Judges

Andrea Foot works with lawyers, law firms and legal technology vendors to turn their goals into practical actions. She coaches leaders and teams to manage the individual, team and system-level challenges that change brings for their organisations. For four decades she has worked extensively in the legal ecosystem in Europe, North America and APAC with legal technologists, law firms and legal teams.

She holds an Executive Master in Coaching & Consulting for Change with distinction from INSEAD, one of the most highly rated European business schools and holds a post graduate qualification in psychology. She regularly deepens her experience and awareness of working with groups as part of the Group Relations community locally and internationally.

Whether she’s acting as an executive coach, a program architect or a strategic advisor, she applies a blend of practical business knowledge, coaching expertise, and systems-psychodynamic lenses to help organisations work through complex challenges.

Ann-Maree David is the National Executive Director of The College of Law, the largest provider of practice-focused legal education in Australasia. She has worked as a lawyer across public and corporate sectors and in private practice as a solicitor. She has also held multiple non-executive directorships.
Ann-Maree is driven by her passion to support all Australian lawyers through mentoring & coaching and education & training. She has a particular interest in promoting greater diversity in all its forms throughout the profession

Geraldine Johns-Putra is an experienced corporate lawyer and expert in enterprise governance, purpose, business & human rights and modern slavery. She runs her own practice in Melbourne focussing on enterprises seeking purpose, and actors in the impact economy. She is legal advisor to not-for-profits making an impact in this space, including B Lab Australia & NZ and Impact Investing Australia. Her purpose is to use the law to build more purposeful enterprises & ecosystems for a happier world.

She has over 20 years' experience practising law in Australia, the UK, Hong Kong and China. She has worked with large global and Australian law firms and was a partner of a top-tier Australian law firm for several years. She sits on the Council of Monash University.

Jessica is a Senior Legal Counsel in the Customer and Supply team at nbn specialising in Consumer Law and Intellectual Property law. In her spare time, she teaches the Consumer Law PLT subject at UTS and enjoys dancing and eating dumplings.

Joseph Catanzariti AM is a Vice President of the Fair Work Commission, the national workplace relations tribunal.
Prior to his appointment to the Fair Work Commission, Joseph was a senior Partner of Clayton Utz and Practice Leader of the Workplace Relations, Employment and Safety Practice Group. Joseph was a trusted adviser to many of Australia’s leading companies and government departments. Joseph was also a highly experienced Commercial Litigator.

Joseph is a Visiting Professorial Fellow of the School of Law and the Faculty of Law at the University of New South Wales, and an Adjunct Associate Professor in Work and Organisational Studies, School of Business at Sydney University.

Joseph is the Chair of the College of Law.

Joseph is also co-author of Workplace Bullying published by LexisNexis.

He has previously held the positions of President of the Law Council of Australia, President of the NSW Law Society, Chair of the Workplace Committee of the Law Society of New South Wales (2000 - 2013), and Secretary of the Industrial Relations Society of Australia (1997-2011).

Joseph was awarded Life Time Recognition, Industrial Relations Society of Australia / Australian Labour and Employment Relations Association 2011, and the Industrial Relations Society of New South Wales in 2015.

Joseph is a fellow of the Academy of Law.

On 26 January 2016 Joseph was made a Member of the Order of Australia.

Kate is the sole Legal Beagle (aka in-house counsel) at Who Gives A Crap. This involves advising on a very broad range of issues including global compliance with regulatory requirements, contracting, privacy, risk management, IP, marketing claims and legal management (plus anything else that gets thrown her way!) She is creating the legal function from the ground up in a rapidly changing environment.

Working in a social enterprise that donates 50% of its profits to help build toilets to those in need means that sometimes matters have to be approached a little differently. This gives her a chance to stretch her imagination (and GIF searching skills) and the opportunity to think outside of the traditional legal box.

Outside of work, Kate is kept busy spending time with her young family, running half marathons and building a large Lego empire.

Mellissa Larkin is the Founder and Managing Director of award-winning boutique law firm Peripheral Blue. Since 2016, she's been making waves in the legal industry in Australia advocating for a client-centred model of practice and championing the flexible workplace. Her views on the culture of overwork in law, lawyers' mental health, and women in business have been featured in multiple industry and business publications.
Prior to founding Peripheral Blue, Mellissa worked in dedicated Project and Construction Teams in international and top-tier firms in Ireland and across the Disputes and Corporate Teams of a national firm in Australia. She also worked in house for blue-chip companies.
In 2016, Mellissa Larkin walked away from the career she had spent two decades building over two continents, to found Peripheral Blue with the aim of disrupting the legal and professional services industries by giving clients access to top tier, responsive legal and advisory services in a flexible and affordable way.
Mellissa was named as the Innovator of the Year in the Lawyers Weekly Partner of the Year Awards in 2022 and as the South Australian Winner in the Small Business category of the 2020 Telstra Business Women's Awards. Her firm, Peripheral Blue was a finalist in the Telstra Business Awards 2019.
Mellissa holds a Bachelor of Laws and Bachelor of Arts from Flinders University and a Master in Laws from Trinity College, Dublin.

Emeritus Professor (appointed December 2025), National Head of School, Law and Business, The University of Notre Dame Australia (December 2020-December 2024),
Dean, School of Law, Sydney, The University of Notre Dame Australia (UNDA) (2013-2020)
Acting Dean, School of Business, Sydney, UNDA (July 2018-June 2019), Allens’ Partner (1998-2012), Senior Associate (1993-1998), Solicitor (1989-1993)

Nicholas brings intellectual rigour, curiosity and creativity to all his work. As a Restructuring and Insolvency Partner, Nicholas is driven by the appeal of never having to face an ordinary situation, and always needing to bring innovative and novel solutions to the table. Whether helping clients address future risks, restructure debt or operations, sell assets or navigate troubled times, he keeps the lines of communication open and brings his trademark creativity and plain speaking to problem solving.
Advising on contentious and non-contentious issues arising from corporate distress, Nicholas represents financial institutions, insolvency practitioners, distressed debt funds, creditors, debtors and company directors. He has worked across a diverse range of industries, including retail, mining, media, construction and financial services.
Nicholas is also the chairperson of KYUP! Project, a charitable organisation with the aim of ending the scourge of domestic violence and empowering the next generation to champion their safety and wellbeing.

Nicole is the General Counsel and Company Secretary of CAR Group. In addition to managing the legal function across CAR Group, Nicole is responsible for governance, risk and sustainability.

Nicole has over 20 years of legal experience, having commenced her career working across a number of legal areas at one of Australia’s premier law firms. For the past 15 years Nicole has worked in-house, advising leading online companies. Nicole has extensive experience in acquisitions, disputes and intellectual property and a strong focus on corporate responsibility.

Nicole holds a Bachelor of Laws (Hons) and Bachelor of Arts from Monash University and a Certificate in Corporate Governance from INSEAD.

Phillip is a Director at CKG, and a veteran legal search and recruitment consultant, where he leads an expert team which provides bespoke legal search, talent management and market intel to top ASX Listed, Fortune 500 and large privately held corporate partners. Phillip diligently promotes ‘diversity and inclusion’ as a cornerstone principle whilst partnering clients to identify, secure and manage talent across a broad variety of sectors and regions.

As a member of the LGBTIQ community he believes differences are what make us stronger as a community and profession. Phillip has been involved with various charitable organisations over the years, most notably The Bobby Goldsmith Foundation.

Rebecca has advised developers and landowners on industrial, commercial and residential development projects, is on the board of Mackillop Rural Community Services and now works as general counsel at PAYCE Consolidated Limited.

Steve Lancken has been a full time mediator since 1999. During that time, Steve has conducted over 2,000 mediations. Steve has worked in Queensland mediating Native Title issues and in Liberia, Malaysia, Hong Kong, Nepal and Northern America. Steve has conducted mediations for Australia’s largest and most successful organisations such as ASIC, ACCC, QANTAS, GPT, AGSM, Mission Australia, the Salvation Army, Australian Treasury, Australian Government Solicitors and Department of Defence. Steve also works with Australia’s largest banks and insurers.
Steve enjoys the opportunity to do the most interesting and challenging work and contribute to social justice, teach, educate and contribute to his profession.

Vice-President, General Counsel and Ethics & Compliance Officer (Capgemini Australia, New Zealand, China and Hong Kong) | GC Powerlist 2022/3 | In-house Leader 2022 | GC of the Year finalist | Equality advocate | Parent | Laughs a lot

Troy Swan is the Group General Counsel and Board Member of the $1.3 billion office products company Winc. Winc was formed following the acquisition and merger of Staples, OfficeMax and Corporate Express in Australia and New Zealand by leading US based private equity firm Platinum Equity.
He has been publicly recognised as one of Australia's leading corporate lawyers and was previously an Australian Lawyer of the Year and an Australian General Counsel of the Year triple finalist. He was also the Association of Corporate Counsel Global Member of the Year, from over 43,000 lawyers worldwide, with this being the first time this honour was ever awarded to a lawyer outside America.
He became only the second Australian lawyer to win the International Value Champions Award in San Francisco and was also named the Association of Corporate Counsel Winner for Excellence in Corporate Social Responsibility.
Known for his business judgement, he is highly active within the legal and business community, being named a Judge at the Australian Law Awards, New Zealand Law Awards, Corporate Counsel Awards, Partner of the Year Awards and the 30 Under 30 Law Awards.
He is a long standing Member of the Law Society Corporate Lawyers Committee, is a regular commentator and speaker on legal and business affairs and leads an award winning legal team based in Sydney, Australia.