Meet the Judging Board 2021

The 2021 Pause Awards judging board is a stellar lineup. You can check the complete list of judges, but here are the five to know.

Lee Tonitto, Managing Director at Tonitto and Partners

Lee is inspired by working with passionate people who share a commitment to achieving results with a focus on values, ethics, and ESG concerns reconciled with commercial goals. She has successfully held C-suite and director-level roles over the past 20 years, spanning Australia and New Zealand and representing major brands such as Unilever, Revlon, AMP and the Commonwealth Bank’s Count Financial.

A specialist in identifying and solving complex enterprise-wide business issues, Lee is a transformation catalyst. Her significant capability includes strategy, brand, marketing, distribution, operational performance improvement, coaching, mentoring and business transformation.

Ben Ford, Head of Growth at Frollo

Before joining Frollo, Ben spent three years with Yodlee, where he established the APAC headquarters in Sydney and enjoyed a stint at illion Open Data Solutions (formerly Proviso).

A fierce advocate and supporter of the Fintech community, Ben has spent time as an advisor and mentor at Antler, the Yodlee Incubator in Silicon Valley, Startup Bootcamp, and Inspiring Rare Birds, as well as at various individual startups. He is also the Fintech Editor for IdeaSpies.

Before entering the Fintech world, Ben spent ten years in product management and sales with Equifax (UK) and Dun & Bradstreet (Australia).

Christina Gerakiteys, Co-CEO at SingularityU Australia

Christina is a sought-after speaker, facilitator, and program designer, creating interactive educational experiences driven by design thinking, purpose, engagement, and play.

Christina is on a mission to educate, empower and inspire leaders to converge transformational technologies to impact and solve humanity’s grand challenges. She has worked with Deloitte, IAG, Employment Hero and Entrepreneurs Organisation.

Christina writes for several publications, hosts the SingularityU Australia Webinar series ‘A Future By Design’, the podcast ‘Inspire for 5’, and speaks on the radio about creativity and innovation. In addition, she is a contributor to the award-winning Front-End Innovation blog.

Christina is an advocate for innovation committees; she produced the annual Hunter Innovation Festival and lectures in business, innovation and entrepreneurship.

Tom Leyden, Global Leader of IT at Woods Bagot

Tom is a global leader in IT with a broad range of sector experience. Over 20 years, he has worked in multiple industries, including finance, business services and, more recently, architecture and design.

His recent work includes delivering technology aligned to the organisation’s strategic needs in cutting-edge architectural design and cost-effective service delivery. Key to this has been getting the infrastructure into the cloud, developing strategies that connect technology with the next generations and driving technology innovation. With the rise of consumer-based technology, Tom believes that technology is no longer the domain of the IT department, and to really unlock technology for an organisation, we must enable people to bring technology to the game.

Sonia Clarke, Director, Future of Work, PwC

Sonia is currently part of PwC’s Future of Work practice, working with the executive teams to shape and articulate what their organisation’s future looks like.

At PwC, she leads a team of communications strategists, content designers, digital producers, artists, animators and creative directors. 

Before joining PwC, Sonia spent more than a decade in PR. She held senior agency leadership roles and directed award-winning campaigns that spanned consumer brands to corporate reputation management.

As we close the Standard Entries this Friday, we will hit a new milestone – receiving more entries than last year! And there is still time to get yours in, don’t miss out. Submit your entries.