Isa Notermans is the Global Head of Diversity & Belonging at Spotify, having recently returned from her second 7 months parental leave (Spotify’s leading paid parental leave benefit) after having her son. Originally from Australia, she has lived in Japan, Arizona and NYC (twice now) and has felt her true purpose in life is to collect as many global cultural experiences as possible to see the world in a balanced, open and accepting way.

She discovered Human Resources due to a love of using her psychology background in a more strategic and impactful application and eventually found her ‘north star’ in the Diversity & Inclusion arena. She wanted to enable people to thrive in their chosen fields, no matter what their background, while also attempting to change the world of tech for the better.
She started her tech industry journey at Google and for 7 years she worked across a number of different disciplines and lead global teams to attract and develop the best talent in the marketplace. After Google’s huge growth and driven by the desire to help build organisations, she joined Pandora Radio as they launched and expanded their presence in Australia and New Zealand. There, she found her best ever mentor in Jane Huxley (MD) and they developed an incredibly successful industry presence and employee culture.
As life drew her back to NYC, Isa realised she wanted to be part of a ‘game-changing’ organisation, where the challenges were dynamic, raw and ambitious – that is where she joined Spotify. Isa leads efforts in partnership with the executive team across cognitive bias, employee knowledge, employer branding, employee belonging, talent development programs, mentorships and product cultural insights all in pursuit of achieving diversity excellence and ensuring Spotify is the most inclusive place it can be.

In her personal life, Isa is passionate about health and well-being initiatives; focussing on yoga, meditation and travel to achieve balance. She has a Biomedical Science (Psychology) and Arts (Philosophy) degree from Monash University in Melbourne, Australia. She currently resides in Brooklyn with her husband and two young children.

My favourite quote: If you’re always trying to be normal you will never know how amazing you can be.- Maya Angelou