoyable process to deliver a building.” 

When he’s not at Ockham, Ben’s spending as much time as he can with his son Louie, enjoying a round of golf, or catching up with friends. 

If you have any media queries, Peter Malcouronne is your go-to chap. His team also look after Ockham’s words, images and ‘story’ – honest propaganda if you will – and oversees the relationship we have with our sponsorees and partners.

Since his feature-writing career began with a story in The Listener on a nudist camp open day, Peter has won numerous national and international journalism awards. In the two decades since, he has paddled through Parnell sewers, attended dog shows, profiled boxers, wood choppers and seditionists – and dabbled as ‘Dr Love Professor’, possibly the world’s most inept dating columnist. He has also written two books – a sentimental and non-best-selling ode to rugby, and a rather more successful opus on Aotea Great Barrier Island. The father of two enjoys AC/DC, ABBA, West Auckland culture, cats and YouTube clips of Shane Bond’s yorkers. 

Joss credits her parents for her incredible work ethic. They were in the hotel industry, so her first job was cleaning rooms in a luxury hotel in Bath, aged 13. Her family loved to travel and Joss discovered a flair for languages, which led to a BA (Hons) in Modern Languages.

After graduating, Joss was snapped by a PR agency who appreciated her ability to pitch stories to French and Spanish journos. She rose through the ranks of public relations but left a high-powered job at AOL’s London branch to try her hand at real estate. “I think as a young person my impression of PR was that it was going to be more like sales. I realised that was my strong point and real estate was right up my alley,” says Joss. She now boasts nearly 20 years’ sales experience in the real estate industry, predominantly in residential sales.

The London native followed her Kiwi husband to Aotearoa in 2008 and started with Ockham when their seven-year-old daughter Evie was a baby. Thanks to her superlative sales skills and sparkling personality, she’s now our Sales Team Leader. When she’s not at work, she takes advantage of the outdoorsy lifestyle Auckland offers. “I love that we're five minutes away from the beach. On the weekends we take the kids surfing and boogie boarding, or head out west for a spot of mountain biking, tramping or horse riding. If I was still living in London, these definitely wouldn’t be options!”

Adrienne perfected her graphic design skills volunteering on the University of Auckland’s student mag, Craccum, while completing a BA. Adrienne began working in advertising after uni, starting out Colenso BDDO before winning a spot at the Australian Advertising School.

She worked in Sydney before landing a role as an art director at TBWA in Johannesburg. “That was one of my favourite jobs ever,” says Adrienne. “I was thrown into TV commercials straight away and I learnt so much!”

Art was always Adrienne’s first love though, and she jumped at the opportunity to study visual arts at the University of Arts London. While working as a professional artist and freelance graphic designer, her art was selected for international art prize exhibitions in the UK and USA.

It was Adrienne who designed Ockham’s distinctive Möbius strip logo in 2010. “Both Mark and Ben have mathematical backgrounds, so creating a logo out of something abstract like a mathematical symbol was intriguing to investigate,” she says. She collaborated with her sister Tania on various signage and design projects for Ockham until her return to Aotearoa from the US, when she became our Head of Graphic Design. When she’s not creating beautiful brochures, advertisements and logos for Ockham, she’s creating beautiful works of art. You’ll find several of her paintings gilding the walls of the Ockham building, Kōkihi and The Isaac.

Financial Controller Javin Solanki – Ockham’s in-house Warren Buffett – joined the company in April 2023. A member of Chartered Accountants Australia and New Zealand since 2011, Javin’s career started as an auditor with Auckland accounting firm, DFK Oswin Griffiths.

A storied decade-long stint in the UK followed, which included senior financial roles with Poplar HARCA, a housing and regeneration association with a portfolio of 9000 homes in East London, and two years as Finance and Operations Director at CBRE Investment Management, the global real estate income fund with $242bn of assets under management.

When his two kidlets are not devouring his time, Javin is a gifted landscape photographer (a trip to Iceland in 2018 remaining a career highlight) and a lifelong (if, in recent years, intensely frustrated) Manchester Utd fan.