Prophet bolsters Australian team with two key hires

Prophet has appointed Lia Carruthers and Becky McMillan as it expands its Australian team.

Carruthers joins in the newly created role of Marketing Executive, responsible for brand, content, events and go-to-market activity. McMillan has been appointed Customer Architect, focusing on customer onboarding and data processes.

Carruthers will support Prophet's marketing efforts as it grows and moves toward a more customer-led approach to B2B marketing. McMillan will work with customers during onboarding and help collect the data used to create digital models of organisations.

Carruthers brings experience in brand, digital and campaign marketing, including brand strategy work for New Zealand food brand Farrah's. She was named New Zealand's Marketer of the Future at the 2024 YouTube New Zealand Marketing Awards.

Her background also includes speaking and commentary on digital transformation, brand building and creativity in marketing.

McMillan has more than a decade of media and marketing experience across education, government, FMCG, entertainment and insurance in the UK, Australia and New Zealand. She joins from RMIT University, where she was a Media and Campaign Specialist in the global marketing team.

Earlier in her career, she held client and account director roles at Atomic 212°, Publicis and Zenith.

The appointments are part of a broader hiring push as Prophet builds out its commercial, technical and customer-facing teams. In recent months, it has also made hires across sales, recruitment, technology and marketing science.

Developers Aysa Matueva and Ruxin Ma joined the Melbourne technology team earlier this year. Carl Clasio and Leo Roubos joined the national sales team in 2025, while James Sawyer was appointed Vice President of Sales and Partnerships in Sydney and Bec Geyer took on talent, people and recruitment.

Rachel Scott was also appointed Head of Marketing Science in February.

Growth phase

Chief Executive Officer Jordan Taylor-Bartels said the appointments reflect a new stage of development for the company.

"Prophet is entering an exciting growth phase, as we transition from start-up to scale-up. We've significantly expanded our team over the past year, investing in building the right foundations across brand, marketing and customer engagement as demand for Prophet's platform grows.

"We're excited to welcome both Lia and Becky to our team. As we grow, it's important that we build the right marketing foundations, while also challenging how B2B companies typically show up. Lia brings a fresh perspective and new energy to Prophet and will play a key role in helping us continue to build a brand and marketing engine that stands out as we scale. She is well-known for her strategic thinking, innovation and leadership potential and will be an important asset to our team.

"Becky comes to Prophet with a unique knowledge of media data sources, platforms and their challenges, and is well-placed to help customers navigate complexities. Her role is directly linked to customer growth; with some major key customers recently won, we need to grow our customer architect capabilities to align with this expansion. Becky's strong customer focus and innate understanding of media data, along with her agency and media planning experience, will bring a unique point of view to the business.

"We are continuing to invest heavily in brand and thought leadership as we scale, with several initiatives planned across industry partnerships, events and research. Our focus is on building a distinctive brand in the marketing science and decision intelligence space as we expand into new markets."

Prophet was founded by Taylor-Bartels, a former Hyperloop global marketing lead, and Sean Taylor, a former Ogilvy and VMLY&R Commerce chief executive. It has built a client base across sectors including retail, insurance, automotive, media, on-demand delivery, wagering and cyber security.

Named customers include BYD, MYOB, New Balance, Intrepid Travel and KitchenAid. Prophet was also named the 2025 AFR BOSS Most Innovative Company in the Media and Marketing category.

New roles

Carruthers said her brief is to build a more structured marketing function as the company grows.

"As Prophet continues to grow, the marketing function is evolving from early-stage brand building into a more structured, scalable engine for growth. I'm excited for the opportunity to work across a range of marketing activities, helping to bring new ideas and fresh thinking to how Prophet shows up in the market," she said.

McMillan said the role combines her media, marketing and data experience with customer work.

"I'm thrilled to be joining Prophet's Decision Science team. For me, this role is the perfect blend of media, marketing and data; it's an opportunity to bring together my unique understanding of media data, strong customer focus and passion for stakeholder engagement. I'm looking forward to helping Australia's biggest brands make sense of their data and own every marketing decision," she said.