- John Wooden
Ursula Elisara is a co-founder and CEO of Immerse, a foster care agency established to help create a transformed and transformational culture of foster care across Aotearoa. Ursula is an experienced entrepreneur with many years’ experience within the space of foster care and adoption in New Zealand and abroad. With a qualification in delivering trauma-informed interventions and a passion to see the outcomes of children in foster care equalise alongside their more advantaged peers, Ursula is on a mission to empower others.
As a survivor of her own complex trauma, a wife and mother of four children (including disability and adoption), Ursula believes that ‘children who come from hard places’ require adults who understand their histories if they are going to be able to help them heal and thrive. The same is true when empowering adults who are from hard places.
Ursula brings formal training, business experience, personal insight and empathy to her work. Under her dynamic leadership, Immerse has experienced exponential growth year on year since its official launch in 2018.
W – immerse.nz
Who Am I
Ursula Elisara is a co-founder and CEO of Immerse, a foster care agency established to help create a transformed and transformational culture of foster care across Aotearoa. Ursula is an experienced entrepreneur with many years’ experience within the space of foster care and adoption in New Zealand and abroad. With a qualification in delivering trauma-informed interventions and a passion to see the outcomes of children in foster care equalise alongside their more advantaged peers, Ursula is on a mission to empower others.
As a survivor of her own complex trauma, a wife and mother of four children (including disability and adoption), Ursula believes that ‘children who come from hard places’ require adults who understand their histories if they are going to be able to help them heal and thrive. The same is true when empowering adults who are from hard places.
Ursula brings formal training, business experience, personal insight and empathy to her work. Under her dynamic leadership, Immerse has experienced exponential growth year on year since its official launch in 2018.
W – immerse.nz
Speaking Engagements
As a gifted and engaging communicator, Ursula has shared her wisdom and experience on multiple platforms and to many audiences over the years. From small groups of desperate caregivers to large conferences of government officials abroad, she is often rated best speaker at events. Depending on the required outcomes, Ursula is able to deliver inspirational, informational, motivational or transformational messages to any audience.
What Inspires Me
An innate and deep appreciation for the fact that life is fragile and life is short.
Business and leading a thriving organisation is both an art and a science.
To inspire the creative in business, the art, I find this in simple, beautiful and breathtaking things. Moments as simple as admiring how the sunlight dances on the ocean like diamonds; observing birds tending to their young; or playing a small part in helping the most broken human life be restored… I find being a part of life, in all its forms, inspiring.
The fundamentals of business, the science, is enabled by my commitment to being an eternal student. I am happy to glean insight and direction from those further down the road than me in successful organisational growth. Having business mentors and CEO coaches who drill down into the nuts and bolts of my work, and ask the hard questions, is what has enabled me to maintain our phenomenal year on year growth at Immerse.
Central to it all is the fact that I was born with a strong desire to help orphans. I thought this would likely come about by moving to some far off land and working in an orphanage, or by inter-country adoption. Little did I realise then that my life’s purpose would be found in my own beautiful homeland of Aotearoa (New Zealand). What began with the humble role of personally taking into our family and caring for over 45 tamariki whāngai (children in care), has now evolved to become a nationwide movement of equipping and empowering caregivers. I find this fact to be both a huge privilege and a tremendous responsibility.
Empowering Women in Leadership Retreats
Would you like to spend an intimate weekend on Kawau Island with Ursula and other likeminded women in leadership? Register your interest to gain more information.
Buy Now
Foster Care ~ Voices from the Frontline brings to the table the voices of those who are standing at the frontline of foster care in Aotearoa. This powerful, informative and inspirational book is a must-read for anyone involved in this space.
Enlisted by the Minister in charge of the overhaul of Child Youth and Family to what became Oranga Tamariki – Ministry for Children, this book has helped to shape the foundations for the new way of approaching foster care.
Get in Touch
Feel free to get in touch with me via the form below. I look forward to all inquiries, business or personal!