Read more about Tamsin’s experience in Australia, Europe and Africa.

Biography

I grew up in rural Australia, inspired by my Dad; a reverend in flip flops who was the epicentre of the community, passionate about social justice and always meeting people where they were - starting a church in a pub, or a skate park. 

There I was watching Nelson Mandela on the TV, Gandhi films, and reading Martin Luther King sermons in the outer suburbs of Adelaide, while most of my friends chilled on the beach. 

By the time I was at Uni I was selected for an internship with the opposition leader and went on to become the youngest government policy advisor in South Australia at 23. I was exposed to the highest levels of decision making in government and was able to work on policies that led to the state being a leader in environmental sustainability and the arts.

Despite being earmarked for a future in politics, I cared more about the issues than the numbers and knew that in order to become the leader I wanted to be it was time to expand my experience of other realms and regions that called me - urban regeneration, public health, leadership, impact investment, innovation and entrepreneurship. 

I took what I’d learned in politics and applied it to spaces where people couldn’t always see the bigger vision of what was possible. As Country Director for an organisation supporting pregnant women living with HIV I secured funding for expansion, going from 5 staff to 140, creating life changing impact through more children born without HIV. I co-founded Workshop17, awarded the best coworking space in South Africa and globally. What started out as a pigeon poop covered industrial shed became an architectural dream of glass and wood, purpose built for imagination, creativity and interaction between the 250 entrepreneurs and community who inhabit it. 

I moved into engaging with the business and investment communities, working for CDC to help establish a pan-African network of CEOs under 45. I then went on to raise £1.6 million and co-founded the leading network of board-ready women across Africa.

I was working flat out and seeing amazing results, but despite being at the top of my game my body was saying no. I was dealing with a system that told me to suppress my emotions and intuition, and override my values and natural way of relational working with a purely transactional approach that stifled possibility and led to systemic and personal sickness. I felt cut off from my body and the environment and it was only when I reconnected the two that I realised the wider impact of this disconnection from the body on the planet. My experience was reflected back to me by hundreds of board women who said if they had to give another piece of themselves away they wouldn’t know who they were anymore.

I realised I needed to be able to articulate and build a business case for a more interconnected way of leading. Despite research showing the benefits of leading relationally, it was not being valued or taught anywhere in the business world. I went on a deep dive to discover what the textbooks weren’t saying, studying at The Somatic School, hosting dinners with C-Suite women on leading with feminine traits and spending time in Bhutan at the Centre for Gross National Happiness.

I joined a collaborative to co-found The Rallying Cry, bringing together the voices of those on the front line responding in an interconnected way to climate challenges with investors so that together they can form a vision for the highest possible future. I began working as a leadership advisor with organisations whose mission it is to create a more conscious future through relationships. 

What has emerged is my authentic life's work. As a business strategist, eco-system innovator and leadership catalyst, I’m here to enable people and organisational systems to see themselves and the world as whole and interconnected.