Our People

Sharne is a Partner at Derwent, working across board and executive search, and leadership assessment and development. Based in Melbourne, she has spent over a decade helping boards and chief executives navigate their most complex talent and leadership challenges.

Sharne has led Chief Executive Officer and board succession searches across financial services, healthcare and industrial sectors, as well as government, with particular expertise in arts, sport and cultural organisations. She approaches every search from the client's side, understanding not just the brief but what the organisation truly needs, and builds the kind of long-standing trust that keeps clients and candidates returning to her. 

She also specialises in General Counsel and Chief Legal Officer appointments across a breadth of corporate sectors, as well as partnering with private and public sector organisations on their leadership assessment and development needs. Her legal background gives her a sharp analytical edge, an instinct for the nuances of a brief, and the adaptability to respond as client needs shift.

Before joining Derwent, Sharne spent over a decade in executive search, most recently as a Partner at Korn Ferry, and before that within Egon Zehnder's Chief Executive Officer and Board Search practice groups. Earlier still, she spent 17 years in senior legal and policy roles within the Victorian Government, including as Clerk of the Executive Council to two former Governors of Victoria. 

Sharne is qualified in 16PF and Hogan DS psychometrics and admitted as a Barrister and Solicitor of the Supreme Court of Victoria and the High Court of Australia.

Sharne holds a Bachelor of Laws from Monash University and a Bachelor of Arts in Philosophy from the University of New South Wales.