Team
TEDxAberdeen
Elisa Doucette
TEDxAberdeen Programme Curator
Elisa is the Programme Curator for TEDx Aberdeen, which means she works with our speakers and the committee to bring the theme “New Ways of Seeing Old Things” to life.
She is an international speaker, writer, and editor who has traveled and lived around the world over the past decade. When she first visited Aberdeen in 2017 she thought she was passing through, but ended up falling for the people, the culture, and those big beautiful architectural slabs of granite throughout the city centre.
Her writing has appeared in publications like The New York Times, The Boston Globe, Yahoo! Small Business, The Shine Network, and The Huffington Post, and she is a for-mer online columnist for Forbes. She also hosts the popular podcast “Writers’ Rough Drafts,” and guests on other shows and speaks at events on writing, innovation, and creativity.
In addition to regular writing and speaking engagements, Elisa owns the remote editorial agency Craft Your Content. When she isn’t traveling, writing, or working, she can usually be found out wandering the city or hill-walking with earbuds in – usually listening to an audiobook – or at any good pub quiz around the city. She is part of a championship quiz team at The Queen Vic in Rosemount, and will tell anyone who dares to ask all about it!
A real behind-the-scenes strategy partner and ideas nerd, Elisa brings her American spirit (the good and the bad of it!) and personal passions to anyone who wants to hear about an outsider’s love affair with the North East.

Favorite cover song
While My Guitar Gently Weeps by Santana, featuring India Arie and Yo-Yo Ma
Favourite TED talk:
Monica Lewinsky “The Price of Shame”

Kim Stephen
TEDxAberdeen Partnerships and Logistics
Nicole Chidester
Volunteer & Audience Experience Coordinator
Nicole works with the people of TEDx Aberdeen to ensure an event inspires and informs everyone involved. She manages audience members from registration to after-party and leads the community volunteers who make TEDx Aberdeen possible. Nicole is no stranger to working in and with the community. Prior to moving to Aberdeen, Nicole was employed at the newest municipality in Utah, USA. While there she managed the Business Council and worked on a $20 million redevelopment project to transform the city’s high streets by creating a focal point open-space surrounded by mixed-use developments. As an undergraduate student, Nicole was a legislative intern, studied abroad at the BYU Jerusalem Centre, and served as a full-time volunteer missionary for her church in the North-eastern United States. When her husband Matt suggested relocating to a little place called ‘Aberdeen’ for his graduate studies, Nicole knew it was the opportunity of a lifetime. She has once again jumped into the community as an employee at the Aberdeen & Grampian Chamber of Commerce and NHS Grampian. She continues to expand her new-found Scottish vocabulary and adds to her ever-growing dictionary. Tenacious by nature, Nicole summited Mt. Kilimanjaro with her father and is still found exploring the munros and great outdoors of Scotland. To balance out all the exercise, she spends her spare time trying new recipes and eating chocolate.

Favorite cover song
Tiny Dancer by Tim McGraw
Favourite TED talk:
Why bother leaving the house?

Favorite cover song
Step On by Happy Mondays
Favourite TED talk:
Inside the mind of a procrastinator
Jill Simpson
TEDxAberdeen Marketing & Communications