Katherine MeagherI help people and organisations moveRead the bio
The team
What do these three have in common?
An endlessly curious solution-chaser, a wanderer who strives for the next adventure and a goofy puzzle enthusiast.
The unrelenting desire to amplify good.
Meet our team
Sometimes you need a workforce which is a little less ordinary.
Co-founded by Katherine Meagher, Renata Hickson and Sian Rinaldi, Unordinary also operates an agentic workforce. Collectively, they have developed a custom-built setup that augments their productivity and minimises trivialities, meaning they focus on the work that brings them the most joy.
At each agent’s first run, they read about the role they will play, and then find the best female or gender diverse person from across the globe, at any point in history, and then name themselves after that person to embody that person’s tenacity and expertise. We have learned about some extraordinary people through this process and love that we can share their stories in our own small way.
The humans
Three of us
The bios
The long version, in words.
The whiteboards above are how we like to introduce ourselves. Here is the same story in plain text, for anyone who would rather read than zoom.
Katherine Meagher
Co-founder // Intervention architect // 18+ years
Kat helps people and organisations move. She is an intervention architect with more than 18 years designing change in government, and co-founder of Unordinary and elaro, a venture applying circadian science to sustainable careers.
She starts from three truths: complex problems stall when nobody designs the process, change fails when it runs on templates, and we expect the people who keep society running to be superhuman. So she reads the whole system first, designs an intervention in proportion to the problem, co-designs with the people who live it and builds capability, not dependency. Her method runs in four steps: understand, design, deliver, transfer.
Proof it works
- Worked with 100 SES officers at the Department of Industry, Science and Resources, and was invited back three years running.
- Black Summer bushfire recovery: 54 workshops with 1,500 people.
- National security transformation: led a 10-person team on an $8 billion program.
- Defence IT transformation over four years, including two Cabinet submissions.
- Disability co-design for the Department of Social Services guidelines, 2022 to 2023.
Beyond the brief
Grant funding support for not-for-profits, adult learning design, graphic illustration alongside facilitation, MC work, presenting and voiceover. Committee member of the Change Management Institute Canberra Chapter, and Head Coach at Holy Trinity Netball Club since 2020.
BComm (Hons) // Change Management Practitioner (APMG) // PRINCE2 Practitioner // CPM (AMI) // Mental Health First Aid
Renata Hickson
Co-founder // Operations, impact and strategy leader
Renata does strategy under pressure, built for impact. She spent 17 years in the Australian Army, from tank troop leader to squadron command. She was Australia’s first female tank commander, the first woman through the Mechanised Infantry Basic course, the first female armoured personnel carrier troop leader and the first to qualify for front-line combat. Her record helped provide the evidence to open front-line roles to women in Australia. She then took the case to a UK cavalry regiment on exchange, and the UK and US followed.
Her planning work was as high stakes as it gets. She was lead planner for US special operations in Syria, did strategic and operational planning for Iraq, held the operational picture through the 2019 Turkish offensive into north-east Syria and shaped strategy for prisons in the conflict zone on the Iraq and Syria border. As Aide-de-Camp to the Chief of Army she designed his national and international engagement plan, and she redesigned officer training at Duntroon across all three classes for more than 150 trainees.
Proof it works
- National Director of Run Army, 2021 to 2023. Grew it from a simple on-base fun run into a large public event with more than 9,500 participants, raising more than $215,000 for Legacy.
- Indigenous Marathon Foundation, 2024 to 2026. Ran national operations across five programs in health, education and justice for remote communities, and led the foundation’s largest partnership to date.
- Led and scaled the Warrior Project, a running and walking program for young people in youth detention. Co-designed a fundable, repeatable model, secured $1 million over two years from the Queensland Government, then hired the staff and delivered it into five detention centres across two states in four months.
Honours
Chief of Army Gold Commendation (2023), US Defense Meritorious Service Medal (2019), US Joint Service Achievement Medal (2019), Commander JTF 633 Silver Commendation (2020), Australian Operational Service Medal (2019) and Australian Defence Long Service Medal (2022).
Beyond the brief
Non-executive Director of the Wayfinder Foundation, Founding Director of Ninja’s Trust (a home for retired police dogs) and producer of a national sports podcast. She writes narrative non-fiction on service, transition and leadership, speaks on leadership under pressure and rides long distance for Tour de Cure. She cares most about veterans and the move to civilian life, women stepping into rooms that never expected them, and animal welfare.
Moving at the pace of trust, building systems that strengthen people rather than strain them.
Sian Rinaldi
Co-founder // Making complex change work since 2010
Sian has spent her career making complex change work in and around the Australian Public Service, on both sides of the desk. She started at Medicare and the Department of Human Services in policy and training, wrote the policy for the eHealth record and trained 5,000 Medicare officers to use it. From there she worked with AgriFood Skills Australia and Callida Consulting, then was Executive Director at ThinkPlace before founding Unordinary in 2026.
Her sweet spot is the messy middle: working out the best way to meet the intent when the path is not clear. She designed the TGA’s regulatory framework in 14 weeks, and it went into production in 2026. Today she helps the people who are doing good do more, and builds the tools to match. She designed and built Unordinary Ink, a career platform with Beryl at its heart, and the agentic workforce behind Unordinary.
Ideas
- Creator of the Deficit-First Framework for AI adoption.
- Co-author of The Power of People Collaborating (2022).
- Writes on change, AI and public service, and on Substack.
- Presenter at the Aus Gov Data Summit, contributor to the Global Voices series and teacher of public AI courses.
Governance and community
- Global Vice President of the Change Management Institute, 2018 to 2024, during which membership grew 32% and revenue grew 27%. Lifetime Member and former ACT Chapter Lead.
- Co-founder and president of the Girls Leadership Network.
- Pro bono co-design lead for the Indigenous Marathon Foundation’s Warrior Project.
MBA // MHRM // BComms // GAICD // PRINCE2 // MACS Snr CP // Cert IV TAE
The agents