Tahlia-Rose Vanissum is a proud Woppaburra woman and Traditional Owner of the Keppel Islands. Tahlia-Rose works across her community and the public sector to improve services for First Nations women, girls and people with disability. She is currently undertaking a Master of Culture, Health, and Medicine at the Australian National University (ANU).

Tahlia-Rose’s is passionate about building understandings and identification of intersectional and systemic discrimination through truth-telling. Tahlia-Rose embodies an inclusive, respectful and reciprocal approach to leadership that amplifies cultural strengths and building the capability of others to identify and address discrimination across national frameworks, jurisdictional priorities and institutional settings.

Tahlia-Rose is currently leading work within the Department of Social Services to embed the National Agreement on Closing the Gap across the Commonwealth’s Social Services Portfolio. Tahlia-Rose is the Chair of the ACT Government’s Ministerial Advisory Council on Women, Sisters in Spirit Aboriginal Corporation, and a Board Director at the Canberra Institute of Technology (CIT) the ACT’s public and largest vocational education provider and CIT’s wholly-owned subsidiary CIT Solutions.

In her admittedly limited spare time, Tahlia-Rose is completing the AICD’s Company Directors Course as a 2023 Disability Leadership Scholar. Tahlia-Rose also holds vocational qualifications in government, business, leadership, and human resources management and a Bachelor of Criminology from the ANU