Sydney Panel Argues Community-Led Design Is Central To Building Organisations That Last

A panel of women leaders from technology, business, advocacy and community organisations has made the case that building products and organisations with active community participation produces stronger outcomes than traditional audience-building approaches.

The Women of Influence panel, hosted by The Pillars in Sydney and moderated by Jess Wilson, brought together four speakers to discuss how community connection translates into organisational growth and long-term engagement.

The panellists were Villagehood Co-Founder and Pound Paws Founder, Brittany Bloomer; Body by Berner Co-Founder, Bernadette Sukkar; UN Women Australia CEO, Simone Clarke; and SBCo PR Agency’s Sally Burleigh.

Despite working across different sectors, the panel returned to a shared theme: that lasting communities are built through active participation rather than passive consumption.

Technology as a starting point, not the destination

Bloomer, whose platform Villagehood is designed to help mothers find local connections and turn them into real-life friendships and support networks, addressed the assumption that technology inevitably works against community.

Villagehood’s model uses the app as a starting point for connection, with the goal of moving relationships offline. Users can discover other local mothers, join location-based groups and organise in-person meetups.

“One of the biggest things I’ve learnt from building communities over the past 10 years is that people want to feel like they belong,” Bloomer explained. “With Villagehood, our mums have been involved from the beginning, giving us feedback that has helped shape and build the app, creating their own Villages in their local area and now hosting their own meet-ups.”

“The strongest communities aren’t just built for people; they’re built with them.”

Bloomer drew on her earlier experience building the Pound Paws community, noting that lessons from that project shaped Villagehood’s approach to co-design and user participation.

She argued the platform’s success metrics differ from conventional app engagement models.

“Technology can absolutely rebuild community when it’s designed with that purpose,” Bloomer remarked. “For us, success isn’t keeping a mum on the app for as long as possible. It’s helping her find her people and actually meet them in real life.”

Panellists connect community to organisational resilience

The remaining panellists brought perspectives from advocacy, fitness and public relations, each linking community engagement to the long-term health of their organisations.

Sukkar framed the approach around personal connection with members.

“Treat people like rockstars. They might forget what you said or taught them on the mat, but they’ll never forget how you made them feel,” she observed.

Clarke, who leads UN Women Australia, drew the link between community mobilisation and systemic change.

“Together, we have the power to dismantle discriminatory systems, unlock transformation and deliver justice, safety and dignity for all women and girls,” Clarke noted.

Burleigh offered a more personal reflection on the patience that community building demands.

“Keep showing up when it feels slow. Keep backing yourself when nobody else does,” she commented.

Built with, not built for

The discussion positioned community not as a marketing function but as a design principle. The panellists argued that organisations that create environments where people feel heard and able to contribute tend to generate deeper engagement than those that treat audiences as recipients.

Host, Jess Wilson, drew the perspectives together through questions exploring what functioning communities have in common, how organisations maintain authenticity as they scale and how businesses can build deeper relationships with the people they serve.

The panel forms part of The Pillars’ broader program of events focused on bringing women together around business, leadership and connection.

The discussion reflects a wider trend among businesses and platform operators rethinking how they engage customers and stakeholders. Where traditional approaches have focused on acquiring and retaining users, a growing number of organisations are exploring models where users play an active role in shaping the product or community they belong to.

For the Villagehood model, that means the platform’s roadmap is influenced directly by the mothers who use it, with community feedback feeding into product decisions and users themselves creating and running the local groups that form the core of the experience.

Last Updated on August 17, 2026 by Nick Ross