“She engages and empowers her teams to achieve their best.”
"You really feel like she’s here to help us.”
Having seven years of professional leadership roles and several years of academic training under her belt, Tara noticed a disconnect between the academic hierarchy and general leadership skills. Almost anyone in academia can tell you that leadership training and preparation for supervisors and principal investigators is commonly absent throughout their academic career. The efficiency, productivity and overall cohesion of a team is modelled off of the team leader, therefore, a leader who is not adequately prepared for their role can precipitate negative or less-then-optimal outcomes.
It is well established that there are significantly higher rates of mental health issues in graduate students in comparison to the general population. Tara recognised that poor mental health within the rigorous academic environment is likely due, in part, to inadequate leadership and mentoring. While providing mental health resources and support is crucial in all spaces, if we do not address the underlying causes, the rampant mental health issues in academia will persist. Tara believes that providing leadership training to current and future academic mentors will better equip them to handle both inter- and intrapersonal aspects of their roles, and provide them with the confidence, and the resources, to prepare the next generation of academics.
Core Principles
Inclusivity and accessibility are of utmost importance: If your workplace or environment is not safe and available to everyone, you are failing your trainees and ultimately your clients/customers.
Effective communication is crucial for developing and maintaining group goals and interpersonal relationships.
Great leaders are able to adapt and tailor their leadership styles for their trainees'/ mentees' needs.
Investment in the professional growth of trainees/mentees is paramount for sustained company/group growth.
The best leaders recognise the importance of giving and receiving feedback, and know how to achieve these appropriately.
Interested in having Tara host a leadership seminar or workshop for your school, department or team?
Professional Leadership Experience
During late high school, Tara started working in at a local McDonald's. Shortly after turning 18, she was promoted to supervisor and, within the space of a year, moved up three tiers in the business before finally moving up to the role of Customer Experience Manager in less than three years with the company.During her time with the company, Tara trained both new and existing employees, mentored crew trainers, and coached junior managers. She earned her Certificate III in Retail Management, completed several multi-day management courses and attended multiple internal leadership conferences. Over the course of her employment, Tara led several distinct teams alongside her day-to-day shift management role including, but not limited to: the crew training team, the promotions team, and the customer experience team. She also coordinated events such as the store's "Clean Up Australia Day" park clean up and the store's McHappy Day where her team raised over $5,000 for Ronald McDonald House Charities.
Following her time at McDonald's, Tara moved into hospitality, joining the gaming team at Dee Why RSL Club. Tara initially worked behind the bar and as a gaming attendant before being offered a position back-of-house reconciling club finances within 9 months of joining the club (a feat not previously seen within the club). During her training, she was promoted to head of the team, and subsequently trained all members of the team, coaching them to adhere to strict policies and guidelines. She also wrote the standard operating procedures and training manuals for all aspects of the role. She progressed within the club and took on other higher-level cash-handling and reconciling duties before leaving in 2019 to move to Canada to start her PhD.
Academic Leadership Experience
Tara first began mentoring younger students during her high school years. In year 9, she mentored a group of primary school students who were tasked with designing and developing a new tech product (Design Make Innovate). In year 10, she mentored a group of primary school students who were working on a conservation education program to raise community awareness about penguin colonies around the local beaches (Project Penguin). In her senior years, she also acted as a mentor for junior high school students.
While not officially a "leadership" role, Tara believes teaching presents a huge potential to demonstrate how good leadership fosters learning and creativity among trainees and students. She brings her wealth of leadership experience into her teaching and has proven success in each of her teaching roles. In the fourth year of her undergraduate degree, Tara took on the position of Chemistry Lab and Outreach Demonstrator at UNSW Sydney. This role saw her mentoring and teaching both undergraduate students in the lab as well as teaching the wider community about chemistry. She worked both on and off campus to demonstrate chemistry research and careers to high school students and non-experts.
Since moving to Toronto and starting her PhD, Tara conducted laboratory sessions and tutorials for several different molecular biology courses. Her success in these roles gave her the opportunity to develop the virtual labs for one of these courses amidst the COVID-19 pandemic despite having minimal experience in the course.
At the start of her second year, she was asked to TA for the “most difficult” course in her department. Following this she was offered the role of head TA for the largest undergraduate course in the department. Tara is currently working towards her Certificate in Advanced Undergraduate Teaching Preparation at UofT.
