Experience

Climate Energy Finance

• Australia
• Think Tanks
• 1 - 100 Employee

• Communications director

  • Aug 2022 - Present

  Invited to join this philanthropically funded think tank (see website linked below) founded by leading global energy analyst and former Citigroup MD Tim Buckley. CEF works probono in the public interest to accelerate decarbonisation. We conduct research and analyses on global financial issues related to the energy transition from fossil fuels to clean energy, as well as the implications for the Australian economy, with a key focus on the threats and opportunities for Australian investments and exports. Beyond Australia, CEF’s geographic focus is the greater Asian region as the priority destination for Australian exports. CEF also examines convergence of technology trends in power, transport, mining and industry in accelerating decarbonisation. CEF is independent, non-partisan, and works with the corporate, finance, NGO and government sectors in Australia and internationally.



Climate Council

• Research Services
• 1 - 100 Employee

• Joint chief of staff/ Senior advisor

  • Sep 2021 - Aug 2022

  Led the Climate Council Media Centre's economic transition / clean jobs program, which focussed on the massive jobs and economic opportunities of the switch from polluting fossil fuels to clean industry, and managed staff assignments on major proactive and reactive interventions, including on the bleaching of the Great Barrier Reef, the mounting energy crisis, and unprecedented, climate-change driven flooding in NSW and QLD in 2022. Amplifying key expert and community voices, the team and I achieved the Centre's highest levels levels of traction as measured in reach and hits for the relevant reporting periods, helping to shift the public narrative to support ambitious policy progress on emissions reduction. Media wins included placing multiple op eds in The Australian, AFR, and SMH; high profile broadcast placements including Q&A, Four Corners and, frequently, RN Breakfast and ABC News Channel; and substantial and consistent coverage in target mainstream / conservative media including Sky News (daytime), Today, Sunrise, commercial TV and radio news, and News Corp tabloids, critical to changing the mainstream discourse and opening the space of political possibility to act.



Australian Democracy Network

• Australia
• Civic and Social Organizations
• 1 - 100 Employee

• Consultant

  • May 2021 - Oct 2021

  Led media and comms strategy and implementation for a large alliance of major NGOs which defeated draconian Morrison government regulations designed to silence advocacy – in particular from environmental and climate groups – by de-registering them for minor offences such as blocking a footpath at a public vigil. I worked with the ADN team and with CEOs and other leaders of a large and diverse coalition including Human Rights Law Centre, environmental NGOs, Anglicare, Uniting Care and St Vincent de Paul, social justice groups including ACOSS, major humanitarian NGOs such as Amnesty, Oxfam, Caritas, Fred Hollows and Save the Children, and First Nations groups. In a major victory for the movement, the regulations were subject to a successful disallowance motion in the Senate.



Climate Action Network Australia

• Civic and Social Organizations
• 1 - 100 Employee

• Consultant

  • Apr 2021 - Sep 2021

  Led comms strategy and implementation for climate summit The Better Futures Forum, August 2021, featuring fmr UN Secretary-General, Ban Ki-moon, former President of Ireland, Mary Robinson, and US Deputy Presidential Climate Envoy, Jonathan Pershing, 2IC to John Kerry. The Forum was designed to influence the Australian Government to develop credible and ambitious climate targets in line with other developed nations and our trading partners ahead of the critical UN Climate Summit, COP26, in November 2021. I achieved extensive media coverage including placing speakers on 7.30, RN Breakfast, in The Australian, Sky news and the AFR and negotiated a valuable advertising partnership with Guardian Australia, delivering $167,000 worth of run-of-site advertising across its website promoting registration in the run-up to BFF, and driving some 6,000 hits to the BFF event registration page. The LNP government committed to net zero by 2050 ahead of COP, and while it remained intransigent on 2030 targets, there was a significant groundswell of progress made collectively and in concert with the broader movement, resulting in the government being thrown out of office in the 2022 "climate election".



Sherman Group, elo communications

• Writer/public affairs/communications strategy

  • Jan 2010 - Jun 2021

  *Commissioned to interview and compile contributions from globally eminent people (including UN Deputy High Commissioner for Refugees Gillian Triggs, High Court Justice Michael Kirby, environmentalist Tim Flannery, philosopher Professor Peter Singer, former Treasury Secretary Dr Ken Henry, primatologist Jane Goodall, and others) on animal protection and social justice. Extensive research, recording, writing and editing of documentation to strict deadlines. *Sept 2020-April 2021: Contracted to lead and implement strategic campaigns for Ministry of Health in the unit working directly to the health minister in a highly pressured COVID-crisis impacted environment. *Co-wrote the 300-page memoir of philanthropist and fund manager (founder of multibillion dollar fund EquitiLink) Brian Sherman (Melbourne University Press, 2018). A chapter was published in a Good Weekend and the book was favourably reviewed in The Australian. Tim Flannery and Nobel Laureate JM Coetzee wrote cover endorsements. Also co- wrote Brian's memoir on the devastating impacts of his degenerative illness, Walking Through Honey, published by Booktopia in March 2022. *Various other freelance assignments in writing, editing and communications strategy in the NFP and social enterprise sector



SCCI: Sherman Centre for Culture & Ideas

• Australia
• Museums, Historical Sites, and Zoos
• 1 - 100 Employee

• General Manager

  • Sep 2016 - Feb 2019

  Developed and implemented communication strategy; managed events; and instigated/managed partnerships with businesses including Google Arts & Culture - which featured SCCI on its website alongside major arts institutions from around the world - government, including City of Sydney, media and community at this not for profit focussed on the sustainability, social, aesthetic, economic and ethical dimensions of architecture and design. The Centre delivered two event series per year featuring some 50 sessions each, showcasing international and Australian leaders in the above fields, films and workshops. All events sold out.



The Sunrise Project

• Australia
• Public Policy
• 100 - 200 Employee

• Director of Communications

  • Jan 2013 - Aug 2016

  Climate justice NFP driving transition from fossil fuels to renewables. Led media and communications strategy and implementation for major campaigns on climate justice designed to accelerate the transition to a renewable energy economy, stop fossil fuel developments and preserve ecosystems. This included campaigns to remove finance from coal and gas developments, the Traditional Owners' fight to stop Adani, major campaigns in NSW and QLD against damaging foreign owned projects, Fight for the Reef, the Land Water Future campaign to challenge the encroachment of coal and gas licences on farmlands, waterways and conservation areas in NSW, corporate divestment campaigns, health campaigns, and political advocacy campaigns at key intervention points such as state and federal elections. This work collectively made significant progress toward a decarbonised future, including, for example, helping to entrench widespread opposition to Adani and remove its social licence; reducing the coverage of coal and gas licences from 90% to 10% of the state of NSW; and accelerating the flight of capital from carbon.



Graeme Wood Group

• Director, Communications and Media

  • Feb 2012 - 2013

  Led all media and communications and issues management for Wotif founder, philanthropist and environmentalist Graeme Wood at a time of considerable conflict between progressive forces and the fossil fuel industry / conservative press; and for his four NFP entities, including Global Mail, the GW Foundation, Artology and Wild Mob, an NFP empowering community conservation volunteers Led all media and communications and issues management for Wotif founder, philanthropist and environmentalist Graeme Wood at a time of considerable conflict between progressive forces and the fossil fuel industry / conservative press; and for his four NFP entities, including Global Mail, the GW Foundation, Artology and Wild Mob, an NFP empowering community conservation volunteers



Voiceless, the animal protection institute

• Australia
• Non-profit Organizations
• 1 - 100 Employee

• Head, Corporate and Communications

  • Dec 2010 - 2012

  Animal protection NFP, with ambassadors and patrons including Jane Goodall, Justice Michael Kirby, artist Ai Weiwei, former treasury secretary Ken Henry and Nobel Laureate for literature JM Coetzee. Voiceless focussed on science-based research, law reform and education. Established by philanthropist and fund manager (founder of Equitilink) Brian Sherman to support the "next great social justice movement", with the key mission of ending the industrial and sanctioned abuse of animals in factory farming.



Do Something, NFP created by founder of Planet Ark, building community sustainability

• Director, Communications & Digital Projects

  • Dec 2008 - Dec 2010

  Led communications campaigns including a major campaign on food waste and food security, partnering with OzHarvest and with Therese Rudd as ambassador; and on establishing the world's first bottled water free town, Bundanoon, NSW. Led communications campaigns including a major campaign on food waste and food security, partnering with OzHarvest and with Therese Rudd as ambassador; and on establishing the world's first bottled water free town, Bundanoon, NSW.



National Trust of Australia (NSW)

• Australia
• Non-profit Organizations
• 1 - 100 Employee

• Editor then Head, Communications & Digital

  • 2005 - Dec 2008

  Australia's oldest conservation organisation, working to preserve natural and built environments for future generations. After starting as editor of publications, I led comms for this large and complex entity with a long history and multiple portfolios in advocacy, conservation and exhibition. This included corporate communications, media and devising creative strategic campaigns such as 2008's "Messages to the Future" time capsule, for which I engaged 5,000 people including celebrities and VIPs such as Russell Crowe, Steve Waugh and Malcolm Fraser to write message cards to the future as we face a climate change tipping point, elevating this frame in public consciousness. Media outcomes included features in mainstream media such as a front page and double page colour spread in Fairfax's Sun Herald and a double page colour spread in News Corp's tabloid weekend magazine, Sunday Life. The capsule containing the cards is to be unearthed in 2033, 25 years after it was buried.



Various Companies

• Book and Periodical Publishing
• 1 - 100 Employee

• Academic, writer, editor

  • 1998 - 2006

  - Completed PhD at University of Sydney and was a tenured lecturer in Arts Informatics. - Journalism: freelanced on longform features on social justice issues for Fairfax including SMH, Good Weekend, and Australian Financial Review; and for The Australian. - Co-edited the book, Prefiguring Cyberculture, for Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Press on the US, 2003, featuring leading thinkers on technology and culture. - Copyeditor, journal of the Institute of Architects, Architecture Bulletin, 2002-2005. -Extensive involvement in arts and culture including co-editor of OnScreen section of the journal RealTime, co-founder and editor of Essays in Sound, extensive reviewing for various publications.