On Fiji’s Coral Coast, where the Sigatoka River meets windswept dunes that hold centuries of human and natural history, a conservation manager’s leadership has quietly shifted the way heritage is explained and protected. Jason Tutani, now education programme manager at the National Trust of Fiji, says the turning point came with his participation in the Leadership Fiji programme in 2012 — an experience that reshaped how he approaches community engagement and the practical politics of conservation.
Tutani was managing the Sigatoka Sand Dunes National Park when he enrolled in the year-long leadership course because he felt he was “lacking in leadership skills.” What he found was not a classroom-style certificate course but an immersive, nationwide series of site visits, community exchanges and cross-sector panels that exposed participants to perspectives beyond their own fields. “It wasn’t stationary. We got to experience different aspects of Fiji while learning about leadership,” he recalled, noting the value of being among peers who were already leaders in business, banking and government.
His presence in the 2012 cohort also stood out: Tutani was the only representative from the conservation sector. That isolation made him vigilant about how environmental concerns were discussed in a group largely focused on economic development. “I was worried conservation might be overlooked,” he said, and he was “adamant that conservation had to be part of that vision” when the cohort shaped its shared goals. Those tensions, he said, were constructive — forcing both him and other participants to confront trade-offs between development and environmental stewardship.
Beyond policy arguments, Tutani says the programme changed his definition of leadership. Rather than equating leadership with authority, he learned to see it as collaborative work: “coming down to the same level as others, working as a team.” The experience also prompted deeper self-awareness. Conversations with colleagues revealed to him that he is an “emotional leader” — an attribute that fuels commitment to conservation but requires careful management in contexts where limited resources and high expectations can strain teams.
One practical outcome of his Leadership Fiji connections was a new line of thinking about financial sustainability for protected areas. Exchanges with participants from the banking sector exposed Tutani to investment and funding strategies he had not considered. He says he carried those ideas back to the National Trust and raised them with the director, helping to start conversations about how protected areas might pursue more sustainable funding models.
In his current role overseeing education and community programmes across Fiji, Tutani draws on those lessons daily. He focuses on connecting people to heritage and bridging knowledge gaps between local communities and conservation efforts — translating the scientific and legal language of protection into stories and values that matter to the people who live alongside sites such as the Sigatoka Sand Dunes. The Leadership Fiji experience, he says, left him with both practical tools and a network that continue to influence how the National Trust frames heritage, funding and community participation in conservation.