The Figure.NZ team

You can see who’s involved in Figure.NZ and how to contact us on our team page.

We’re a remote-first team, and we don’t have a physical office — but we still love meeting people! If you’d like to arrange a meeting, please get in touch with the person you want to see.

Join our team

We’re not taking applications for any positions right now. We’ll update this and share on our social media channels when we’re hiring again.

Volunteer to help Figure.NZ

We really like volunteers at Figure.NZ — they’re how we got started.

In the past we’ve had volunteers working in our data team to find, clean and visualise data. Right now, we can’t commit to bringing in new volunteers because we can’t provide the level of support and training required.

In the meantime, there are many other ways to show your support.

  • Use data from Figure.NZ in what you do — we exist so you can do just that. A community of people building things with data and sharing them is good for everyone.
  • Tell people about Figure.NZ in the real world, or on social media, with a chart that catches your eye.
  • Give us your thoughts on what we’re doing well and how we can improve — you can email us at feedback@figure.nz, or get in touch with us using the details on our team page. We welcome all feedback, especially if you’re using data from Figure.NZ in your own projects.
  • We do user-testing of new features every few months. Email us at usertesting@figure.nz if you’d like to be involved.

Postal address

You can send us mail and parcels at:

Figure.NZ Trust
9541/17B Farnham Street
Parnell
Auckland 1052
New Zealand

Errors on figure.nz

We always want to hear about issues you notice so we can fix them and make figure.nz more useful for everyone.

This could mean a mistake in a chart or table like a typo, or something you feel is misleading, incomplete, or inaccurate in some other way. It can also mean a problem with our website, like the search not working or an image not displaying.

If you see something wrong, please email feedback@figure.nz.

Make sure to:

  • include the phrase “bug report” or “issue report” in the message title
  • provide a description of the issue and links to problem pages.

What does a great issue report look like?

A great issue report is clear, precise, and reproducible.

It helps if you include the following.

  • A clear subject line.
  • A description of the problem. Please make this as clear and concise as possible.
  • How we can find or see the problem. This might be a link to the page, or a description of what buttons we need to push or things we need to click to see the issue. If it’s a technical issue, it’s helpful to include your browser and operating system.
  • Additional information, like console logs, images and GIFs.

Screenshots are very useful for explaining issues with how our website looks, and animated GIFs help a lot for issues with how it acts, like broken animations or transitions that aren’t very good.

People using Macs can download LICEcap to capture GIFs.

Logos and guidelines

If you’re working with Figure.NZ, you may need to use our logo or brand colours, or want to make sure the charts you download look their best.

To make that easier, we’ve put together some guidelines and logo files which you can download below.

Please email nat@figure.nz if you want to do any of the below.

  • Use our logo or charts in a way that’s not covered by our guidelines.
  • Have us check that your use of our logo or charts meets our guidelines.
  • Source chart images in a larger size than what’s available on our website.

Media

Are you part of the media and looking for help on a story? Email ngapera.riley@figure.nz.

Media kit

About Figure.NZ

Founded by Lillian Grace in 2012, Figure.NZ is an organisation that sees numbers as a language that hold our stories — whether it be that there are 41,000 registered Labradors in New Zealand, 18 mushroom farms, or 60,000 babies born each year. It’s the first organisation in the world to make numbers truly accessible for everyone, not just experts.

Figure.NZ is devoted to getting people to use data about New Zealand, so we can all better understand our country and care for our future. We do this by making it easy for everyone to find and use our country’s numbers for free, through our website.

Read more about our purpose.

About Ngapera Riley

Ngapera is Figure.NZ’s CEO. She believes everybody should have access to good information, and that knowing how to find and use data is vital to solving our country’s biggest problems. Ngapera cares about everyone being able to take part in that, so we can collectively work towards a better future for Aotearoa.

Ngapera works closely with Māori business and education efforts across New Zealand. She currently holds board positions with the InZone Education Foundation, Hyundai’s Pinnacle Programme, and Te Ohu Whai Ao Trust, which connects indigenous business efforts from around the world.

Formerly the Global Director of the World Class New Zealand Network for Kea, Ngapera has also worked for New Zealand Trade and Enterprise, Ministry of Health, University of Auckland, and Manukau Institute of Technology.

About Lillian Grace

Lillian is Figure.NZ’s founder. She believes everyone will benefit when we can all better understand our context, and shift from debating about what is, to where we want to be and how to get there.

Lillian was named Inspiring Individual of the Year at the 2018 NZ Hi-Tech Awards, and has been on the Data Futures Partnership Working Group, Open Government Partnership Expert Advisory Panel, and the boards of the Innovation Partnership and of Centre of Research Excellence Te Punaha Matatini. Previously, Lillian was also at Academy Award-winning Massive Software, and think tank The NZ Institute.

Lillian was Figure.NZ’s CEO until August 2019, when she stepped out of the role to start Figure Group. Read Lillian’s blog post about the transition.

Download Lillian’s profile photo.

Previous media coverage

Idealog | A graceful transition

19 March 2019

Lillian talks to Elly Strang about stepping down as Figure.NZ CEO and launching Figure Group.

Read on Idealog.

Radio New Zealand | The benefits of making data widely available

7 March 2019

Lillian speaks to Kathryn Ryan on Nine to Noon about Figure.NZ’s plans to grow New Zealanders’ use of data by working directly with communities throughout the country.

Listen and read on Radio New Zealand.

Stuff | Data for sale

3 October 2018

Nat speaks to Katie Kenny about Figure.NZ and the role data and algorithms play in Government and society.

Read on Stuff.

Radio New Zealand | Lillian Grace: Graphing New Zealand in 40,000 charts

1 July 2018 

Lillian speaks to Jeremy Rose on Mediawatch about how journalists are using Figure.NZ.

Listen and read on Radio New Zealand.

Stuff | Lillian Grace: It’s time to remember technology is the tool, not the mission

26 June 2018 

Lillian writes about why we need to step outside of our buildings, suburbs and towns to work together on solving Aotearoa’s big problems.

Read on Stuff.

Idealog | How data can be used to create a fairer society

30 May 2018

Ben Mack speaks to Lillian about how data can be used to promote a more equal society where more people have access to the specific help they might need.

Read on Idealog.

Idealog | Most creative in Digital/Data: Lillian Grace

3 November 2017

Profile on Lillian as Idealog’s award winner for most creative in digital and data.

Read on Idealog.

Stuff | How well do you know Gisborne?

22 September 2017

Schools, sheep and Te Reo Māori speakers — we reveal the stats behind Gisborne.

Watch and read on Stuff.

Stuff | When big business backs social enterprise and the country wins

23 May 2017

Lillian writes about the benefit of corporate sponsorships for social enterprises and for New Zealand.

Read on Stuff.

Radio New Zealand | Lillian Grace: Visualising data

27 April 2014

Lillian speaks to Kim Hill on Saturday Morning about making data accessible for everyone.

Listen on Radio New Zealand.

TEDxAuckland | Lillian Grace: Know your country

24 September 2013