Tony Dench

Experienced board member and chair.

Your programme director is Tony Dench, bringing decades of expertise in financial services strategy. He’ll be helping you unpack the latest shifts in the landscape and what they mean for the future of financial advice – ensuring you get the most out of your experience.

Andrew Inwood.

Founder & Principal, CoreData.

Andrew Inwood is the founder and principal of CoreData, a global research and strategy consultancy with offices in Sydney, Perth, London, Boston, and Manila. With over 30 years of experience in financial services, Andrew brings deep insight into adviser and client behaviour, market dynamics, and strategic growth opportunities.
Having held senior roles at Rothschild Asset Management, AMP Investments, Virgin Direct UK, Wizard Home Loans, and Telstra, Andrew’s career spans across investment, technology, and customer experience. Since founding CoreData, he has authored more than 50 major research studies and is a highly sought-after speaker.

Sam Tremethick.

Experienced financial services executive.

With over 25 years of experience in retail distribution across life insurance, investments, and superannuation, Sam Tremethick has held multiple C-suite roles. Now at NMG, he provides a market overview, highlights key opportunities and insights.

Wayne Handley

Director, Bombora Advice

Wayne brings over 35-years of experience in financial services, having built a career spanning senior corporate leadership and private business ownership. A respected industry figure, Wayne has held director and executive roles across some of Australia’s most prominent advice networks.
With a proven track record in building and leading high-performing advice networks, Wayne is known for his practical insight into what drives long-term success in advice businesses, serving on numerous Boards of Advice to help shape strategy, culture, and growth. Wayne’s deep understanding of the advice landscape—and how it’s evolving—makes him a valuable voice on the future of financial advice.

Dean Holmes

Co-Founder, Absolute Wealth Advisers | Adviser Coach, The Wealth Network

Dean brings over 15-years of real-world experience as a financial adviser and business owner, having co-founded Absolute Wealth Advisers in 2008. Dean has built a proven formula for creating genuine business value.
Known for his no-nonsense, results-driven approach, Dean now coaches advisers across Australia, helping them avoid costly missteps and build smarter, more scalable businesses. His coaching is grounded in experience—he never recommends what he hasn’t personally put into practice.

Kevin Chou

Senior Pricing Director

Kevin is a Senior Pricing Director at PartnerRe, based in Singapore. He is a qualified actuary with over 12-years' experience focusing on the Australia and New Zealand markets, having started his career at Sovereign / AIA. More recently, Kevin has broadened his expertise with exposure to Southeast Asia, Korea, and Japan. He looks forward to sharing insights drawn from both his ANZ background and a wider APAC perspective.

Yalcin Akcay

Professor of Operations Management, Melbourne Business School

Yalçın Akçay teaches Operations Management at the MBA, Executive MBA and Senior Executive MBA programs. He received his dual-title PhD from the Penn State Smeal College of Business. Previously, he was an Associate Professor at Koç University.
Yalçın’s research focuses on revenue management, dynamic pricing, inventory management, retail operations, stochastic modelling of service and manufacturing systems with his research having been published in leading academic journals. His work was also selected as the Revenue Management and Pricing Section Practice Prize Finalist by the Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences (INFORMS).

Kris Mason

Seasoned leader and business growth specialist.

We’ll also hear from Kris Mason, Founding Partner and Co-CEO of MBS Insurance, one of Australia’s leading specialised life insurance advisory firms. Since shifting MBS’s focus solely to life insurance, Kris has led the firm through extraordinary growth and will share insights on scaling a business, drawing on real-world experience in specialisation, joint ventures, referral networks and external investment to drive national growth.

Olivia Hendy

Senior Behavioural Strategist, The Lab Insight & Strategy

Olivia is passionate about applying behavioural science to create actionable, innovative strategies. With a focus on upskilling clients and teams through practical frameworks and insight sharing she helps them tackle complex challenges and drive meaningful change. Her diverse background in economics, social impact, and research allows her to approach problems from multiple perspectives, focusing on delivering insights that inspire real-world impact.

Nikki Dahlgren

Executive Director, and Head of Behavioural Science, The Lab Insight & Strategy

Nikki works on the forefront of behavioural science and psychological theory to more deeply understand why people behave the way they do and develop creative, tailor-made strategies to ignite behaviour change. 20 years of experience consulting on a range of cultural, social and commercial challenges for top tier corporates, government and social agencies to drive growth and deliver effective, impactful change.

Terry Bell

Principal, Business Health

Terry Bell is a founding Principal of Business Health, a specialist practice management consultancy that has supported financial advisory businesses across Australia, New Zealand, the US and Canada for over 2 decades. With deep experience in senior leadership, business development and operations, Terry has spent his career helping advisers strengthen the performance, sustainability and value of their businesses.
Terry brings a global lens to his insights and is widely regarded for his ability to translate complex operational challenges into clear, actionable steps. He is passionate about helping advisers achieve measurable growth through business planning, innovation and implementation that works.

John Eales.

Australian rugby's most succesful captain.

Rugby legend and leadership expert John Eales will be joining us to share his insights on high-performance culture and resilience. As one of Australia’s most successful Wallabies captains, John knows what it takes to build and lead winning teams – both on and off the field.