Mary Haddock-Staniland MC/Entertainer Profile

Executive Leader, Changemaker & Powerful Voice for Belonging

Mary Haddock-Staniland is an award-winning executive leader, keynote speaker, commentator and changemaker known for bringing together commercial leadership, lived experience and a deeply human approach to creating change.

With an executive career spanning organisational leadership, people and culture, inclusion, transformation and social impact, Mary has built a reputation for challenging conventional thinking while bringing people with her. Today, as an Executive at Burnett Foundation Aotearoa, she works at the intersection of organisational performance, people, communications, advocacy and social impact, helping shape organisations that are more connected, courageous and equipped for the future.

Mary is also a highly sought-after speaker and commentator whose voice extends well beyond the corporate world. Her commentary explores leadership, identity, belonging, visibility and the importance of creating a world in which people do not simply feel included, but genuinely valued.

As a proud trans woman, Mary has long used her visibility to help create space for others. Her lived experience is an important part of her story, but her message is universal: being yourself matters, and so does how you make other people feel.

Mission

Mary believes the most powerful change happens when courage and humanity come together. Her own journey taught her early that being different can mean navigating systems, expectations and assumptions that were never designed with you in mind. Rather than simply learning how to succeed within those systems, Mary has dedicated much of her career to helping change them.

Her work is grounded in a belief that difference should not merely be accommodated. It should be understood, respected and valued.

Whether she is leading organisational transformation, advising senior leaders, advocating for communities or speaking to an audience, Mary encourages people to think differently about leadership and belonging. She challenges us to replace performative inclusion with meaningful action, to lead with both courage and kindness, and to recognise that progress is something we create together.

At the heart of her work is a simple philosophy: empower and encourage. Create the conditions for people to thrive, simplify what gets in the way, amplify what matters and unify people around a shared purpose.

Alongside her executive career, Mary has held a range of governance, advisory and ambassadorial roles and has been a long-standing ambassador for Lifeline Aotearoa.

Keynote

Warm, candid, glamorous and deeply engaging, Mary is a speaker who connects quickly and authentically with audiences.

Her keynotes bring together personal storytelling, executive experience, humour and sharp social commentary to explore what it really means to lead, belong and create change. She is equally comfortable speaking about organisational culture and leadership as she is identity, resilience, visibility, allyship and the courage required to live authentically.

Mary does not deliver inclusion as a corporate exercise or leadership as a collection of buzzwords. She makes both personal, practical and human.

Audiences can expect laughter, moments of reflection, provocative thinking and a genuine invitation to consider their own role in creating environments where people can be themselves and succeed.

Mary's message is ultimately one of possibility: we can be ambitious and kind, commercially focused and deeply human, different and connected.

And when we bring those things together, we create change that lasts.