APAC Insider- Australian CEO Excellence Awards 2025 | 17 AIM-Jun25100 Kyle Prasser is the CEO of Life Skills Victoria Inc. (LSV), a regional not-for-profit organisation providing high-quality disability, education, training, and community services. Working under the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS), this registered charity drives impact by building relationships across the community and ensuring everyone is aligned with its aim: to empower individuals in need of support to achieve their goals and aspirations. We caught up with Kyle for more. With more than a decade of experience in purposeful, crosssector leadership to his name across fields such as education, mental health, and disability services, Kyle Prasser is the perfect man to lead LSV. Boasting an ability to blend strategic insight with practical results – and underpinning it all with the sense of empathy that is essential for working in this environment – Kyle’s skills in key areas like planning, governance, and technology integration have paved the way for a career synonymous with impact and success. “Having led wholeof-organisation strategic planning and enterprise-wide restructuring across multiple roles, I have strengthened not just my governance literacy but also my understanding of organisational behaviour, culture, and politics.” Over the course of his career, Kyle has purposefully sought out roles that have allowed him to both broaden his horizons and expand his skills. For example, the foundations of his career stem from project, programme, and portfolio management within health and aged care. Working for organisations such as Calvary Health Care and Southern Cross Care (now Mercy Health), Kyle began to develop his understanding of service coordination/implementation and risk management, as well as gaining insights into life working in highly regulated environments. Kyle quickly realised how essential it was to balance compliance with innovation, and this has been a common theme throughout his career, all the way up to the present with LSV. More recently, Kyle’s abilities have been tested as a result of the ever-evolving compliance burden that stems from running a multi-disciplinary community services operation, which has resulted in the organisation having to both pivot operationally and tighten financially. Along with constraints on resources meaning that this regional service provider must do more with less, these challenges have required LSV to get creative, streamline its processes, and create more purposeful partnerships. These relationships have also proven instrumental in LSV taking the necessary steps to uphold its overarching belief in bringing equitability, sustainability, and a values-led transformation to fields like disability support and training. Going a step further, Kyle told us: “My work means creating environments where people that experience disadvantage, are vulnerable, or are susceptible to exclusion or isolation, can thrive. And as a leader, I see it as my role to ensure the systems we establish support those aspirations.” For instance, Kyle often challenges his team to ask themselves what they would want from a service of this kind, reflecting his status as thought leader. Thus, in a society where there is a tendency to disempower people with disabilities – the team buck this trend by raising awareness of the fact that treating people well does not mean making their decisions for them. Its services therefore nurture the kind of life transformations that empower communities, and this is a path that Kyle and the team are committed to continuing to walk moving forwards. Kyle explained: “Education, training, and employment innovation for LSV’s participants and partners will be a key project in 2025.” One example of this is the launch of a café at the Latrobe Regional Gallery in Morwell, with this social enterprise delivering training, skill development, and real employment opportunities for people with disabilities. This is just the beginning for this non-profit disability-training organisation in Victoria, which remains at the forefront of forpurpose disability training and education thanks to Kyle and co. Finally, reflecting on those who have proven instrumental in his journey to being recognised with this award, Kyle shared with us: “I have been particularly fortunate and am extremely grateful to have such a supportive group of managers in my leadership team that have been incredibly strong and resilient even in the most testing of times.” He continued: “I am also very lucky to have a board that is truly committed to the purpose of LSV, enabling me to focus my time and energy on the sustainability and development of the organisation.” For more information about Life Skills Victoria Inc., including its disability training and education services and its programmes, use the web address listed below. Contact: Kyle Prasser Company: Life Skills Victoria Inc. Web Address: https://www.lifeskillsvic.com.au/ Most Outstanding Community Services NPO CEO 2025: Kyle Prasser
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