The Resilience Institute was founded in New Zealand by Dr Sven Hansen, building an evidence-based, integral approach to resilience training for individuals, teams and organisations.
Today, Bounce & Flow offers individual resilience assessments, one-on-one coaching, and workshops for organisations navigating change and uncertainty — bringing the same evidence-based methodology to leaders and teams who need practical tools, not just theory. Explore assessments → | Workshops for organisations →
Dr Sven Hansen is from a medical family, who completed two years in special forces before completing medicine. His passion for sport and flow took him into sports medicine where he discovered the power of deliberate, scientific training to secure both individual and team success.
After completing an MBA in 1993, he asked how one could translate and take these ideas to a wider population. Ahead of his time much!
He found he could help businesses reduce risks and improve business performance. This set the scene to build an evidence-based, integral and practical solution to sustainable performance in business and life.
Sven has worked extensively with professional firms, banks, corporates, government, entrepreneurs, universities, schools and sport. He leads the development of the Resilience Institute's methodology, research and training. He is actively involved in supporting leadership teams around the world to build personal and organisational resilience.
Sven's mission has always been to promote sound physical, emotional and mental wellbeing. In 2008, as his work involved measuring human factors more actively, by 2018 he had developed the Resilience Diagnostic which was integrated into a multi-platform App.
I (Lauren) was so so lucky to grow up with Sven as my dad (and Susan as my mother, and James as my brother, but this article is more about Dad - sorry guys. Your time is coming).
Anyway. Growing up in a medical family with a resilience trainer father was quite the adventure. 5am wake ups, family walks together every morning, beetroot juice before it was trendy. Some of my friends to this day recall how they were scared to come for sleepovers because they'd be woken up so early or berated about their posture. Sven was iconic.
And boy, it worked. Today, I am capable of undertaking risk that many would not dare. Through that risk tolerance, I've lived in six countries, I've got my science and my law degree, mooted and argued with judges in front of a crowd, competed in international negotiation competitions, worked in corporate law, co-founded a tech startup, started posting on social media... it's not Mt Everest and it's not being a billionaire but it's sure not the average life experience.
The most common question I get asked is how I bounce back. First, that's a mid aspiration and we can all do much, much better than just bouncing back to where we were. I prefer bouncing into another, not previously seen dimension. (Google: antifragile)
I truly believe each experience is a gift and we can alchemise pain into power. But being open to the opportunity of challenge requires staying calm in the face of adversity.
I've been obsessed with this work since I was young but I really wanted to go out into the world and experience how these tools work in practice. I took the long way around, and it benefits my clients more than anyone. Now, I am honoured to be part of this legacy family business and not a day goes by that I'm not grateful I get to do what I truly love and make meaningful change.
Lauren has a unique background that makes her incredibly well placed not just to advise clients on the neurobiology of managing pressure, but understand what they are going through. With negotiation, corporate law, and startup-founding experience, she's more than a psychologist giving you theories. She knows what it's like to work a 70 hour week and still want a social life. She knows the uncertainty of finding customers in a new city.
The Resilience Institute was built on a simple bet: that resilience could be measured, trained and proven, not just preached. Twenty years on, that bet has paid off, and Bounce & Flow is where it continues, for the next generation of clients who'd rather build real capacity than just survive another hard week.