Our team

The SmartyGrants team is highly experienced in the grantmaking, grantseeking and technology arenas.

We also really care about our work. We’re passionate about creating positive social change – this underpins every single thing that we do to create accessible, commonsense solutions to improve the interactions between grantmakers and grantseekers of all sizes and types.

Denis Moriarty AM, Our Community Founder and Group Managing Director

Denis is the founder of Our Community and its Group Managing Director. He has a strong background in executive management in both the public and private sectors. He was the former head of the Victorian Government’s Information Service, Managing Director of Strategic Australia Pty Ltd, a boutique management consultancy, and former Commissioner and Deputy Chief Executive Officer of the Victorian Tourism Commission. Denis is a graduate of both the Vincent Fairfax Ethics in Leadership Awards and the Williamson Community Leadership program, and a member of several not-for-profit and private boards. He is a graduate of Harvard University’s Innovation and Entrepreneurship Program.

Kathy Richardson, Our Community Executive Director & Chaos Controller

Kathy has more than a decade’s experience overseeing grantmaking knowledge development and dissemination. She is also an experienced grantmaker and grantseeker, having held a range of roles with a number of not-for-profit and grantmaking organisations and networks. A journalist by trade, Kathy oversees the Our Community Group’s communications activities as well as helping to develop and embed technology reforms and new business directions. She was a founding team member for SmartyGrants. Kathy has a degree in journalism from RMIT and a long-standing interest in community and social justice issues. She was selected as an Eisenhower Fellow (Innovation) in 2014.

Fiona Bramham

Fi joined Our Community in July 2021. She started her career in human resources working for State Government and the consulting sector. Fi soon left HR and joined the City of Greater Geelong as a Community Development Worker. This is where she found her passion and commitment to working with communities, particularly those experiencing social and economic exclusion. Some of the initiatives she has been involved in are community information, digital Inclusion, community leadership and community safety. Fi also worked for The Sexual Assault and Family Violence Centre and Torquay Community House. She lives on the Surfcoast and loves family, fitness and the Carlton Football Club.

Gina Cirillo

Gina works as part of the SmartyGrants Managed Services team. She is highly experienced in all things SmartyGrants after years of delivering training and working with clients to find commonsense solutions to day-to-day issues. As part of the Managed Services team, Gina provides consulting services including everything from guidelines reviews, process mapping and platform implementation. She is dedicated to building a community of best practice and is part of the working group that brings grantmakers together to participate in an annual Grantmaking Intelligence Conference. When she's not at work, Gina spends many hours with a lump of clay and a pottery wheel. She is working on making a perfect sourdough loaf and looks forward to having an Australian as the head of state and to a time when equality is a given for all.

Fiona Dempster

Fiona is a Strategic Advisor for SmartyGrants. A former federal government public servant and ministerial advisor with more than 10 years experience in program management and delivery, Fiona co-authored the SmartyGrants Grantmaking Toolkit. She is skilled at guiding individuals and teams through the process of undertaking a program review and conducting a grants diagnostic. Fiona plays a leading role in convening and delivering SmartyGrants' annual conference. She is based in Queensland's beautiful sunshine coast hinterland.

Danielle Frankel

Danielle is part of the SmartyGrants Managed Services team. She comes from a legal, development and strategic background and enjoys problem solving and consulting with clients to achieve their desired outcomes. Danielle has broad experience working in both the commercial and not-for-profit sectors. She has a double degree in Laws and Arts from Monash University.

Alex McMillan

Alex is Manager, SmartyGrants Managed Services, a role she took up after cutting her teeth in not-for-profit and grantmaking services through various roles at Our Community, and externally in professional and voluntary roles with organisations including Red Cross and Climate for Change. She has an undergraduate degree in Media and Communications and a Master of International Relations from the University of Melbourne. As Manager, Managed Services, she oversees a dynamic team of a SmartyGrants and grantmaking experts dedicated to helping customers achieve their goals.

Josh Presser

Josh joined Our Community in January 2020 as Director, Special Projects, SmartyGrants, where he spends his days building tools and resources to help drive best practice grantmaking. He has extensive experience leading the management and delivery of large scale Commonwealth grant programs in the Settlement and Multicultural Affairs, Disability Employment and Families and Communities portfolios. Josh holds a Bachelors of Commerce (Management) and Arts (Media and Communications) from Deakin and Swinburne Universities.

Charles Rignall

Charles is the Business Development Manager in the SmartyGrants team. With more than 35 years of global sales and customer engagement experience, Charles has worked with major IT hardware and software vendors in Australia and the USA, plus leasing companies involved in funding IT acquisitions. He commenced his career with IBM, and since 2000 he has focussed on business process driven solutions. Charles is also a voluntary member of the Business Development Board for one of Victoria’s regional health service providers that offers a range of health, welfare and community services. He is based in NSW.

Jen Riley

Jen joined Our Community as Chief Impact Officer in January 2022. She brings to the role 20+ years working in the social sector for both government and not-for-profits and is skilled in strategic planning, program and product design and management, outcomes measurement, and evaluation. Jen is currently focused on the roll out of the Outcomes Engine within SmartyGrants and helping clients to collect and report on their outcome data across grant portfolios. Jen’s passion is technology and outcomes and helping organisations understand and improve their impact.

Eden Rose

Eden is a Project Director working on Our Community House, Good Jobs and other projects in the innovations team. He holds a Bachelor of Arts from Monash University and previously worked in the Programs Team at The School of Life Australia. His passion for community and equality has led him to become a member of Melbourne's annual Homeless Memorial committee as well as volunteer as a student mentor at St Kilda Youth Service.

Matthew Schulz

Matthew is an experienced journalist, charged with writing and editing for a range of Our Community publications and websites. Matthew joined the Our Community team in 2017, and before that was a digital editor at the Herald Sun and Sunday Herald Sun, and reporter for the masthead's web and print editions. He has a shared Walkley Award for coverage of Victoria's devastating 2009 bushfires, and has an arts honours degree in Communications.

Barry Smith

Barry is a Strategic Advisor for SmartyGrants. He is a former senior federal government public servant, with more than 30 years' experience in grants program management and delivery. As a co-author of the SmartyGrants Grantmaking Toolkit, Barry has expertise in advising on process optimisation and best practice in grants management across the development and delivery lifecycle. Barry is based in Queensland's beautiful sunshine coast hinterland.

Fiona Waugh

Fiona joined the SmartyGrants Managed Services Team in 2022. Fiona has a Bachelor of Business from Swinburne University and a Master of Public Policy and Management from the University of Melbourne. She worked for over 20 years in the not-for-profit space spanning disability, education, welfare and out-of-home care sectors, in project management, policy and advocacy roles. Fiona has also held several board member positions and sat on various government and community reference committees. She is passionate about improving the lives of marginalised and vulnerable members of our society so that they gain access to the equal opportunities, agency, dignity, respect, and quality of life that so many people take for granted.

Stef Ball

Stef is communications coordinator in Our Community's Innovation Lab, where she works with the rest of the team to research and write resources to help not-for-profit organisations understand data and become more data driven. Stef also heads up the Funding Centre, an online grants database and fundraising capacity-building website and enterprise of Our Community. Stef has a degree in journalism from the University of Queensland and is interested in closing the gap between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians, reducing mental health stigma, and intersectional feminism.

Dr Nathan Mifsud

Nathan is a data scientist in Our Community's Innovation Lab. He has done research in youth mental health and higher education, is an enthusiastic teacher, and has a PhD in cognitive neuroscience from UNSW. He cares about social good, the lives of animals, and tight hex bolts.

Michael McLellan

Michael is a data analyst at SmartyGrants. He joined Our Community in 2022. Michael has a Bachelor of IT and has partially completed a Master of Science. His unique combination of professional experience in customer service, IT systems, business analysis and application support will prove valuable as our team continues to work to make life easier for SmartyGrants users. In his spare time, Michael enjoys training in Brazilian jiujitsu and volunteering as an IT mentor. You can expect to come across Michael in some of our training workshops or via the support team.

Dr Paola Oliva-Altamirano

Paola is Our Community's Director of Data Science. Paola trained as an academic researcher in Astrophysics based at Swinburne University of Technology from 2012 to 2017. Now she is bringing her research and data science skills to Our Community's Innovation Lab. She is part of the "data science for good" movement, which seeks to keep not-for-profit organisations up to date with technology. Paola believes that everyone should have access to education. She followed this passion by co-founding the Organisation for Central American Astronomers: "Astrophysics in Central America and the Caribbean (Alpha-Cen)," providing mentorship to students in underdeveloped countries. She was selected as an Uptake Data Fellow in 2018 and a participant of the leadership Veski program, inspiring woman in STEM side-by-side, in 2020. In 2021, she joined the Standards Australia committee helping to write the Standards for the use of Artificial Intelligence.

Orgil Tumurbaatar

Orgil is a Data Analyst who supports SmartyGrants' client engagements by creating reports and analysing data. He also handles data migrations, gets involved in SmartyGrants reporting and works on other data-related projects with the Innovation Lab. Orgil has experience in monitoring, evaluation and learning (MEL) and delivering data and reporting solutions in various development projects funded by international donor organisations. He has been involved in projects across several sectors including economic and community development, environment, energy and water utility. He came to Australia driven by a desire to take a deep dive into data analytics, completing a graduate program at Monash University. Outside the office, Orgil spends his time with his young family and travelling to new places.

Catherine Yen
Cat is a data analyst with Our Community's Innovation Lab, working primarily on SmartyGrants client reporting, as well as other data analysis and data science projects. Cat has worked with government departments in the past and has immense knowledge and experience in building dashboards and delivering insights. In her spare time Cat likes to volunteer in multiple not-for-profits. She is passionate about bringing equal opportunities to everyone and has experience working with young people living in low-socioeconomic communities.

Reino Basile

Reino is a SmartyGrants Training and Support Specialist. He has a diverse background in technical account management, retail management and IT support. Reino also has excellent background knowledge in ICT infrastructure and systems administration, and experience delivering software demonstrations and user training and in writing technical documentation. From 2009 to 2015 he ran his own technical consulting business.

David Bradley

David joined the SmartyGrants team in March 2019 as a Training and Support Specialist after an extended period working in Learning and Development in Tokyo, Japan. Originally working in research laboratories as an instrument technician, he has also held positions in fashion, logistics, hospitality and tourism. David is driven by helping people become the best they can be and has a passion for sports and gaming.

Simon Di Berardino

Simon is one of our Training and Support Specialists at SmartyGrants. He joined Our Community in 2022. Simon has a Master of Arts and Cultural Management and has previously worked as a trainer in the fields of retail and consumer technology. In his last role, he was responsible for upskilling a national team of trainers, as well as designing and delivering high-quality training sessions for numerous stakeholders. In his spare time, Simon enjoys films, music, board games, reading and socialising.

Emily Painter

Emily is a SmartyGrants Support Specialist. Prior to joining Our Community she worked for a leading youth mental health organisation performing various roles including research, advocacy, peer support, and coordinating the build of a clinical quality registry. Emily is passionate about humanising technology and working for organisations with a positive impact on the world.

Kat Paltoglou

Kat is a Training and Support Specialist at SmartyGrants. Kat has experience working in marketing and communications within the arts and technology sector, providing end-user support and training for various hardware and software applications. Kat’s passion lies in positively contributing to the community through the utilisation of technology.

Max Penno

Max is our Support & Training Team Leader at SmartyGrants. He has been with Our Community since 2019. Max leads our support and training team to deliver first-rate customer support and training. He aims to make life easy for SmartyGrants users by promoting best practice and efficiency in support and training operations day-to-day. Max values high-quality education in all aspects of grant management. A background in operations management, business administration and degree lecturing drives his passion for development of people and processes in order to achieve excellence in work and education. Max is a graduate in music composition and business administration. He also holds a postgraduate qualification in commerce and a Master of Business Administration (Educational Leadership). In his spare time, Max enjoys writing music for screen and mentoring higher education students in various disciplines of business in the creative industries.

Simon Richardson

Simon joined the SmartyGrants team as a Support Specialist in August 2022, bringing 22 years of experience working in Support as a Technical Support Analyst and Team Leader. His previous roles included servicing top-tier banks & financial institutions using Reconciliations, Cash & Liquidity Management and Corporate Actions applications, and most recently supporting a Network Devices discovery tool. Joining Our Community enables Simon to use his corporate experience in an organisation that aligns with his values and contributes to the greater good. In his spare time, Simon enjoys walking, cycling, and sailing on Port Phillip Bay.

Irene Zelios

Irene joined the SmartyGrants team in 2019 as an account management and support specialist. She has qualifications in member services, banking, business administration and training. Her previous job was as a ghost guide in Melbourne's notorious former Pentridge Prison.