Malu Matriarchs Collective is a female led First Nations and Pasifika Advisory House.
Who We Are
We occupy the space where institutional systems and the authority of First Nations, Pasifika and Indigenous communities meet. Our role is to provide the "Malu", A protected environment where cultures can immerse safely, ensuring that development is grounded in respect, sovereignty, and shared prosperity.
We work in contexts where decisions affect people, Country and future generations — and where trust, legitimacy and accountability matter as much as technical expertise.
Malu Matriarchs Collective operates differently because we are grounded in community authority, relational worldviews and lived governance experience — not extractive consulting models.
Community-Led, Not Community-Consulted | We centre Indigenous priorities from the outset, embedding Free Prior and Informed Consent (FPIC) to ensure decisions are cultural legitimate and institutionally sound.
Board-Level Credibility with On-the-Ground Insight | Experience at Chair and Executive levels paired with deep operational delivery knowledge to ensure strategies are sheltered by practical reality.
Relational Authority Across Contexts | We operate with legitimacy across First Nations, Pasifika, and Indigenous contexts, translating community priorities into institutional systems without losing integrity.
Strategic Stewardship | We focus on embedding commitments into business-as-usual practice, prioritising leaderships behaviours that project outcomes beyond project cycles. We prioritise systems, policies and leadership behaviours that endure beyond individual projects or funding cycles.
Our difference lies not only in what we deliver, but in the standards, care and accountability we bring to every engagement.
Our Point of Difference
- Vakatabu (Sacred Alignment)
- Tausi le Va (Nurturing the Space & Relationships)
- Mana (Dignified Authority)
- Kuleana (Reciprocal Responsibility)
We listen first and adopt a shared responsibility and respect for place. We take deliberate pause to learn from communities and leaders, recognising that durable outcomes are built through relationships, consent and clear decision-making — not extraction or transactional engagement.
We bring together board-level credibility, operational execution insight and deep community connections. This enables us to translate community priorities into strategies, governance arrangements and systems that hold integrity across cultural, political and institutional environments.
Malu Matriarchs Collective exists to support work that is community-led, defensible and built to endure — whether operating across regions or on Country.
our approach
Malu Matriarchs Collective is led by a team of First Nations and Pasifika women with deep experience operating at the intersection of community authority, governance, strategy and delivery. Our leadership brings together lived cultural knowledge, board-level credibility and practical execution insight across complex environments.
Leadership
Why Our Leadership Matters
"O le ala i le pule o le tautua"
(the path to leadership is through service)
In a modern business landscape that is often exhaustingly transactional, Malu Matriarchs Collective offers a return to authentic connection. Our leadership is defined by the Samoan proverb:
We believe that a transactional approach is unsustainable because it fails to build the enduring connections required for long-term prosperity. Authentic leadership at Malu is defined by uncompromising integrity and a values-driven approach to the people, the clients, and the partnerships we serve.
We do not offer mere "consultancy"; we offer stewardship. Our Executive Directors bring the weight of National, Regional and Global Executive oversight alongside the cultural standing of Matriarchs and Elders, ensuring every strategy is sheltered by ethical practice and built for restorative, long term success.
Authentic Stewardship
Bronwyn is a proud Arabana woman whose leadership is grounded in responsibility to Country, culture and community.
She has held long-term Director and Chairperson roles within her Aboriginal Prescribed Body Corporate and worked extensively across its operations, advancing community-led self-determination through FPIC-aligned negotiations, agreement-making and institutional strengthening.
Bronwyn’s work sits at the intersection of Traditional Owner authority and contemporary governance systems, supporting organisations and communities to engage in ways that protect cultural integrity while delivering practical outcomes.
She brings extensive experience working with corporates, government and advisory organisations across strategy development, complex program delivery and operational transformation. Known for translating intent into implementation, she designs governance frameworks, operating models and engagement approaches that embed accountability, respect and measurable impact.
Bronwyn is recognised for bridging First Nations knowledge systems with contemporary practice to enable partnerships built on trust, legitimacy and long-term stewardship.
Bronwyn Dodd
Founder & Executive Director, First Nations
Rosanna is a distinguished Pasifika executive with more than 30 years’ experience working across banking, governance and regional development.
Her leadership is deeply influenced by her heritage as the daughter of a Paramount Chief and a Pastor, grounding her approach in service, reciprocity and relational responsibility.
She held senior leadership roles at Westpac, including Relationship Director and Regional General Manager, where she led high-performing teams and championed culturally safe banking and financial inclusion initiatives. Her work earned her recognition as a trusted advisor to institutional, government and community partners across Australia.
Rosanna currently serves as Chairperson of the Pacific Islands Council of South Australia and has held numerous community leadership roles, acting as a bridge between policy environments and community aspirations.
She brings to Malu Matriarchs Collective a belief that trust is the true currency of sustainable development, ensuring partnerships across the Pacific are culturally anchored, values-driven and built for enduring impact.
Rosanna Maualaivao MacDonald
Founder & Executive Director, Pacific
Amy brings more than 20 years’ experience working alongside remote and regional communities across Australia and the Indo-Pacific.
Beginning her career as a paediatric and operating theatre nurse in remote and humanitarian settings, she developed a leadership philosophy grounded in listening, dignity and community-led change.
Amy has worked across diverse First Nations communities including Larrakia, Maung, Iwaidja, Mowanjum, Mutitjulu and Warumungu Country, supporting governance development, organisational capability and programs designed with — not for — community.
She has held senior executive and board roles leading large, complex portfolios spanning health systems reform, organisational transformation and regional service delivery. Her work focuses on translating policy into practice and building systems that are accountable to the people they serve.
Amy is known for navigating complexity with humility and building trust across sectors, ensuring that strategy, delivery and leadership remain anchored in relational practice and long-term sustainability.
Amy Gildea
Founder & Non-Executive Director
Free, Prior and Informed Consent (FPIC) underpins how we design engagement, strategy and negotiation processes. Consent is treated as an ongoing practice — not a one-off step — embedded into governance, decision-making and implementation.
We Design with Consent and Care
We begin every engagement with deliberate pause. We take time to understand context, history, authority and relationships before defining pathways forward. This ensures the work is led by community priorities and grounded in respect for people and place.
We Listen First
We recognise that trust, legitimacy and progress are built through relationships. We invest in maintaining and protecting relationships across communities, organisations and partners, supporting shared understanding, reciprocity and long-term accountability.
We Work Relationally
We are accountable to the communities we work alongside and to the organisations we advise. We bring clarity, professionalism and integrity to every engagement, holding ourselves to high standards of ethical practice and delivery.
We Remain Accountable
We work at the intersection of community authority and institutional systems. Our role is often to translate priorities across cultural, political and organisational contexts, ensuring community intent is reflected accurately in policy, strategy, agreements and delivery models.
We Bridge Worlds
We prioritise outcomes that can be sustained over time. Strategies, RAPs and reforms are designed to embed into governance, systems and everyday ways of working, reducing reliance on individuals and strengthening long-term capability.
We Focus on What Endures
How We Work
This approach allows us to support work that is community-led, culturally legitimate and built to endure.
Our way of working is grounded in Indigenous values and shaped by experience operating in complex governance, community and institutional environments. We are deliberate in how we engage, careful in how decisions are made, and accountable for how outcomes are delivered.
Malu Matriarchs Collective acknowledges the First Peoples of Australia as the Traditional Custodians of the lands, waters and skies. We acknowledge that Country is not a resource to be owned, but a living authority — holding Lore, knowledge, kinship systems and responsibilities that have guided communities for tens of thousands of years, and we honour their ancestors whom they walked before them, their Elders present and the next generation of leaders. We recognise their deep enduring connection to this place, and their sovereignty that has never been ceded.
We also acknowledge the Indigenous Peoples of the Pacific, Southeast Asia and beyond, whose cultures, customary governance systems and relational ways of being continuing to shape their lands and communities. We honour the shared strength, resilience and wisdom of Indigenous peoples across the region.
Wherever we work, we commit to walking respectfully, upholding cultural authority, and ensuring our practice strengthens — rather than extracts from — the communities and Countries we engage with.