Our People
Our purpose is “to elevate others… to elevate others”.
We help give lift-off to the potential within progressive CEOs, purpose-driven influencers, activists, impact-focused organisations and social movements.
We help give lift-off to the potential within progressive CEOs, purpose-driven influencers, activists, impact-focused organisations and social movements.
Fancy words for an organisation, led by Julia May and Sarah Anderson, that works at the intersection of leadership, strategy and communications to help you unleash the potential within. So you, or your organisation, can create impact where it really matters, from wherever you are.
Our three-pillared framework is proven to maximise influence and impact for individuals, organisations and movements.
Visibility for vanity is not what the world needs. Visibility for impact and influence is.
We’ve helped clients ignite global social movements, triple their revenue, get published in the New York Times, transform organisational culture and create life-changing shifts at work and at home.
Over the years, we have:
Our founders, Julia May and Sarah Anderson, who are best friends, next-door neighbours and mums of little ones, shared a passion for social justice and saw the need for a leadership revolution.
While their careers had intersected across international media, communications, strategy and leadership, that was the night they decided to join forces.
They developed a new strategic methodology – a three-pillared framework focusing on visibility for impact and influence.
The methodology helped Homeward Bound reach nearly 1 billion people, be published in the New York Times, and attract some of the world’s most inspiring thinkers and leaders including Jane Goodall, Musimbi Kanyoro and Christiana Figueres.
Julia and Sarah soon found themselves leading the world’s largest all-women expeditions to Antarctica.
Amongst icebergs and orcas, they have coached and facilitated more than 350 leaders from around the world to become more influential and effective.
Visibility Co has grown to encompass a diverse group of experts with a common goal – to help other leaders create a better world.
While we have the experience and skill to create impact across a wide range of industries and focus areas, these are the themes that we’re especially passionate about:
Leadership that is courageous, self-aware and values-driven can and will create greater impact.
When leadership becomes a state of mind, you become a leader in every setting – at home, at work, everywhere.
We work with progressive CEOs, emerging leaders, influencers and movement-makers to close the gap between their will and their ability to lead with purpose.
Instead of focusing solely on external visibility, we unlock the potential within by helping you craft your leadership identity, a clear vision, strategic communications and an actionable roadmap.
If we want to achieve real gender equality, we need everyone to work together to disband the patriarchal constructs that are holding us all back.
If we only bring half the population along, we won’t get there.
We work with both men and women across a diverse range of industries to tackle structural barriers, create allies and champion safety for all.
We do this by enhancing self-awareness, leadership and influencing skills, and supporting radical collaboration.
Using the three pillars of visibility, we empower individuals and teams to build influence and ignite systemic change.
We are inextricably linked to the natural world. It is our greatest teacher.
Mother Nature is trying to get our attention and we are running out of time to bring the world back from the precipice.
Only mindful, future-focused and visible leadership can address the climate emergency and create a more sustainable world.
We work with people across the system to align their beliefs with their leadership and take action wherever they are.
Our clients soon realise that profit doesn’t have to be at the expense of purpose and activism doesn’t have to be a dirty word.
We help organisations see that systems thinking and sustainability make for good strategic outcomes.
As we’ve seen so clearly in 2020, for an individual or community to thrive they need their physical, emotional, social, spiritual and intellectual health to be supported and connected.
If one area is compromised, the whole system is.
We take an integrated view of health, working with health policy disruptors, researchers and progressive health providers who want to improve outcomes (and see the economic benefits of doing so).
Using our unique methodology, we empower them to tackle health inequities, collaborate, even in unconventional ways, and find new ways to make a difference.
“Diversity is inviting everyone to the table. Inclusion is changing the menu.” - Musimbi Kanyoro
All human beings deserve equality.
It is up to all of us to prioritise diversity and inclusion wherever we are.
This includes hearing the wisdom of First Nations peoples and the insights of other marginalised or vulnerable groups.
We work with progressive CEOs, government agencies, values-driven businesses and national indigenous organisations to tackle inequality and create culturally safe environments.
We foster understanding and recommend practical measures for individuals and organisations to support diversity and inclusion.
Our methodology ignites social shifts for a more inclusive and diverse world.
I co-founded Visibility Co because I believe that inside every person and organisation is a bigger vision and the potential for meaningful influence.
My career began in journalism, which included five years as a foreign correspondent for Fairfax and senior roles at global media companies including Reuters and The Times of London. Strategy, media, storytelling and social justice are second nature to me.
As a founding leader of Homeward Bound and former head of Compass, the national leadership program, I’ve coached and facilitated hundreds of people across government, corporate and non-profits and co-designed many strategies across leadership, organisations and communications.
I’m driven to help bring our world back from the precipice, for the future of my daughters, Orla and Esther, and their children. I see what’s possible when leaders are supported to look inwards and have access to the tools that enable them to take the best parts of what they find out into the world.
Six months after I delivered our first visibility program on board a ship in Antarctica (my own act of radical visible leadership), Visibility Co was launched. The global revolution in leadership is only just beginning.
We all want to live with purpose – to find and pursue that thing that plants a fire in our belly and drives us to do and be more.
My purpose is to help others identify their own, then ripple that into bigger impact. I feel most in flow when eliciting vision and helping people see a strategic pathway they couldn’t before.
Over twenty years, I’ve led international teams and transformations in some of the biggest corporate, government and non-profit organisations in the world, including CBRE in London, ANZ Bank and the Department of Justice in Australia.
Having spearheaded major change and communications initiatives in large organisations, I discovered perfect alignment between my skills and values as a founding leader of Homeward Bound, where I first delivered our visibility program to 76 women scientists… while breastfeeding.
When the initiative went viral globally, supported by my role as lead communications strategist, it affirmed the efficacy of our three-pillared framework and Visibility Co was launched.
Working with progressive global CEOs, Nobel Prize winners, vice-presidential nominees and key advisors to world leaders like Mary Robinson and Jacinda Ardern has been both exhilarating and life-affirming.
Mum to 5-year-old Louis, I am also trained in yoga, meditation and breathwork, sharing these mindful practices alongside traditional leadership and coaching methods.
Elicia leads the smooth operation of day-to-day life at Visibility Co and manages client services and programs. Fifteen years as an executive assistant, operations manager and project lead has equipped Elicia with management skills across stakeholder relationships, business operations and complex logistics.
Before joining our ranks, Elicia managed more than 80 high-level projects across the government, corporate and education sectors. She is renowned for her warmth, responsiveness, attention to detail and ability to come up with creative and lateral solutions.
Elicia is passionate about supporting women to lead with impact. Her top values are honesty, fairness, integrity, trust and reliability.
Anna is a digital marketing and communications expert with a genius for bringing together strategy and pragmatic implementation. She thrives on combining data and technology with creative storytelling to turn big ideas into meaningful results.
With more than 12 years' experience across a range of industries and sectors, Anna leads Visibility Co’s marketing and communications and provides trusted advice to our clients on all facets of their visibility.
Anna previously spent seven years in marketing at Myer, where she created the brand’s social media strategy and built its social media channels from the ground up. Anna’s top values are authenticity, compassion and optimism.
Kit has spent more than 25 years helping leaders and organisations around the world manage strategic change and is recognised as a global strategy execution expert.
She has served in senior leadership roles at Rexam PLC and TORI Global and is a managing partner of Strategy Together. Like Julia and Sarah, Kit is also a member of the founding leadership team for Homeward Bound.
Kit created the personal strategy map, a holistic tool for leaders to articulate and fulfil their aspirations across life and leadership. Kit also partners with us on strategy, culture and leadership programs around the world.
Our clients value Kit’s ability to facilitate courageous conversations for transformational change. Her top values are courage, conviction and compassion.
Isabelle Silbery is a strategic partner and program mentor at Visibility Co. A social commentator, writer and impact investor, Isabelle is best-known for her work on Gogglebox Australia, where her drive to showcase multi-generational women’s voices has propelled her into the show’s 13th season internationally. Isabelle thrives on starting conversations that cut through societal norms, and inspiring others to do the same. As an investor in social impact projects she's driven by collaborative, purpose-driven thinking that leads to connection and social change. After a transformational personal experience with Visibility Co, where she developed the skills to use her voice and platform as a force for good, she teamed up with us to help take our programs and work out to a larger audience. Nothing lights Isabelle up more than a-ha moments for people as they realise their true potential and ability to accelerate positive change. Her top values are true to self, connection and passion.
Cara, a Senior Creative Director and Graphic Design lecturer launched Studio Together in June 2013. Studio Together is a bright young graphic design studio which revolves around the principle of togetherness – the designer and the client – a collaboration intent on producing outstanding design that makes an impact! Cara translates this into everything she does with Visibility Co with flare, fun and visionary design skills.
Cara is not afraid to be bold and brings a wealth of knowledge and skill from over 25 years working in the Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne creative industries.
Cara’s top values are independence, creativity, fairness and harmony.
Tom has been making contributions as a trusted advisor in the accounting profession for more than ten years. His unwavering focus is to support entrepreneurs and businesses to soar, by using accounting and forensic skills to ensure financial health and unearth new opportunities for impact-focused entrepreneurs and businesses.
Tom is a new generation of accounting professional. His passion for technology and his strategic outlook put him unapologetically at odds with the traditional view of the accountant as a historian looking ever in the rear-view mirror. He leads all aspects of Visibility Co’s financial management and provides expert strategic guidance on special projects.
Tom is a qualified CPA and holds a Bachelor of Commerce with majors in Accounting and Finance. His top values are integrity, fairness, creativity and fun.
Dr Tara Shine spent 20 years as an international climate change negotiator and adviser to governments and world leaders on environmental policy. She was Special Adviser to the Mary Robinson Foundation-Climate Justice and The Elders before setting up Change by Degrees.
Tara is Chair of the Board of the International Institute of Environment and Development (IIED) and along with Julia and Sarah, she is a member of faculty and lead facilitator for the visibility stream of Homeward Bound. Tara is co-facilitator of the Structured Expert Dialogue (SED) of the 2nd Periodic Review under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, a process to monitor progress and enhance delivery on Paris Agreement goals.
Tara is a science communicator, TV presenter and author and works with Visibility Co and its clients on social impact strategy. Change by Degrees’ top values are integrity; intergenerational and inspiration.
Madeleine Murray spent six years in academia tutoring, teaching, writing and researching as an Archaeologist in the School of Archaeology UCD and the National Museum of Ireland. She also worked for years as an Archaeological Manager in the private sector. She is an expert in employee sustainability engagement, narrative crafting and messaging and is passionate about making complex information accessible, helping businesses to create and tell their sustainability stories. Madeleine has a Diploma in UX Design making her the first Irish sustainability adviser to use sustainability and UX as a problem solving tool for business. She was winner of the 2020 Emerging New Business Award at Network Cork. Madeleine is also a successful entrepreneur and businesswoman and works with Visibility Co and its clients on social impact strategy. Change by Degrees’ top values are integrity; intergenerational and inspiration.
Download our free e-book, Vision-Mapping for Purposeful Leaders and discover how to clarify your vision and bring it to life.
