Our team
At Diversity Council Australia, our senior consulting staff have strong business and legal backgrounds in the fields of diversity and EEO and extensive experience in human resources, training, investigations and policy development. We will work closely with you to understand your needs and develop programs to suit you. Our goal is to provide you with expert advice and service that is practical and anticipates your needs.
Collectively, consultants’ work history includes substantial experience in:
- All private sector industries, government, quasi-government, higher education, non-government school, trade union, employer association and non-government organisations sectors, and;
- Law, human resource management, workplace relations, organisation development, change management, adult learning, diversity management, policy and procedure development, and preventing and managing workplace discrimination and harassment.
Please see below for more information about each of our senior salaried and consulting staff. In addition to these, we also have a range of other highly experienced, DCA accredited consultants who work with our members and clients.
Nareen Young, Chief Executive Officer
Lisa Annese, Acting Research Director
Mark Ney, DCA Consultant
Jane O'Leary, Research Director
Catherine Petterson, Communications Director
Susan Sieber, DCA Consultant
Nareen Young, Chief Executive Officer
Since June 2007, Nareen and the team she leads have transformed DCA in all possible terms – governance, infrastructure, financial and communications – to place it as Australia’s leading business and workplace diversity authority. Under Nareen’s leadership, DCA is a vibrant and progressive organisation involved in significant activity and collaborative partnerships across the business and diversity spectrums to provide Australian’s businesses and workplaces with a flourishing independent, not-for-profit diversity peak body.
Nareen is one of Australia’s employment diversity thought leaders and experts, having worked in diversity employment exclusively for over a decade. Prior to her appointment at DCA, for seven years she was Director of the NSW Working Women’s Centre, funded by state and federal governments as the peak body for women’s employment in NSW. Her time at the Centre was characterised by her leadership in developing an implementing sustained activities so that the Centre was accessible to all women in NSW and could play a significant role in mainstream employment matters. Nareen was nominated for an Australian Human Rights Award and Medal for her work during this time.
Prior to this appointment, Nareen was a trade union official and served on the executives of both the Australian Council of Trade Unions and Unions NSW in affirmative action positions representing women’s employment interests. On both of these occasions she was elected to these representative positions by her peers.
Nareen has presented and published widely on employment diversity matters, made appearances in most of the employment and human rights tribunals relevant to employment matters and made appearances before government and independent inquiries.
Nareen was appointed Chair of the Australian Government’s National Work-Life Balance Awards Judging and Accreditation Panel by (then) Deputy Prime Minister Julia Gillard in 2008. Nareen is a Board member of the Institute for Cultural Diversity and a Community Advisory Group member for the AFL’s Greater Western Sydney Team.
Nareen has qualifications in education, her original career choice, and employment law.
Lisa Annese, Acting Research Director
Lisa Annese joined DCA as Acting Research Director in April 2009 while Jane O'Leary is on parental leave. Lisa has extensive background in equal opportunity for women and diversity including several years working at EOWA (Equal Opportunity for Women in the Workplace Agency).
At EOWA, Lisa was instrumental in the management of the majority of projects of the time, including the first ever census of ‘Australian Women in Leadership’, the first-ever ‘Business Achievement Awards’, the beginning of the ‘Employer of Choice’ citation, the development of a new website and the implementation of the Equal Opportunity for Women in the Workplace Act (1999) through assisting employers with both compliance/waiving applications and conducting assessments.
In 2004, Lisa co-authored “Chief Executives Unplugged: CEO’s Get Real About Women in the Workplace” which was named a “must-read business book” by AFR/BOSS magazine in 2005.
Lisa’s career began in 1991 as a business graduate at Westpac Banking Corporation. She soon realised her strong calling in the area of social justice and developed her talents in human resources as a stepping stone into diversity management. She spent many months running sexual harassment and discrimination training sessions to an often hostile audience. She also developed many ‘best-practice’ (at the time) company policies and communicated them to a workforce of over 30,000. Her final project at Westpac was the establishment of its first ever on-site childcare centre.
Lisa has a Bachelor of Business (Marketing) from UTS in Sydney and a Graduate Certificate of Commerce (Human Resource Management) from Charles Sturt University.
Mark Ney, DCA Consultant
Former Assistant Commissioner Mark Ney APM retired from the Australian Federal Police in January 2009 after 25 years of service which included a broad range of operational experience. This included significant experience as a senior leader and manager. He also worked in the Australian Securities and Investment Commission.
Mark ran the Human Resources Department for the AFP for four years, and was responsible for Learning & Development, Professional Standards, Wellbeing Services and management of diversity programs in addition to normal HR delivery services. Mark managed around 300 staff devoted to providing those range of services to the 6,500 staff in the AFP. He was responsible for negotiating certified agreements, making employment/termination decisions, and has appeared before Industrial Relations proceedings, to give evidence and represent the organisation in disputes. During Mark's time with AFP he represented the organisation at a number of forums including at the United Nations Drug Control Organisation, International Counter Terrorism events, and Senate Estimates Hearings and Enquiries.
Mark was recognised for his service to policing in the 2006 Australia Day Honours List. He was awarded the Australian Police Medal for distinguished service, particularly in the field of furthering law enforcement relationships both nationally, internationally and the indigenous community. Mark was very active in the various diversity programs undertaken by the AFP which included his voluntary work as Patron of the Indigenous Officers, and Gay and Lesbian Officers Networks.
Mark was a member of the DCA board for a number of years and resigned as Chairperson in December 2008, coinciding with his retirement from AFP. He has a Graduate Certificate of Business (Banking) from Monash University and a Graduate Certificate in Management from Charles Sturt University.
Mark is qualified to administer psychometric tools such as MBTI and Firo B, and works with management teams to improve team effectiveness, and improve business productivity.
Jane O'Leary, Research Director
Jane O'Leary has been with DCA since 2001, working closely with members to assist them foster organisational cultures which are inclusive of all personal differences. In 2005, Jane was awarded a federal government scholarship to conduct PhD research examining the diversity capability of Australian managers - specifically, what constitutes competence in managing diversity and how Australian managers can most effectively manage workplace diversity.
Jane is in the final stage of her PhD examining competence in managing workplace diversity at The University of Queensland Business School. Her research has been well received, with papers based on her research having been presented at international and national conferences.
Prior to joining DCA, Jane worked in the Equal Opportunity for Women in the Workplace Agency (EOWA) and the Queensland University of Technology, consulting to employers and staff on issues relating to diversity and inclusion and adult learning and development.
In 1996, Jane was awarded a Masters of Education, studying in the area of women in leadership. She has published papers on women and careers, women and leadership, qualitative research techniques, and learning and development. Her particular areas of specialisation include managerial diversity capability, diversity strategy development, implementation and evaluation, women in the workplace, and learning and development.
Jane O'Leary took parental leave in April 2009 and is also finalising her PhD.
Catherine Petterson, Communications Director
Catherine Petterson joined the Council in 2004 to revamp its communications and organise its 20th Anniversary celebrations. This evolved into orchestrating DCA’s name change (from the Council for Equal Opportunity in Employment Ltd) and implementing a new corporate image in 2005. This was very well received with 92% of members surveyed approving of the new logo and image.
Catherine now looks after DCA’s regular communications including Diversity Matters and Diversity Matters update, Annual Review, the website and all member communications. She is also is responsible for planning and management of all DCA events including DCA’s Diversity Leadership Briefings. She is now working on a new digital strategy to introduce more effective ways of engaging and communicating with members.
Catherine has a background in corporate communications including a long stint at ANZ in a variety of senior communications roles. She also worked at public relations firm Hinton & Associates where she provided strategic financial and corporate communications advice to listed companies.
Catherine has a Bachelor of Commerce from the University of Melbourne and a Master of Arts in Communications from Monash University.
Susan Sieber, DCA Consultant
Susan Sieber recently joined DCA as a Consultant. Having worked for NAB for over 20 years, Susan was responsible for managing the first ever Pay Equity Audit between a large corporate (NAB) and a union (the Finance Sector Union - FSU). The audit was ground breaking in that NAB’s Enterprise Agreement 2006-2009 contained a clause which committed both NAB and the FSU to undertake a pay equity audit.
During her time in NAB, Susan was responsible for the diversity strategy for the Australian Region. In this role she implemented the first ever diversity survey for NAB, set up employee networking forums (e.g. Working Parents Network) and was a party to the development of a very successful in-house flexibility toolkit. Susan prepared regular communications on diversity and inclusion news, Employer of Choice for Women citation applications and EEO applications – many of which resulted in waivers from reporting for NAB.
In her role as Diversity Manager, Susan was also responsible for developing suitable metrics to track NAB’s progress on diversity and inclusion measures and the implementation of the first ever School Based Training program for Indigenous youth. Susan was also instrumental in gaining support within NAB to sponsor the DCA’s ground breaking research into barriers for Indigenous Australians in the workplace. She has also won awards within NAB for her commitment to the employment of people with a disability.
Prior to her time in diversity, Susan spent a number of years in NAB’s Industrial/Employee Relations providing HR teams, employees and the business with support on people management and advice on Award terms and conditions. She has worked as a Contact and Investigation Officer for discrimination and harassment claims and was part of the leadership team responsible for a number of consultants advising the business on employment/termination decisions.
Susan holds a Bachelor of Economics from La Trobe University.