Emerging Leader Award
Lara Keys
Manager, Teaching & Research Services
Macquarie University
Lara Keys joined Macquarie University Library in April 2024 as Manager, Teaching & Research Services; her first formal people-leadership role leading a team supporting the Faculty of Arts and Macquarie Business School. Building on a strong foundation as a faculty librarian and experience coordinating education and research support at Western Sydney University, Lara has quickly established herself as an emerging leader who translates strategy into innovative and sustainable service improvements. Lara’s leadership is characterised by curiosity, thoughtful collaboration, and respectful dialogue with colleagues and clients. She is particularly effective in leading projects that transform client experiences and bringing people with her through change: she creates clarity of purpose, builds capability across teams, and models reflective practice. This is especially evident in work that calls for cultural care and strong partnerships. Through this mix of project leadership, service innovation and people-centred delivery, Lara has strengthened the Library’s capacity to respond to evolving student and faculty needs, and built momentum with future-focussed practice across the organisation.
Mid-Career Award
Chingmy Lam
Manager, Metadata Services
The University of Sydney
Chingmy Lam is a highly respected mid‑career library leader whose work has had sustained impact on metadata practice at institutional, national, and international levels. She has served as Manager, Metadata Services at the University of Sydney Library since 2019, leading metadata strategy, policy, and operational practice across one of Australia’s largest research library environments.
Chingmy brings deep expertise in metadata standards, library management systems, and authority control, and is recognised for translating complex technical and standards‑based work into coherent, ethical, and future‑focused metadata services. Her leadership spans innovation, governance, and workforce capability, ensuring metadata practice supports discovery, analytics, and informed decision‑making.
A defining feature of Chingmy’s work is her leadership in reparative and inclusive metadata practice, including alignment with AIATSIS Pathways, Indigenous Cultural and Intellectual Property (ICIP) principles, and the implementation of Homosaurus to support respectful description of LGBTI+ communities and histories. In parallel, she is a recognised sector leader in the responsible application of artificial intelligence in metadata workflows, contributing to international initiatives through the OCLC Research Library Partnership.
At this stage of her career, Chingmy is shaping how metadata practice can advance equity, trust, and responsible innovation across the academic library sector.
Outstanding Library Team Award
Adelaide University (AU) Library Team, Adelaide University
This nomination recognises the combined teams of the two foundation university libraries who delivered the establishment of the Adelaide University Library, while simultaneously maintaining full business-as-usual operations across both institutions.
Over an 18-month period, the teams undertook one of the most complex library transformations in the Australasian sector, with no established precedent at this scale. This included the design and implementation of a unified operating model, consolidation of collections and licensing, and the delivery of an integrated systems and service environment to support a new, large-scale, multi-campus university.
At the same time, staff continued to deliver uninterrupted services to students and researchers across both legacy institutions, supporting teaching, research, and student success during a period of significant organisational change.
The work required deep collaboration across functional areas and a sustained commitment to staff wellbeing and user experience. The result is a future-focused, scalable library service that is fully aligned to Adelaide University’s strategic ambitions and positioned to support its community from Day 1 and beyond.
Indigenous Leader Award – Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples
Eytahnyia Scott
Indigenous Learning Advisor
Curtin University
Eytahnyia Scott is a Jaru woman, from the Kimberley’s Halls Creek, adopted by the Yolngu people of Galiwin’ku in Northeast Arnhem Land. She commenced her role as the inaugural Indigenous Learning Advisor at the Curtin University Library in 2023 and has transformed the way the Library engages with and supports the Indigenous students and staff. Eytahnyia has achieved this through purposeful collaboration, quickly building and leveraging relationships across Curtin. She has been brave in calling out our limitations and challenging our ingrained ways of thinking, always encouraging Library staff to learn about and embrace Indigenous ways of working, knowing and being. As the only continuing Indigenous staff member in the team, Eytahnyia empowers other staff to share this vital work of Indigenising library services, with less fear of making mistakes. She shares her own stories openly and courageously, illuminating the challenges and triumphs of an Indigenous woman in colonial spaces (libraries and universities), often with a sense of humour. Through her vulnerability, her generosity and her leadership, Eytahnyia has truly begun a transformation in how the Library interacts with and supports Indigenous students and staff.
Indigenous Leader Award – Māori Peoples
Dr Rangihurihia McDonald
Pou Ārahi
University of Waikato | Te Whare Wānanga o Waikato
Dr Rangihurihia (Hurihia) McDonald is a respected Māori leader in Te Iho o Te Manawataki (the University of Waikato Library), whose kaupapa-centred leadership has measurably strengthened cultural safety, capability, and belonging for staff and communities across the university. As Pou Ārahi within Te Iho o Te Manawataki, Hurihia has designed and delivered an innovative, evidence-informed programme that embeds te ao Māori and Te Tiriti o Waitangi into everyday library practice, including the Library’s Cultural Capability Framework now woven into objectives, induction, and team rhythms.
Hurihia leads with mana-enhancing steadiness and service. She creates inclusive, practical pathways for people to grow confidence in te reo Māori and tikanga through sustained learning opportunities (including waiata and reo practice), and she amplifies Māori voices through initiatives such as the He Kōkonga Ngākau speaker series and Kōrero Corner. Her influence extends beyond the library: she convenes Te Kupenga (Māori and Pacific staff network) and has modelled sector leadership by weaving tikanga and te reo Māori into major professional events, including as co-MC and tikanga leadership for the IATUL conference.
Distinguished Service Award
Hero Macdonald
University Librarian
Deakin University
Hero Macdonald is a highly respected senior higher education leader whose career reflects a sustained commitment to advancing information equity and amplifying the role and impact of academic libraries within the sector.
As a current CAUL Board Director and Chair of CAUL Content Procurement, Hero’s leadership of the recent CAUL major negotiations represents a defining contribution to the Australian and New Zealand research sector aligned with Hero’s values of openness and equity. Hero has demonstrated the ability to articulate a compelling, clear, values-led position for the sector, backed up by a strategic, ambitious and highly effective approach to collective negotiations that have delivered unprecedented benefits to the sector.
Through this work, Hero has been instrumental in positioning CAUL as an influential force within the global scholarly communications landscape. Hero’s leadership reflects a deep understanding of both the systemic challenges facing researchers and universities, and a deep commitment to leveraging libraries’ collective power to shape a more sustainable and equitable future for research.