Place Lab: Innovation Without Walls

David is an internationally recognised leader in brand, communications and legacy strategy. An innovator in creating economic and social outcomes through informed brand strategy, he has led high-profile place and corporate branding projects in Australia and around the world.

As a place branding expert and Managing Director of Generation Alliance, David has led projects for the ACT Government, Penrith City Council, Parramatta City, Warringah and Wyong Shire Councils as well as nation branding projects in Bangladesh, Botswana, Jamaica, New Zealand, The Gambia, Tonga and Zanzibar.

Prior to starting his own business, David worked for 14 years in executive roles at the Australian Trade Commission (Austrade) where he gained a broad international business perspective and a solid understanding of global trade and development.

Dr Lara Moroko is an educator, researcher and consultant to industry. She combines her passion for entrepreneurship, placemaking and innovation with her area of specialisation - creation of value for customers, staff and stakeholders - throughout her portfolio of roles.

Building on a decade in the finance industry, Lara leveraged her early career experience to consult to the banking and finance, pharmaceutical, IT, construction, health, advertising, design and telecommunication industries, before embarking on an academic career in 2005.

Throughout her research and consulting Lara continues to build a bridge between the latest in academic thinking with the challenges and opportunities of doing best practice business in Australasia.

Matthew Tukaki has led some of the largest social investment and social impact projects in the world and is an expert and trusted advisor when it comes to the identification and development of social investment opportunities across Asia, the Middle East and Africa.

After leading one of the world’s largest employment companies through the heights of the global financial crisis, in 2010 Matthew founded the Sustain Group & EntreHub, which became one of the Asia Pacific’s largest social investment organisations. In the same year Matthew was the first Australian Representative elected by business and industry to the United Nations Global Compact (UNGC). He was also the first UNGC Local Network Representative to have been appointed to the Governing Board of the UNGC by UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon.

In 2014, Matthew was appointed as the inaugural Chair of the International Advisory Board Joint Initiative between the United States National Socio-Environmental Synthesis Centre, the United States National Science Foundation’s new Centre for Sustainability Research and the University of Sydney. He is also a Director of Suicide Prevention Australia; has been the Chairman of Board for Splash International and Drake WorkWise; a former Director of the Board of the AICC and former Chair of Deakin Universities Centre for Sustainable and Responsible Organisations Advisory Board. 

Professor Sherman Young is Macquarie University’s Pro Vice Chancellor for Learning and Teaching and a Professor in the Department of Media, Music, Communication and Cultural Studies where he teaches and researches in the area of new media theory and production. He is the author of The Book is Dead, Long Live the Book (UNSW Press, 2007), co-author of Media Convergence (Palgrave, 2012) and Beyond 2.0 - the Future of Music (Equinox, 2014) - all of which analyse the impact of new media technologies. 

Sherman has a BSc in Design (UNSW), an MA in Media, Technology and Law (Macquarie) and a PhD in Media and Cultural Studies (UQ). Prior to becoming an academic, Sherman ran a multimedia production company building interactive media for a range of corporate and publishing clients.

Oona Nielssen heads up CSIRO’s corporate communication strategy. With over 25 years experience in communication she has worked in-house and as a strategic consultant for major companies as well as the public sector.

Previous roles include senior strategist with Impact Employee Communications, Head Of Communication Lend Lease Asia Pacific, and National Manager Television Training, ABC. She has expertise in implementing cultural change, in stakeholder engagement and in creative campaigns. Oona’s work focuses on identifying the business drivers and needs of an organisation and working with people internally and externally to achieve goals.

Michelle is the International Development & Corporate Partnerships Director of Engineers Without Borders (EWB) Australia - a member-based community organisation that, for more than 13 years, has been ‘engineering a better world’ by creating social value through humanitarian engineering. Within this role, Michelle facilitates collaborations between stakeholders which deepens their relationship with community partners and the communities they serve, develops their personal and professional skills, and enables them to contribute to solutions that are fundamental to a life of opportunity, free from poverty. 

Prior to joining EWB, Michelle’s career has spanned working around the world as a volunteer and manager of international development programs, developing justice initiatives with indigenous community leaders, facilitating community engagement opportunities for youth, and implementing corporate social responsibility programs. As a qualified partnership broker that has worked at the intersection of multiple sectors - community development, business, education and government - and an Associate Director of the Inner North Community Foundation, Michelle is an advocate for the impact of collective action and the importance of community.