BHL Communications Director
Manager, BHL Australia
Chair, BHL Persistent Identifier Working Group
Nicole Kearney leads the Australian branch of the Biodiversity Heritage Library (BHL), based at Museums Victoria. Nicole manages digitisation operations, copyright clearance, contributor liaison, strategic planning, reporting, staffing, and stakeholder engagement. Under her direction, BHL Australia has grown from four contributing organisations to a national consortium of 62.
Nicole also serves as Chair of BHL’s Persistent Identifier Working Group, which she established in 2020 to bring BHL content into the modern linked network of scholarly research. She is a passionate advocate for open access and the use of persistent identifiers to make biodiversity knowledge discoverable, trackable and interoperable.
A skilled science communicator, Nicole is a regular international speaker. In 2024, she was selected to take part in Homeward Bound’s global Leadership Initiative for Women in STEMM. As BHL Communications Director, she will lead BHL’s internal and external communications through the transition and into the next chapter.