Critical Perspectives on Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Practice in 2026
Description
Critical Perspectives on Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Practice in 2026
Strategic repositioning of DEI for impact
Four practitioners, four practices, one vision.
Featuring
Niveditha Balachandran
Sugandha Chapman
Shruti Chandhok
Fourth Speaker to be announced
And introduction by Roman Ružbacký
Purpose
The purpose of this forum is to bring together four unique people and practitioners, all leaders in human rights and inclusion, with outstanding contributions to workplaces and the community.
They will share a lifetime of work and offer an honest reflection our current DEI profession and practice in Australia in 2026 and usher in a new vision of what great can look like. How can the world of DEI can look different? How do I not lose myself and my value?
We will also provide four unique lived experience perspectives on: Who is being set up to fail? Who is quiet quitting? Who is experiencing burnout? Who is carrying the load? and, What is the elephant in the room?
Join us for an honest, heartwarming conversation where we explore how we have strategically redefined and repositioned our roles and the profession, influence upwards, and bring people on the journey.
Four practitioners, ninety minutes, no recording, no slides.
They will be bringing heat into the conversation and join us on our journey.
Lineup
Niveditha Balachandran
Niveditha is a diversity, equity and inclusion specialist with a background in international development, law and social change. She has spent her career working to advance human rights across a range of sectors. She commenced her career as a VPS graduate in 2011, working across a range of functions across various departments, and then switched gears to study law and work in international grassroots peacebuilding internationally, across Asia, Europe, and North America. She juggled work as a part time commercial lawyer, and working part time international peace building for a number of years. She then moved into Diversity, Equity and Inclusion work to advance human rights and meaningful outcomes for people from marginalised communities and came back to the public service in 2020. She has led various DEI functions and teams, setting strategy through to implementation, across OD culture transformation and service delivery projects. She takes a systems thinking and intersectional approach to embedding sustainable DEI into employee experience and organisational culture design, and inclusive service delivery.
Shruti Chandhok
Shruti is a strategic culture, diversity, and inclusion leader with more than 15 years of experience leading the development and delivery of strategies, complex multidisciplinary projects, and initiatives across the public sector. She holds a bachelor’s degree in psychology and a master’s degree in human resources, and began her career as an HR practitioner, building experience across all areas of human resources. In 2013, she moved into diversity, equity, and inclusion at Victoria Police, where she began driving DEI capability and has since played a key role in helping organisations and community partners translate equity commitments into practical, measurable, and community-informed systemic change. Most recently, she led diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives within the Mental Health & Wellbeing Division at the Victorian Department of Health, improving outcomes for multicultural communities by strengthening workforce capability, advancing mental health equity, and embedding culturally safe practice. A key priority in this role was implementing Victoria’s first Diverse Communities Mental Health and Wellbeing Framework and Blueprint, a recommendation of the 2021 Royal Commission into Victoria’s Mental Health System. She is deeply committed to advancing human rights, cultural safety, and equitable access to services, particularly for communities affected by systemic marginalisation. She works across government and community-led organisations to build collaborative partnerships that strengthen impact and advance equitable outcomes. In her role as s a current board member on Multicultural Centre for Women’s Health, she leverages her skills, expertise and capabilities to contribute to the future strategic direction of the organisation. As a woman of colour who migrated from India and a carer with firsthand experience of the acute mental health system, she brings both professional expertise and personal insight to her work. These lived experiences inform her approach to strategic workforce development and organisational transformation, grounded in cultural humility, intersectionality, and genuine partnership with communities.
Sugandha Chapman
Sugandha (Sig) Chapman is a leadership, culture and inclusion adviser, facilitator and speaker who helps organisations tackle the problems another workshop won’t fix. After nearly two decades across Big 4 consulting, technology, social impact and organisational development, her view is simple: you can’t train your way out of a culture problem. Her work focuses on the systems and everyday leadership decisions that shape who gets heard, sponsored, promoted and able to contribute, working with organisations including CBA, Aurecon and Defence, Turner & Townsend, Woolworths and Adobe. As an Indian-Australian woman of colour with late-diagnosed ADHD, Sig brings both lived experience and a systems lens to questions about inclusion, power and what we still assume a “good” leader, communicator or thinker should look like.
your hosts
This free forum is proudly brought to you Roman Ruzbacky & Associates and Adrian Price.
Tickets for good, not greed Humanitix dedicates 100% of profits from booking fees to charity
