Bosses drop from Sky Tower

‘‘Our punchline is 'transforming young lives forever', and that's exactly what we do.’’

Growing up in South Auckland, Martin Payne says he knows what it’s like on the ‘‘other side of things’’.

So when his sister-in-law ‘‘tapped him on the shoulder’’ to raise money for the Graeme Dingle Foundation, he couldn’t really say no. Even if it did mean throwing himself off the side of the Sky Tower.

Payne was joined by 26 other community leaders and bosses from around Auckland, to hurl themselves 192 metres off the Sky Tower.

As general manager of Water Supply Products, the Birkenhead Point resident was the perfect candidate for Drop Your Boss.

Drop Your Boss is an annual event to raise money for the Graeme Dingle Foundation, an organisation founded 21 years ago by outdoors enthusiasts Graeme Dingle and Jo-anne Wilkinson. Their vision was to improve New Zealand’s negative youth statistics.

‘‘People have tough lives,’’ Payne says.

‘‘The foundation is trying to pluck kids out of the wrong path and put them on the right path, which is a great thing.’’

Co-founder Graeme Dingle says he launched the unconventional fundraiser in 2013, in order to give participants the opportunity to experience, first-hand, the challenge of overcoming fear that young people face everyday.

So far, nearly $50,000 has been raised.

Funds go towards the foundation’s programmes for Kiwi kids aged between 5 and 18. Each programme targets the different needs in children, from low self confidence to youth offenders.

‘‘Our punchline is ‘transforming young lives forever’,’’ Dingle says.

‘‘That’s exactly what we do.’’ Joining Payne, was fellow North Shore resident and Kaipatiki Local Board member Richard Hills.

Despite not being the ‘‘biggest fan of heights’’, Hills says it was great to support working with youth in New Zealand

Dingle remembers Hills as a teenager, when he went to Antarctica as a part of the programme with co-founder Wilkinson.

‘‘We’ve watched him blossom since then.

We prove our outcomes in the people in we produce,’’ Dingle says.

Visit givealittle.co.nz/event/ dropyourbossauckland2016. just

PHOTO: CHRIS MCKEEN/FAIRFAX NZ Martin Payne receives a hug from his mother and his daughter before getting suited up. Graeme Dingle