Inside Tribal: Rachel Harker's Values-First Approach to Connection

By Rachel Harker

Tribal's website introduces its founder and CEO, Rachel Harker, and the thinking behind an app built to put shared values ahead of first impressions. A clinical psychologist based in Sydney with more than a decade of experience in youth mental health, Rachel has brought her professional background directly into the design of the product.

The app's signature feature is hard to miss. Tribal blurs a user's profile photo for the first 72 hours after a match, a design choice meant to encourage connection based on values and conversation before appearance enters the picture. Matching itself runs on a questionnaire that measures shared values, interests and communication styles, with 44 questions for dating and 33 for friendship.

Rachel's perspective is rooted in her clinical work. She believes aligned values are the key to any lasting friendship or relationship, and that principle sits at the centre of how Tribal pairs people. She also argues that judging a person purely by their photo has fostered a culture of objectification and self-surveillance that isn't healthy or sustainable, a concern that informs the app's photo-blurring approach. As she puts it, everyone owns a smartphone, yet people are more disconnected than ever before.

Tribal is more than a single product. Alongside the dating app, Rachel operates a friendship-focused brand called Connect by Tribal, extending the same values-based matching to platonic connection. The app soft-launched in March 2025 and is available on the App Store and Google Play, with Aneesh Bond serving as co-founder and CTO.

What the Tribal site ultimately presents is a product shaped by its founder's own field. Rachel sees an opportunity to redesign how people meet, moving the focus from how someone looks to what they value, and building that idea into every stage of the experience.