Amy Hubbard

Co-founder and director Amy Hubbard is one of Australia’s most recognised stakeholder and community engagement specialists. She has worked extensively with state and local governments on significant infrastructure, urban renewal and public policy projects in Australia and overseas. Amy delivers community engagement training, undertakes formal evaluations and is a highly regarded facilitator.

C / Social equity, the four boys in my life, exploring new cities, running and more running! /

Sandra Jerkovic

Sandra is a passionate engagement leader who brings over 15 years’ experience delivering improved engagement outcomes for people and projects throughout Australia, the UK and the Pacific. Her extensive knowledge in community engagement and passion for organisational development supports companies to develop purposeful and effective engagement strategies. Sandra specialises in facilitating community participation in planning approval processes and project design, providing strategic engagement advice on major projects to clients across both private and public sectors.

C / People planning projects, hanging with the fam, Melbourne by bike. /

Chris Robinson

Co-founder and director, Chris Robinson, has over 20 years technical experience in developing business and development strategies that creatively re-position projects to incorporate cultural, social, economic, governance and environmental aspects for maximum performance. Chris has specific skills in team stakeholder engagement and execution, partnership development, bid management and planning/management for complex infrastructure and community projects.

C / Participation in the planning process, raising the next generation, DIY, surviving outdoor adventures. /

Mollie Rashleigh

Mollie is an experienced consultant with a focus on engagement and collaboration. Specifically, Mollie’s experiences have provided her with the skills to work across different tiers of government, and alongside communities and stakeholders to build local capacities to undertake community-based planning, strategic planning and policy development.  

C / Empowering people with tools for development, celebrating equality and diversity, the outdoors. /

Denise Francisco

Denise Francisco is an Associate with extensive experience in social planning, policy, project delivery and programs for a wide range of government and non-government organisations. She is adept in both community and urban development sectors at undertaking social infrastructure planning, engagement, research, analysis and communications. Her desire is to see an inclusive planning landscape for our future communities, to involve all voices in their environment.

C / Hanging at the market, Melbourne’s cuisines, learning from people’s stories, scraping the underbelly of foreign places. /

Matthew Gordon

Matthew’s experience in the public service and start-up technology enterprise has taught him how to build teams, projects and organisational culture to solve complex social and environmental challenges. His career in public policy, communications and engagement and start-up entrepreneurship has spanned twelve years. The last eight focused on founding an online community engagement and advisory company driving public sector performance. Since 2013 Matthew has delivered over 2000 public sector engagements working across three tiers of government. His work has led to radical increases in positive reputation for government agencies and created new opportunities for collaborative policy development and design with communities, customers and stakeholders.

C / Straight talking, family guy, great in the kitchen, prefers running over walking. /

Shannon Cheal

Shannon chooses to work in roles and organisations which are aligned to her primary value of recognising and responding to the inherent dignity in every person. This has primarily been in the not-for-profit and public sectors, including prominent disability and youth organisations. Shannon’s focus on organisational planning and management support excellence in operations, compliance and creating great workplaces.

C / Compassion and dignity, walking the dog, flat whites and fruit toast /

Niamh Moynihan

Niamh is an experienced community and stakeholder consultant. Niamh works on planning and infrastructure projects ranging from state significant to locally important in nature. Niamh designs engagement strategies and activities that ensure broad participation whilst allowing clients to obtain meaningful feedback to inform their strategic and project objectives.

C / Giving community a voice, exercise and carb loading, spending time in Ireland and with my family. /

Eleanor Howe

Eleanor is an engagement specialist with wide-ranging experience working with decision makers to connect with their communities. She brings a warm and genuine approach to community, stakeholder and client relationships. Eleanor enjoys challenging the traditional approaches, encouraging colleagues and clients to think differently and recognise that every project is unique and requires a bespoke engagement approach.

C / Ideas as open knowledge, progressing the engagement practice, coffee and sunshine, my small person. /

Clare Murrell

With over 15+ years working across local and state government, Clare brings together her extensive knowledge of effective community engagement processes and the role of government in creating and maintaining thriving communities. Clare is passionate about democratic innovations to support meaningful and inclusive engagement. Seeing how a collective voice - representing the values of their community – is given the time, information and agency to make good decisions.

C / Curious about the opportunity of change, music in all forms, practitioner networks, nature and Bea. /

Sarah Roberts

Sarah has over 12 years’ experience in community and stakeholder engagement, advocacy and systems change, specialising in diversity, inclusion and equity. Sarah’s educational background in public health/health promotion has enabled her to be influential in elevating inclusion and equity across tertiary education settings, research, government and community/acute health sectors. Utliising her stakeholder engagement experience, Sarah led the codesign of Australia’s first regional gender service alongside trans and gender diverse community members and clinicians. Sarah grew up in regional Victoria and is dedicated to continuing to enable rural and regional communities to influence decisions that impact them.

C / Celebrating all things Pride and rainbow families, a good hearty pasta, and mini breaks near the beach or mountains.

Athalia Zwartz

Athalia has over fifteen years’ experience in facilitating learning and development with meaningful community and stakeholder engagement as a core practice. She has worked internationally in leadership development and conflict resolution and has extensive experience working with all forms of diversity. Athalia was Executive Officer at Initiatives of Change Australia, Head Trainer at CAUX Peace and Leadership Program in Switzerland and a Researcher at Australian Multicultural Foundation. Athalia facilitates in complex environments for insight, creating alignment and focus, identifying new possibilities, and distilling next steps.

C/ shifting paradigms, getting off script, books and jigsaw puzzles, life as a mama, nature as art.

Astrid Ruban

Astrid is an engagement and social sustainability consultant with over 13 years’ experience providing social assessments and designing and delivering engagement programs. She has worked on infrastructure projects in the transport, power and water sectors including project of state and federal significance. Astrid applies a social research lens to her engagement practice to support rigorous analysis, evaluation and reporting. Astrid’s focus on evidence-based decision making delivers tailored, practical approaches to enhance benefits for her clients and their communities.

C / The census, blue skies, pickles, cities in transition. /

Tiffany Tang

Tiffany is a Senior Consultant with extensive experience in placemaking and urban development within rapidly growing neighbourhoods in Hong Kong, Myanmar and Thailand. Tiffany has led various scales of stakeholder engagement programs and delivered cultural mapping and placemaking projects to promote place identity and sense of place. She is skilled in engaging stakeholders with diverse cultural and ethnical backgrounds.

C / Wonton noodles, flat white and sea breeze, empowering locals, identity, cultural heritage. /

Triada Papadimitriou

With experience in higher education, government and the corporate sector Triada holds a variety of skills including in public policy and stakeholder engagement and has recently developed skills in design thinking and human-centred design through her MBA studies. Triada is experienced in both building and engaging communities that align and drive strategic objectives. Triada is driven by the opportunity to see the community at the centre of policy design and implementation. Her role at Capire focuses on supporting governments and their communities to engage well, solve problems and innovate.

C / Passionate about inclusive policy design and community engagement, Executive MBA candidate, novice tennis player, foodie, live music and yoga /

Kathleen Webster

Kathleen has experience working across consulting and tertiary education sectors on energy infrastructure, social research and policy analysis projects. Recently she has worked on multiple water industry, social housing, strategic planning and masterplan development projects. Delivery has included coordination, delivery and reporting on the stakeholder and/or community engagement. Many of these projects have required analysis of detailed technical project content and translation into community friendly communication materials or engagement activities. Kathleen is experienced in coordinating the data analysis and reporting required submission processes. Her passion is to find creative ways to give communities a voice that can help transform the places, policies and issues important to them.

C / Amplifying the unheard, cities and places for people, sunshine, being outdoors. /

Eliza Knox

Eliza contributes valuable community engagement skills and urban planning knowledge to a diverse range of projects. Eliza has a particular interest in empowering all individuals, particularly young people, through interactive activities which help them to take ownership of their neighbourhood. She has great attention to detail, a strength in ensuring everyone is included, is adaptable and trustworthy to all assigned tasks, and is a communicative team player. These strengths provide benefits for the client and engaged communities during both online and face-to-face engagement.

C / Exploring and understanding different cultures and places, giving people ownership of their neighbourhood, bringing out my competitive side, enjoying live sport and theatre. 

Christian Demetriou

Christian (they/them) approaches community engagement with a multidisciplinary outlook, informed by a belief that locally and culturally sensitive knowledge tied to place can help foster vibrant living environments and communities. They have interests in post-COVID urban adaptation and transformation, working with culturally and linguistically diverse residents, and empowering grassroots movements to be able to actualise positive community outcomes. Christian's experience continues to be fortified through maintaining an inquisitive and open mind, having worked across face-to-face and online settings. Their technical experience is underpinned by confidence in qualitative and quantitative analysis and methods, data analysis and visualisation, and concise report writing. Christian has a Master of Urban Planning from the University of Melbourne.

Bernard Chong

Bernard is a graduate urban planner with a passion for community engagement, urban history, transport, and land use planning. He is interested in providing safe spaces for diverse communities to engage with governments and the social sector. Bernard provides technical and workforce support for a diverse range of projects. These projects span different clients, from local and state governments, the private sector and not-for-profits.

C / Giving international students a voice, trainspotting, and walking around well-planned cities /

Charlotte Yu

Charlotte has a Master of Urban Planning from the University of Melbourne. Her interests include policy evaluation and analysis, placemaking for local communities, and exploring creative ways to engage culturally and linguistically diverse residents. She contributes multidisciplinary knowledge to a variety of projects. These projects span across diverse topics including social housing development, community behavioural change, local government reform, and masterplan development projects. Charlotte provides face-to-face and online engagement support, data analysis, and reporting.

Olivia Simon

Olivia is a creative and savvy communications professional with a passion for storytelling. A skilled copy writer, communicator, and marketeer, Olivia is an all-rounder.

Olivia started her career copywriting for AAP before joining prestigious consultancy EdUnity, where she worked on projects for Western Water, Department of Health, Australian Council Of Trade Unions and Origin Energy. Her experience also includes Australia's most influential community radio station Triple R FM, Melbourne cultural icon Cinema Nova and leading public health agency Dental Health Services Victoria.

Her work has provided her skills across many areas including communications and PR, content marketing, writing and editing, social media, strategy development and digital. Accustomed to working in fast paced environments, highly organised and always ready with a “can-do” attitude.

C / Fun family time, supporting the underdog, good books with a cup of tea, new recipes, Autumn walks, Merri Creek jogs, Podcasts /

Nina Read

Nina is a graphic designer with experience in branding, publishing, digital, and signage. She has worked with clients ranging from RM Williams to the University of Melbourne and has worked extensively within the architecture industry. At Capire, Nina supports projects by designing collateral and publications, along with creating innovative engagement tools and resources, as well as upholding the Capire brand. Nina has a thoughtful approach to her work, minimalist style and high attention to detail. She enjoys the creative challenge a design brief, collaborating with others, and making the complicated uncomplicated.

C / Nature, art galleries and museums, wine bars, nicely designed typefaces, and ceramics classes /

Lauren Nicholson

Lauren is an Administrator with over fifteen years experience supporting others in an array of fields, including Legal. She is a strong all rounder who enjoys learning, problem solving and assisting with a wide range of tasks. Lauren completed a Bachelor of Illustration at Melbourne Polytechnic in 2012 and has been a practicing artist for the past decade, exhibiting around Melbourne.

C / Long bike rides, islands, colour and texture, live music /