Climate Leadership Accelerator: Into the Arena

“I grew up in Tasmania and the environment has always been important to me. I studied environmental science and have travelled the world to better understand how we interact with our natural environment.

My curiosity for better understanding our environment and how we can protect the planet, led to founding Nation Partners in 2013; a certified B-Corp, purpose-driven business that has implemented progressive Teal principles to fully unlock human potential.  I have created a business that directs its energy towards saving the planet and provides a blueprint for a new business model that recognises the importance of the environment and society, and ensures they are considered in every business decision we make.

More recently, I have been exploring my own inner-wisdom and wellbeing and considering how I can be emotionally healthy and best positioned to lead others.  At Nation Partners, we talk about wholeness and leaving your ego at the door, and I have found a place of greater contentedness through the work I have done with the Small Giants Academy in the Masters of Business Empathy and from the time I have spent in Bhutan.”

Gayle and her Global Leadership Foundation co-founder, Malcolm Lazenby, are passionate about and committed to making a positive difference to people, organisations and communities – both locally and globally.  They each bring over 30 years of experience and internationally recognised expertise in developing, strengthening and transforming individuals, teams, organisations and communities.

As a ‘for purpose’ organisation and a certified B Corp, Global Leadership Foundation, uses its business as a “force for good”, placing its profit each year into a philanthropic fund for the development of leaders in community. It’s pro-bono and low bono work also strengthens and supports individuals, organisations and communities to build compassionate and sustainable approaches to leadership and life.

Global Leadership Foundation along with its Global Fellows, works with boards, and senior leaders all over the world in a range of areas, including: transformational leadership and change in individuals and organisations, strategic planning and development, emotional health and leadership resilience, leading through facilitating, strengthening collaboration, and board and executive mentoring and coaching.

‍

Danny is co-founder and the Executive Chair of Small Giants. Danny was the inaugural Social Entrepreneur in Residence at RMIT, the founder and former CEO of Engineers Without Borders Australia and is the co-founder and Chair of the Impact Investment Group. He has founded over a dozen for profit and non profit organisations, as well as non-profit boards and advisories boards including the Jewish Museum of Australia, Stand Up, Smiling Mind, The Gross National Happiness Centre in Bhutan and Toniic. Danny has been recognised through many awards including a Churchill Fellowship, RMIT Alumnus of the Year, EY Social Entrepreneur of the Year, UN PRI Social Investment Pioneer and the Medal of the Order of Australia.

Nathan will be with you each step along the way as you move through the program. Guiding you with his years of wisdom and deep pull towards helping people find and amplify the stories inside them.

Nathan is a supporting artist for individuals and organisations wanting to tell their story. He was previously the editor of Dumbo Feather magazine for eight years, and now edits the sustainability quarterly, Renew. He enjoys a good ‘deep and meaningful’, as well as shining a light on ideas and work that help bring about a more beautiful world.

Tamsin is the Head of Programs and the Mastery of Business and Empathy at Small Giants Academy. She brings several decades of leadership experience and systems change in Europe, Australia and Africa. Tamsin believes the best way to predict the future is to create it, change moves at the speed of trust and the superpower of leadership today is our ability to listen. After working as a policy advisor to the Premier of South Australia over two successful campaigns, Tamsin went on to ignite and co-create a string of initiatives including co-founding: Workshop17 inclusive innovation hub in Cape Town; TheBoardroom Africa to bring board gender balance; and The Rallying Cry to shift investment at the intersection of gender and nature for climate outcomes. She is a strategic advisor to CEOs on feminine leadership, gender lens investing and embodiment and holds an MBA from the University of Oxford as a scholar of the Skoll Centre for Social Entrepreneurship.

A passionate and experienced governance professional, Mele-Ane’s work explores the intersection of cultural wisdom, purpose-led business, and the “next economy,” and believes in the immense power of storytelling for change. Mele-Ane holds an MBA from Oxford, where she was a fellow of the Skoll Centre for Social Entrepreneurship. She also has an LLB/BA from Monash University.

Mele has over 20 years of experience reporting to Boards and Board sub-committees with over 13 years of experience as a non-executive Director of Boards. Her experience spans ASX-listed companies, not-for-profits and for-purpose organisations across a wide range of sectors.

Alexa Firmenich is an investor, consultant and facilitator focused on climate and biodiversity. She is the co-director of SEED, a new centre of the Crowther Lab at ETH Zurich. SEED is developing the world's most holistic measure of biodiversity that reflects multiple scales of nature's complexity for any location on the planet, with the goal to steer financial and political decision-makers to crystallise the value of nature into the global economy. Alexa is also the founder of Ground Effect, an animist investment vehicle that supports early stage nature-based solutions, scientific research and new economic models. Parallel to this work, she is trained as a group facilitator in leadership development and ecological pedagogy, designing multi-day learning journeys through her role at Leaders' Quest.  She is also an author, podcast host of Lifeworlds, a founding board member of Terra Habitus – a Mexican environmental fund that operates large-landscape conservation and watershed restoration – and a wilderness guide.

Eleanor curates gatherings to bring people together around ideas for a hopeful future. She facilitates our Impact Safaris and was previously the Director of The School of Life Australia and the Head of Programming across Small Giants Academy.

Eleanor is a curatorial advisor to Groundswell Giving and sits on the council of the Art Gallery of New South Wales Atelier program.

Eleanor and her husband Dan also started First Light, a climate-focused investing vehicle supporting ideas and people doing transformational work for our planet.