From the age of 18, Lara knew Internet and Digital Platforms were her passion. She started her career as a web designer and developer. Witnessing the digital landscape evolving and the importance of HCI coming into play, Lara made her move towards Human-Centred Design and Interaction Design. For almost two decades, she has been applying human-centered research and design thinking into developing user interfaces and digital products across different industries.

She is currently the Head of UX at Booktopia, leading the research, design and delivery of award winning web and mobile experiences, while she enjoys sharing her knowledge by teaching, mentoring and consulting.

Lisa is a UX Design Strategist specializing in Agile research & team building. She has 25 years of agency & client-side experience, including leadership roles at CommBank, Atlassian, eBay, Plantronics, and PC World. She has worked in Silicon Valley for more than half her career but she still calls Australia home, and has managed to retain her Aussie accent!

Lisa is passionate about helping others hone their UX skills in personally relevant and practical ways. In 2015 she was awarded a Governor commendation for leading a Design Thinking workshop with Social Ventures Australia & PWC for over 70 school principals.

On this project, Lisa will help each student gain a working knowledge of the critical facets of UX design & research, with special emphasis on “problem framing,” “empathetic interviewing,” and “quantifying the user experience” – to achieve customer-centred results with meaningful impact.

Elizabeth (Liz) is a versatile, strategic and pragmatic UX professional with 20+ years experience in designing, developing and transforming market-leading digital products and customer experiences for B2C, B2B and B2B2C businesses in both start-ups and enterprise settings. She has held many Head of UX roles in Financial Services, Telecommunications, Media, and Health and Wellness industries, working on award winning products and helping these companies build their design teams and capabilities.

Liz is passionate about creating experiences that deliver WIN-WIN for business and customer, by combining UX with agile, lean-startup and Human-Centred-Design (HCD) approaches. She enjoys working on the full customer experience life cycle from ideation, strategy & vision through to development, execution and delivery. She also loves coaching individuals and teams towards high performance, and supporting them to achieve the best versions of themselves.

Ken has over 17 years experience in UX design, most of which has focused on mobile strategy and design. As Head of UX at Fairfax Media, Ken received multiple Australian Mobile awards for his user centred, mobile led contribution to iconic Australian brands such as the Sydney Morning Herald (SMH), Domain, Good Food Guide and Realestate.com.au. Throughout his tenure, Ken’s leadership saw Fairfax double its UX capability and he was instrumental in the launch of key flagship products including the Domain mobile app, which many of us use every day.

Ken has a passion for tackling complex design challenges and turning these into experiences that feel second nature to consumers and it’s this drive that gets him out of bed every morning. This project is a unique opportunity to be mentored by one of Australia’s leading UX designers and we’re so excited to welcome Ken to the Harness Projects mentor team.

Christian brings to his students 19 years of experience across the entire UX lifecycle – from opportunity research to the definition, validation and release of new apps and websites. He collaborated at strategic and executional levels with Lexus, CBA, Westpac, Woolworths, Google, Menulog, Network 10, the ABC and the NSW Department of Transport & Education to deliver impactful solutions that advance target users’ lives.

He mentors students on making user experience design actionable by helping them to reflect on their project work, by providing insight into practical challenges and by broadening perspective.

Carrie Webster has worked in the field of user experience for over 19 years, having worked in start-ups through to specialising in complex B2B environments. With strong stakeholder and team management experience, she has worked for organisations including Optus, NBN, Equifax and Deloitte Digital, as well as working as an instructor and mentoring in the UX field.

Her passion lies in enabling businesses to create compelling stories for their products and services and using her experience to help others sharpen their own User Experience design skills to do the same. Carrie holds a Masters of Information Architecture, a Bachelor of Visual Arts, and she also has a background in web design and development, and she spends her “spare time” on creative projects.

Rebecca has a diverse portfolio of skills across strategy, marketing, experience design, and digital product development built over a rich career journey of nearly 20 years. She has headed up digital teams in corporates, health organisations, not-for-profits and tech start-ups.

Always curious and a passionate continuous learner, Rebecca thrives in environments where she can enable and empower others to be their best. Collaborative practice is at the heart of her operating style with Rebecca loving the challenges of bringing together teams of diverse talents with a clear shared objectives to work on transformative projects.

For Rebecca, the arena of digital marketing unites her love for user experience, creative, strategy and engagement in a space that continues to evolve rapidly.

Agility, adaptability and curiosity are both mindsets and values that guide her practice.

Rebecca is working on a range of projects including Heading up Digital and Marketing at Leadership Victoria working on the implementation of new brand, web and marketing stack.

Nell has over 15 years’ marketing experience in listed and entrepreneurial environments spanning the UK, Europe and Asia Pacific regions. Originally from England, Nell has lived in Australia since 2009 where she held leadership roles at Yahoo7 and then at LinkedIn as Head of Marketing and Head of the Employer Brand and Media.

Nell has a passion for building marketing solutions that fit the most challenging client brief and as a team leader, combines this with building others’ skills at digital and content marketing. Nell is a public speaker at industry events most recently at the Digital Innovation Summit and Mumbrella360. Nell is a judge for the industry awards – B&T, Mumbrella & Women in Media. Nell continues her own learning, studying Psychology with Monash University which allows her to bring a deep understanding of the science of human behaviour to marketing.

On this project, Nell will facilitate the learning of each student in the core areas of digital marketing; understanding an audience, crafting a digital content strategy, defining channels and measuring impact.

Stefano currently specialises in User Experience Research in the financial sector working within the largest UX team at Commonwealth Bank.

Stefano has a background in organisational and behavioral psychology with a strong focus on research in the digital and tech space. Having worked in both consulting and large corporates, Stefano has a wide breadth of knowledge in the UX and CX research space.

Stefano is deeply passionate about design thinking & agile practices, to help develop great customer outcomes as well as physical and mental well-being.

Yummii thrives on creating products and services that delight customers.

She is deeply passionate about understanding what motivates others, their biggest fears, their deepest desires, and what is important to them. Equipped with amazing insights and exciting opportunity area’s to delight their lives, Yummii sets out to design products and services that customer’s didn’t know they wanted.

Yummii believes that everyone has the power within them to make the world a better place – and that, as designers, we are accountable for crafting experiences that make heart’s sing.