Leadership Series 02 - Jacqui De Lacy

Good Will Hunters

Welcome to the second episode in our leadership series of Good Will Hunters. I’m Rachel Mason Nunn, and I have the great joy of stewarding has through these conversations on leadership. Your response to our first episode was nothing short of incredible. Thank you for listening with such a genuine willingness to reflect on your own leadership, and grow as a leader. Today I speak to Jacqui De Lacey. Many of you would know Jacqui as the Managing Director of Abt Associates Australia. In this role, Jacqui is on the Boards of Abt Associates Australia and the UK, as well as being on the Board of UNICEF Australia. This is Jacqui’s second appearance on Good Will Hunters. The response to Jacqui’s first episode was huge, and for a long while it was our most downloaded episode ever. Today, we speak about Jacqui’s experience growing in PNG and how it shaped a love for working in international development. Jacqui’s shares the importance of adaptive leadership and mentoring, and we talked about the human-skills required of authentic leaders, like vulnerability, humility and emotional intelligence. We also discuss diversity and how efforts to promote diversity must be bold and deliberate. I hope this episode supports your leadership journey. Since announcing this series, a few of you have reached out to me to share your own work in the sphere of leadership, which I’m very grateful for. I had a great conversation recently, offline, with Susan Pizzati who is doing her PhD on Navigating Complexity and Paradox: Leading Strategic Structural Innovation in the Not for Profit Sector. The research aims to provide valuable insights into the way not for profit leaders are tackling current and emerging challenges, with a focus on the approach to strategic, structural innovation. It was so fascinating to speak with Susan about her research. More about Susan here: Susan Pizzati spent over a decade working in a range of senior management, executive and board roles in the not-for-profit sector in Australia, before establishing her own consultancy and leadership coaching practice in 2020. She is a certified Workplace and Leadership Coach, as well as holding bachelor’s degrees in Business and Communication; a master degree in Social Investment and Philanthropy; and is currently a PhD candidate at the Centre for Social Impact researching organisational change, complexity and implications for leadership in not-for-profit organisations. And here are some relevant links: Centre for Social Impact's Governance for Social Impact Course - https://www.csi.edu.au/education/programs/UNSW/exec-ed/ Institute of Community Directors - https://communitydirectors.com.au/ A great paper on nonprofit boards - https://hbswk.hbs.edu/item/nonprofit-boards-it-is-time-to-lift-your-gaze-and-see-the-system