The Thirriwirri Team

Jason is a Yuin man with cultural and familial ties extending from the NSW South Coast, north to Laperouse.

For over 20 years, Jason held senior executive roles in the NSW public and university sectors, including eight years as the Head of Aboriginal Affairs NSW, leading Government strategy and reform in Aboriginal economic participation, community governance, land rights, culture and heritage, community safety, environmental health and service accountability.

Jason’s other roles have included Associate Professor and Associate Dean, Indigenous Strategy at the University of Sydney’s Faculty of Medicine and Health; and Executive Director, Culture and Heritage in the NSW Department of Environment and Climate Change.

Jason has been a member of numerous national and state level councils, executive committees and working groups on Aboriginal affairs, state and economic development, public land management, and social policy reform. He is currently Chair of the National Indigenous Australians Agency’s Indigenous Evaluation Committee.

Jason is an accredited executive coach and experienced board member, having served on the Boards of NSW Health Pathology, National Aboriginal Sporting Chance Academy, the NSW Heritage Council and NAISDA.

Jason received the Public Service Medal (PSM) for outstanding public service. He is a Fellow of the Australian New Zealand School of Government and a recipient of the Sir James Wolfensohn Scholarship for executive education at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government in Cambridge. Jason holds a Bachelor of Economics from the University of NSW and is a Global Alumni of the Commonwealth Study Conference.

David is a Yuin Maneroo man from south east NSW and has worked in land and cultural heritage management for more than twenty five years. David has worked both within Government and as a consultant in NSW, ACT, and Victoria – with his most recent senior role in Government being the Executive Director of Visitor Engagement, Conservation, Planning and Partnerships at Parks Victoria.

David is an experienced facilitator and coach educator, and has provided mentoring to emerging leaders for many years. David has a passion for supporting community leadership and capability, and has spent a lot of his career developing strategic approaches to community and government partnerships and co-design.

David is also an experienced board member and has been a member of the NSW Heritage Council, the Temperate East Marine Park Advisory Committee for Parks Australia and is a member of the Australian Facilitators Network.

David has championed the recognition and protection of cultural landscapes for many years, and believes that heritage management is about telling stories with a focus on making heritage accessible and part of every community’s ongoing identity.

Melissa has over 20 years experience working with Aboriginal people and communities in NSW. Having worked in the fields of Land Rights, Social Housing, Finance, Public policy and Aboriginal affairs, Melissa has a strong focus on community engagement and facilitation. After spending 12 years in the social housing sector, she transitioned to the public sector working as a Senior Project Officer and Regional Manager at Aboriginal Affairs NSW. During her time with Aboriginal Affairs Melissa acted as a relationship and partnership broker between Aboriginal communities and government.

Her networking and engagement expertise has seen her contribute to significant policy, program design and implementation in the fields of Social Housing and Aboriginal affairs. Having worked in and spent time on boards for several non government organisations and a sector peak body, Melissa also brings knowledge and experience in governance and strategic business planning.

Melissa has a passion for working with and in the interests of young people, Aboriginal people and vulnerable communities and uses her extensive facilitation experience to support Aboriginal people to feel heard.

Nicole is a Bundjalung woman from northern NSW and has spent over 25yrs working within education sectors across the country.

Nicole’s passion for education has seen her work within the Early Childhood, School and University sectors as a teacher within the NSW public education system, an administrator within the NSW Teachers Federation and senior leader within the Australian Education Union and University of Melbourne. She has developed strategy and policy as well as advocated for improved educational opportunities and outcomes for First Nations people at a local, state, national and international level.

Nicole has extensive experience in program management, student and staff recruitment and retention as well as employment strategies and staff development planning and delivery.

Nicole is an experienced facilitator and coach and has mentored many developing First Nations leaders over her career. She is an accredited executive coach and has delivered coaching and leadership workshops as part of the First Peoples Leading program. In additional she has supported and advised many non-First Nations people on their journey of learning about and engagement of First Nations people.

Rachel is a Yuin women from the South Coast of NSW and is a Senior Associate at Thirriwirri. Rachel has worked in Senior Executive roles in the NSW public service for over ten years with a focus on community-led development, social justice, truth telling and healing. She places cultural safety, trauma informed approaches and Aboriginal peoples’ right to self-determination at the centre of how she works.

Rachel has worked extensively with Aboriginal people and communities in the areas community voice, Stolen Generations reparations, family violence prevention services and child sexual assault services. Through this work Rachel collaborated and facilitated discussions with people who experience trauma as a result of harmful government practices. Through a Social Policy lens she also worked extensively to bring Aboriginal community and organisational stakeholder perspectives into various settings to influence policy, reforms and approaches. She has set up practices and supports to enable the phycological safety for those involved in this work.

An example of Rachel’s relevant experience is her role in coordinating and implementing the NSW Government response to the Parliamentary Inquiry into Stolen Generations Reparations (Unfinished Business). Through this work Rachel facilitated discussions and collaborated with Stolen Generations survivors to shape of the NSW Government response and worked with survivors to oversee its implementation.

Melissa is a proud Wiradjuri woman, born and raised in Sydney's inner and southern suburbs.

After nine years of managing two family businesses with her husband, Melissa moved into the public sector in 2011. Since then, she has held various roles in business administration, human resources, project management and community engagement. Melissa's recent role as a Regional Manager at Aboriginal Affairs NSW focused on strengthening stakeholder engagement and partnerships to progress community aspirations. Additional roles included representing the interests of the Aboriginal workforce of Aboriginal Affairs in public sector forums and the development of the Department's Aboriginal Employment Strategy.

Melissa is passionate about creating lasting opportunities for young people to thrive in their communities and advocates building the Aboriginal Community Controlled Organisation sector for sustainable, transgenerational wealth and health.

Melissa is undertaking a Bachelor of Business Administration, which she is leveraging to support and empower Aboriginal people for enduring well-being for their families and communities.

Jason is a Gunditjmara man, born and raised on Gadigal land. Jason played a central role working for Aboriginal Affairs NSW for 13 years on initiatives promoting Aboriginal communities leadership and self-determination, including the Partnership Community Program and Local Decision Making, shifting the models of partnerships between communities and government.

His previous work also involved implementing the NSW Government’s Unfinished Business commitments for Stolen Generations and advancing a strengths-based dialogue on healing in NSW, including the OCHRE Healing Forums.

Jason has been responsible for building significant relationships and working alongside Aboriginal communities committed to healing, including Stolen Generations survivors and Stolen Generations Organisations in NSW.

Jason is a graduate of the Australian Graduate School of Management and NSW Public Service Commission’s Aboriginal & Career Leadership program. His personal leadership, integrity, spirit and a depth of understanding of intergenerational trauma and healing has enabled him to influence positive change in his role for Aboriginal communities.

Claude is a Minjungbal man from the Tweed Valley, that calls Gambaynggir Country Home. He is passionate about working closely with Aboriginal Communities and being part of a diverse environment that contributes to making significant changes.

Claude has over 20 years of experience with the NSW government developing, implementing and managing cultural heritage, administrative strategic solutions and emergency management planning, preparation and responses which ensures he is a logical and critical thinker who can devise and execute creative, adaptive solutions for various challenges.

He has extensive stakeholder engagement skills as well as knowledge and insights as a member of various organisations, such as the Local Aboriginal Land Council, Consultative Group, and Indigenous Corporation, that have enabled him to work effectively with Aboriginal communities across NSW.

Claude holds a Bachelor of Applied Science from the University of Canberra & a Certificate in Emergency Management.

Jess is a Dunghutti woman, who grew up on Dharawal Country in southern Sydney and now lives and works on Dharug Country in northwest Sydney.

Jess has over 20 years' experience working with NSW government in natural and cultural heritage management and land use planning. She has worked in several different roles developing and delivering a diversity of strategies, programs and projects, with Aboriginal people and communities, on a variety of scales from local, to regional, to state-wide.

Jess holds tertiary qualifications in Environmental Science, Project Management, and Urban and Regional Planning.

Jess is passionate about improving outcomes for First Nations communities and has taken on voluntary roles in her local and professional communities to achieve this, including recently as Adjunct Senior Lecturer, Sydney School of Architecture, Design and Planning, Faculties and Schools, the University of Sydney.

John has nearly 30 years working in senior management and consulting roles across the Aboriginal cultural heritage, indigenous affairs, infrastructure, and Aboriginal owned and controlled business and not for profit sectors. He led the development and implementation of the NSW Aboriginal Heritage Information Management System (AHIMS), as well as innovative Aboriginal programs supporting Aboriginal community projects in NSW. His work has a strong focus on Aboriginal led whole of Country approaches to managing the natural and built environment, cultural heritage, and landscape resources.

John works on statewide Aboriginal policies and initiatives whilst continuing to directly support the delivery of local community led projects. As a senior consultant for over a decade, he is currently focused on large scale transfers of public lands to Aboriginal ownership, disaster risk planning and recovery informed by local Aboriginal community leadership, and large infrastructure projects that support government and business clients to work more effectively with their Aboriginal stakeholders.

Melissa is Ngarrindjeri woman based on Kaurna country in South Australia.

Melissa brings more than 25 years of work in the fields of justice, child protection and human rights leading teams in government and non-government organisations. As a private consultant Melissa’s work focused on strengthening organisational and individual leadership and development within and for Aboriginal communities.

Melissa is a qualified and experienced executive coach.

Kylie worked in the Communications industry for 20 years, in production, live broadcasts, post production and event/ location services before taking a new direction and moving into NSW Government. After many years of managing reactive scenarios, this opportunity saw Kylie working with Aboriginal organisations and many women focussed groups working on active changes.

Using Why as a focus Kylie works with evidence to develop direction and strategy for the most suitable possibility to move a project or organisation toward and end goal. Working closely with NSW Government funding recipients enabled Kylie to gauge progress at a grass roots level and together with stakeholders, work toward converting data into beneficial results. Stakeholder engagement is one of Kylie’s key strengths across government to private sector, and not for profit to corporate.