Charmaine Hunzwi
Founder & Creative Director, Safe Space Media · President, Incubate Foundation · Founder, Blacks in Technology Australia · Host, Can We Talk About It?! Podcast
Charmaine Hunzwi is living proof that you can close billion dollar deals by morning and curate cultural revolutions by evening. Named one of Women’s Agenda’s 2024 Women to Watch in Leadership and Agenda Setter of the Year Finalist for the 2023 Women in Leadership Awards, she has spent over a decade making corporate Australia and community impact not just coexist, but amplify each other.
As Founder and Creative Director of Safe Space Media, a creative cultural agency, Charmaine helps brands and institutions move beyond performative diversity into genuine community engagement. Her portfolio spans activations and campaigns connected to the Australian Open, Melbourne Fashion Week and Melbourne International Film Festival — alongside her own landmark events, including the acclaimed Amari Gala and the Victorian African-Australian Student Conference, which she created to open corporate doors for the next generation.
“She’s mastered the art of turning ‘that’s not how it’s done’ into ‘watch me do it anyway.’”
Charmaine’s career began in Retail, Corporate and Institutional Banking, where she held roles across credit risk, relationship management, and branch leadership — experience that gives her a rare fluency in the language of boardrooms, balance sheets, and corporate decision-making. She was a committee member for FINSIA’s Young Finance Professionals, an advisor to the Victorian Government on community policy, President of Incubate Foundation, and a co-architect of the viral movement to counter the harmful #AfricanGangs media narrative in 2018.
A skilled communicator and screen producer, she hosts the multi-award-nominated Can We Talk About It?! Podcast, tackling the conversations the Australian Black diaspora is too often asked to avoid. Whether on a corporate stage, a community panel, or behind a microphone, Charmaine brings the same thing: a refusal to shrink, and an unshakeable belief that individuals can be catalysts for lasting change.
Speaking Topics
Beyond Performative
Building cultural partnerships with underrepresented communities that create mutual value — not just optics. Drawn from real campaigns with major Australian brands and institutions.
The Audience You’re Missing
How organisations unlock engagement with Australia’s multicultural communities — audiences of significant economic and cultural influence that most brands fail to reach.
From Inclusion Strategy to Community Impact
Most organisations have an inclusion strategy. Few have community impact. What it takes to close the gap — practically, from someone who has done both.
Joy as a Business Model
Why celebrating communities, rather than documenting their disadvantage, drives deeper engagement, stronger brand alignment, and more sustainable impact.
Keynote
30–60 minutes
Panel / Fireside
Moderation or panellist
Workshop
60–120 minutes
MC & Hosting
Half or full day