CEO of Media Diversity Australia, Mariam Veiszadeh was named the overall winner of the awards, now in its fifth year. 

The University of Melbourne’s centre for Asian capability, Asialink is a sponsor of the awards that recognise the Most Influential Asian-Australian across a wide range of fields, including  arts and culture, community and advocacy, corporate, education, entrepreneurship, legal and professions, media, public sector, science and medicine, and sport. 

CEO of Asialink Martine Letts, said the awards “shine a light on the incredible leadership talent and potential of Asian-Australians.” 

Mariam Veiszadeh is widely known for her advocacy in diversifying Australia’s media landscape, as well as her work setting up the Islamophobia Register Australia — a collective database of Islamophobic incidents experienced by the public. 

Veiszadeh, who began her career as a lawyer at Westpac, spoke about the importance of workplace diversity and inclusion in 2017 at a TED Talk in Sydney. 

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A post shared by Mariam Veiszadeh (@mariamveiszadeh)

This week, she told the ABC (a media partner for the 2023 Asian-Australian Leadership Awards) that during the TED talk, she was “the only person on that stage that they hired a security guard for.”

“That was the extent of the risks that I was facing,” she said. 

“It really impacted me. I was physically sick, I had a lot of mental health challenges. It takes a significant toll on you as a person.”

“But I think it also cemented my determination to continue fighting against hatred. So I tried to raise awareness about it. I tried to tackle it head on.”

In 2021, she became the CEO of Media Diversity Australia, a not-for-profit organisation and the nation’s peak advocacy body for diversity and representation in media. 

In October 2022, the organisation partnered with eight inaugural newsrooms to offer them diversity, equity and inclusion expertise to help champion cultural diversity in their workplaces. 

At the time, Veiszadeh said she was “pleased to witness and help drive the palpable push from many newsrooms to have their journalists and commentators reflect the broader community and, by default, the wider national conversation.” 

This week, she told the ABC the organisation is still working tirelessly to create a media landscape that “looks and sounds more like Australia.” 

“That means holding up a mirror to an industry that doesn’t always want a mirror held up to it,” she said.

“My strategy is bringing everyone on the journey, because you don’t drive change through using a sledgehammer. We don’t want to just talk about the media, we want to talk to the media. We want them to be part of the solution.”

Asialink’s CEO Martine Letts said that even when one in five people in Australia have an Asian cultural heritage, only 3 per cent of senior management positions are held by them. 

“It’s not only in the boardroom where this bias exists, it extends across all industries,” Letts said. “There is still a long way to go, and there is a real lack in recognition of and focus on leveraging Asian-Australian grown talent.”

“If overseas markets are more attractive to talent from multicultural backgrounds we risk losing our best and brightest.”

Johnson Partners, a Sydney-based executive search firm affiliated with the Awards, released recent findings which revealed that 93 per cent of board members on ASX-listed companies have either an Anglo-Celtic or European background, while per cent of top CEOs are of white Anglo-Celtic or European heritage.

Jason Johnson, founder and CEO of Johnson Partners, believes that a significant shift needs to happen in corporate Australia’s approach to cultural diversity.

“We need to see a  It is not only the right thing to do but also critical to unlocking the full potential of our economy,” Johnson said.  

“Companies that embrace diversity and foster an inclusive culture will be better placed to navigate an increasingly globalised business environment and increasingly diverse customer sets and stakeholders.” 

Johnson, a former Global Chairman of the Association of Executive Search Consultants, believes that the ‘bamboo ceiling’ is preventing Asian-Australians from taking their share of top leadership positions.

“Our major companies, government departments and universities….[do not] reflect their staff, student populations or customer bases,” he said. 

“The pandemic caused many diversity statistics to go backwards, so we have some serious ground to make up to address the under-representation of diverse leaders.”

Other winners

Lifetime Achievement Award: Ming Long 

As the first woman with Asian heritage to lead a top 200 ASX listed entity, Long is a well-known corporate leader who was appointed Chair of the Diversity Council of Australia’s board in 2021. 

She has held a range of senior executive positions throughout her career, including CEO and CFO roles in both listed and unlisted companies, Chair of AMP Capital Funds Management Limited, and a non-executive director of QBE Insurance (Auspac), CEDO, Chartered Accountants Australia & New Zealand, and is an advisor on the University of Sydney Culture Council.

Under 25 Rising Star: Rhea Werner

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At just 17, year-old Rhea Werner has been using her platform on social media to talk about body image and mental health. 

In 2021, she co-founded the Body Confident Collective Youth Project, the first, national youth-led initiative supported by researchers from Melbourne University.

Arts and culture: Mindy Meng Wang

Mindy Meng Wang is a Chinese Australian composer and performing artist who specialises in the guzheng — an ancient Chinese zither. She is known for her cross genre collaborations with international artists including Gorillaz, Regurgitator and Paul Grabowsky. 

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A post shared by Meng Wang (@mindy_mengwang)

This week, she spoke about her latest album collaboration, “Origin of You” which she recorded with fellow Chinese Australian Sui Zhen.  

The album, according to reviewer David James Young, is a musical exploration of their “personal experiences with death, grief, motherhood and diaspora.” 

“Every single time we play this music, it’s a way to help us process these things,” Wang told Young. 

“I want this music to remind people that we all have shared feelings as human beings. My goal in music is to make people realise that we’re inherently the same — no matter your cultural background, how you grieve, how you feel about love, how you feel about your family. If we knew how similar we all were, I feel like the world would be a better place. I want this music to be a sonic hug for people.”

Education, Science and medicine winner: Dr Celina Ping Yu

Having spent her career working towards cultural inclusion, diversity and relationship-building between Australian and Asian academic and business communities, Dr Celina Ping Yu was the clear winner in this category. 

She is the founder of the Global Business College of Australia and since 2014, has been the college’s managing director.

In 2017, she started Edvantage Institute Australia, an international higher education campus of the Edvantage Group, a Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency registered private higher education provider. 

Community & Advocacy/Not for Profit: Marjorie Tenchavez

Marjorie Tenchavez is the founder and director of Welcome Merchant, a social enterprise  supporting small businesses owned by refugees and asylum seekers.

Tenchavez, who is a former finalist for Emerging Leader in Non-Profit at the Women’s Agenda Leadership awards, was also a recipient of the NSW Humanitarian Awards in Business this year. 

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Speaking to Women’s Agenda last year, Tenchavez said many migrants and refugees in Australia struggle to get bank loans “…because of their visa status and/or lack of financial history in Australia.”

“I’ve been in this sector for a long time and there were times when I thought about changing industries but hearing their stories and successes keeps me inspired,” she said.

“It’s really important for me to see them succeed without our help.” 

Legal and Professional Services: Mannie Kaur Verma

As a principal lawyer at Regal Lawyers, Mannie Kaur Verma empowers her clientele, who are mostly migrants, to fight for their rights. 

“This may include demanding a respectful relationship, employee entitlements or justice in a dispute,” she describes on her website. “I place intersectionality at the core of my practice.”

The former Labor candidate for Rowville in Victoria is also the co-Founder of the non-profit organisation, Veera – Brave Girl, an organisation that seeks to educate and empower migrant women to break the cycle of abuse. It also provides a network of resources for vulnerable women to leave violent relationships.

“A lot of women come here on partner visas, so they are dependent on their partners,” she told Women’s Weekly in 2021, when she was nominated for the Women of the Future Awards. “They have no networks. No support systems. No access to resources.” 

Read the full list of winners here. 

The post “I was paranoid that my work wouldn’t understand,” Asian-Australian Leadership Awards winner Mariam Veiszadeh on fighting islamophobia  appeared first on Women's Agenda.

This first foray into paid writing work, managed alongside my kids, taught me a number of immediate lessons, which I wrote about at the time, on Women’s Agenda.

Since 2018, I have gone on to a number of different roles in customer services and community services industries, and to three different paid full time roles.

Now in 2023, with my kids much older, I thought I’d update the initial five lessons I shared about moving into paid work and employment, after spending a number of years at home with my kids.

Below is my updated list.

1.    Confidence is everything

I remember the first time I picked up the phone in my first call centre job and how my nerves were evident from the way my hand shook, the way I struggled to listen to my trainer’s instructions, the way that I told myself that I simply couldn’t do it. Just because.

Since that first full-time job, I’ve realised that everyone is a new employee at some stage. That sometimes you do just start from the very bottom. Sometimes we have no idea what we are doing and doubt ourselves. That is why the ‘imposter syndrome’ is even exists.  However, when we let those insecurities, the questioning of our abilities weigh us down – we don’t allow the logical part of our brains the opportunity to move past these anxieties and fears.

Since that first job, I now confront every new position with confidence, with hope, with the belief that if I don’t know how to do something now
– I definitely have the ability and skill to learn it. Experience, knowledges and skills come with time. Don’t be so hard on yourself.

2.    Success doesn’t happen in a straight line

Having studied Youth Work and struggling to secure paid employment in this field, I worked in call centre customer service work for almost 3 years. Working in a high pressured, key performance indicators (KPIs) environment wasn’t what I had envisioned for my career. But I reminded myself that the work I was doing now was positively contributing in moving my career forward. This became the stepping stone to my next position, a position that later opened the door for my entry into community services.

3.    You will have to make sacrifices, but they will be worth it

In the job I am currently employed at, I have to travel quite a long distance to get there. However, I haven’t let that hold me back. On my commute to work, I use the time efficiently to plan and cultivate my future business, to play music and create some downtime for myself, to read a book and immerse myself into another reality to calm my mind down. Sometimes I even just look outside the window and appreciate the views of the world around me. I don’t see this distance as a barrier to me accomplishing my work goals.

4.    Success is a two-way street

The connections and bonds you build at work can become instrumental to your career growth. Having built professional connections, I’ve been able to move my career forward, whilst also forming friendships that will stay with me for life.

5.    Work hard, play hard

Working a shift work job for years has also helped me to develop the importance of maintaining a healthy work-life balance. I always make an active attempt in my downtime to switch off – to spend time with family and friends, to treat myself even for an hour, to partake in activities that bring a smile to my face and joy to my life.

Work cannot become the focal point of everything where our mental and physical health, our relationships, our sleep, gets pushed to the wayside. The work we do needs to build us up so when we are not working, we can still be at our best.

I’m grateful that my years of full-time work have opened my eyes even further and now I am a better person, employee, partner, and even friend to the people around me.

The post What I learned about confidence and success when I secured my first full-time paid roles appeared first on Women's Agenda.

As of today, LinkedIn has 930 million users worldwide. Three years ago, I was a LinkedIn lurker. Observing, inactive, passive. It wasn’t until I started my business that I took the platform seriously. I put in the hard yards, getting to know my audience, creating content that magnetises, leveraging comments as mini thought leadership opportunities and initiating relationships in the DMs.

I strengthened my IQ 3.0 muscles (influence, not intelligence) and it has returned to me ten-fold. Today, I teach this stuff to some of the biggest names in engineering and tech. Beyond the obvious business opportunities, LinkedIn has given me friendships, collaborators, partners, referrals and more. 

Building influence here is not about accruing followers, but about making a genuine impact. 

Here are five strategies to help you do just that:

Craft compelling content

Nearly every great idea starts as a spark in the mind. Translating that spark into engaging content is the first step towards building influence. Share your insights, experiences, and unique perspectives – believe it or not, people want to know what’s inside that brain of yours! 

Whether it’s a thought-provoking article, a well-crafted post, or a captivating video, ensure your content resonates with your audience. This means you need to get to do your homework and get to know them intimately. Remember, the power of a story is immeasurable. Narratives connect, inspire, give meaning and leave a lasting impression. 

Share your professional journey, highlighting the lessons learned, challenges overcome, and victories celebrated. The most influential personal brands are ones whose online and offline personas are completely congruent. Remember, authenticity is the bedrock of influence.

Engage meaningfully

Influence is not a one-way street. It thrives with ample amounts of dialogue and interaction. Respond thoughtfully to comments on your posts, participate in discussions, and initiate conversations with others in your network. Show genuine interest in what others have to say. Your engagement should reflect your passion for your field, your personality and a desire to learn from and connect with like-minded professionals.

Don’t shy away from sharing the spotlight. Celebrate the successes and achievements of your peers. This leverages the reciprocity principle by fostering goodwill, encourages others to return the favour 5x, and positions you as a collaborator rather than a competitor.

Leverage visual storytelling

A picture is worth a thousand words, and on a platform like LinkedIn, visuals are a powerful tool you’d be crazy not to take advantage of. Incorporate eye-catching images, infographics, and videos into your content. Visuals not only break up text but also enhance the impact of your message. They draw the viewer in, making your content more shareable and memorable.

Remember to maintain a consistent visual identity. This includes using a recognisable profile picture and creating a cohesive aesthetic for your posts and articles. Consistency builds brand recognition, trust and credibility.

Position yourself as an expert 

Building influence means establishing yourself as a go-to authority in your field. Share your expertise through original articles, insightful analyses, and informative posts. Provide value to your network by offering practical advice, thought leadership, and solutions to common challenges. Don’t be afraid to tackle complex topics – it’s where your expertise can shine the brightest. A post I did about the Silicon Valley Bank collapse from a change management perspective got me mentioned in the media. You never know who’s watching.

Consistent, informed contributions will significantly bolster your reputation. The key word is “consistent”. This is not a short-term band-aid. You need to show up day in and day out, even when you don’t feel like it. It takes time for people to trust an online persona they’ve never met. 

Network with purpose

Influence is not just about the size of your network, but the quality of your connections. Seek out professionals who align with your goals and values. Connect with them, but don’t stop there. Engage in meaningful conversations, offer assistance if appropriate, and look for opportunities to collaborate. Building a network based on mutual respect and shared interests is a key driver of influence.

Don’t spray and pray. Personal messages are highly impactful. When reaching out to connect, invest the effort in customising your message. Express why you’d like to connect and how you believe the connection can be mutually beneficial. This extra 10% will skyrocket your acceptance rate. I also like to ask new connections why they sent me a connection request. This gives me real-time feedback on what content is resonating, so I know to do more of it!

In conclusion, building influence on LinkedIn is not a one-size-fits-all endeavour. It requires a thoughtful, strategic approach that balances content creation, engagement, expertise, and networking. Remember, influence is not about amassing followers, but about inspiring action and effecting positive change. By implementing these five strategies, you’re on the path to making sure your influence = income x impact.

Friska Wirya is the founder of Fresh by Friska.

This article was first published by SmartCompany.

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But with projections for another 100,000 engineers needed by 2030, it’s clear much more needs to be done to address this massive gender imbalance.

Dr Morley Muse is one such engineer, and much more. And she is currently addressing the lack of diversity in STEM head-on, through a wide range of initiatives, including tech, advocacy, and even careers fairs.

In 2022, Dr Muse was named the Emerging Leader of the year in STEM, at the Women’s Agenda Leadership Awards in recognition of her efforts to transform an industry.

In the year since, she highlights some of the further, incredible work she has done — including launching a new platform for eliminating bias in recruitment and hosting a careers fair promoting opportunities for women in STEM.

We asked Dr Muse to share more on the year since she won the award, including some of her best advice to those aspiring to break through and her chief concerns around representation in STEM and entrepreneurship in Australia.

What’s been happening since you won the Emerging Leader in STEM award in September last year? 

I am absolutely thrilled to share some exciting updates on my journey since receiving the award. 

We’ve launched the DEIR platform, a game-changer in eliminating recruitment bias using specific elements like anonymous recruitment, job benchmarking, and ethical job and interview guidelines. 

It’s incredible to see companies like Arup, Westpac, Telstra, and Worley already embracing this platform to recruit diverse talents. Best part? It’s currently free for both women and employers, using our trial packages. 

Another proud accomplishment was the 2023 Women in STEM Careers Fair hosted by iSTEM Co. It’s now in its second year. 

Last year, we created 20 new employment opportunities for women in STEM, and this year, with over 250 attendees, we’ve already sparked 50 new opportunities. It’s not just about mentorship alone; it’s about real opportunities for women to thrive and be retained in STEM.

I’m also excited to share my involvement in groundbreaking initiatives like the RISE Expert Panel with Diversity Council Australia, the Executive Committee of Science Technology Australia, and the Energy Reference Group with Jemena Energy. 

These roles allow me to contribute my leadership expertise across STEM, Energy, and Women Leadership, breaking down systematic barriers and providing pathways to leadership positions.

The RISE project aims to break down systematic barriers and provide pathways to leadership positions for CARM women. 

Joining the RISE Expert Panel is highly prolific for me as it enables me to contribute more broadly to empowering CARM women into senior leadership, which in effect will promote retention within their organisations and reduce attrition.

I have also been appointed to the Executive Committee of Science Technology Australia and the Energy Reference Group with Jemena Energy. 

I am also glad to be a mentor for STA’s superstars of STEM program, an opportunity to elevate the work of senior and executive women in STEM. 

On accepting the award, you noted that you entered into workplace environments and you don’t see women who look like you, other female engineers. Has this still been the case over the past 12 months? 

Well, obviously that is changing with the initiatives we have launched at iSTEM Co., as well as other initiatives like STEM sisters, DCA CARM program, etc and the awareness we are generating in the STEM community, but we still have a long way to go. 

The current statistics for women engineers in Australia have grown from 11.2 per cent in 2022 to 16 per cent in 2022 according to Engineers Australia. So, there is some progress but the key issues are employment and retention, which we should focus more on. 

To solve the under-representation of women in STEM, we need to tackle 4 fundamental areas: Education, Employment, Retention/Leadership and Entrepreneurship. Most of the initiatives have since focused on education, which is great. 

However, if we encourage young girls to study STEM and yet they can’t see their role models with STEM qualifications working in STEM, then there is a big problem. 

Currently, only 15 per cent of women with STEM skills are in STEM-qualified jobs. The others have either left STEM post-qualification or working elsewhere. This shows that we have a big retention issue which must be tackled with a sense of urgency.

What are you most concerned about now in 2023, regarding challenges facing women (or others) in your industry? 

In 2023, my main concerns revolve around the lack of retention of women with STEM skills in the industry and insufficient funding for startups. 

Only 3 per cent of women startups received funding from the $10 billion VC funds in Australia in 2021, despite having a startup ecosystem where 22 per cent of founders across all firms identify as women according to LaunchVic. 

We can do better. We’re open to collaborative opportunities for our upcoming program to help women in STEM turn their ideas into startups.

Best piece of advice you’ve learned when it comes to leadership?

When it comes to leadership, the best advice I’ve embraced is to be visible and use your privilege to advocate for positive change. Remember, there are no real failures—only opportunities to learn, grow and improve.

Any quick tips for those who might be hesitating about putting their hand up for an opportunity – whether it’s for a promotion or something else?

And for those hesitating to seize opportunities, my quick tip is simple: Don’t be afraid of what might go wrong. Embrace the possibilities of Yes, No, or Maybe. If it’s a Yes, fantastic! 

If it’s a No, move forward without hesitation. If it’s a Maybe, invest more effort; it could very well turn into a Yes. The journey is all about learning, growing, and making a positive impact.

So, here’s to breaking barriers, creating opportunities, and building a future where everyone, regardless of gender or background, can thrive in STEM!

Dr Muse’s iSTEM Co. is currently set to engage in a STEM commercialisation program to enable women to commercialise their research into startups and is taking expressions of interest. She encourages interested individuals to reach out to her directly for further information on how they can get involved. 

The winners of the 2023 Women’s Agenda Leadership Awards will be announced on Friday the 12th October.

The post Break barriers and create opportunities: Dr Morley Muse on transforming STEM appeared first on Women's Agenda.

The producer, author and social activist’s ‘Stand up to Yourself’ campaign officially kicked off with the release of a two-minute film showing pairs of people reading cruel and hurtful comments off a card.

“We asked people to write down the mean things they’ve said about someone they know,” a title card reads on the screen.

Some of the comments read include “You’re a loser”, “No one likes you very much”, “You’re needy”, “What’s your excuse for being fat?” and “You have failed your daughter.” 

It’s a confronting watch and likely to hit some viewers on a raw, emotional level. In a twist, the next title card reads: “Only these aren’t words they’ve said about someone else. These are words they’ve said to themselves.” 

“Self-bullying is still bullying. This anti-bullying month — stand up to yourself,” the film concludes — adding a link to the campaign website offering strategies to help fight negative self-talk.

Lewinsky launched the campaign during National Bullying Prevention Month in the US in an effort to educate and raise awareness of bullying prevention.

“Our campaign is looking inward, at the bullies we all know too well,” Lewinsky said in a personal essay for the Today show. 

“The ones who may be our harshest critics: ourselves. Maybe the Dalai Lama doesn’t have a negative voice in his head, but I’m pretty sure everyone else does, to some degree.”

“We can quiet it at times and even begin to see subtle changes in how we automatically talk to ourselves. I have worked tirelessly on my silent bully and yet my friends would probably tell you I’m still not as kind about myself as I could be.”

Lewinsky explained the genesis of her campaign, which occurred over a decade ago at a seminar where participants were asked to write down three negative things they say to themselves and then read them aloud to another participant.

“They made us read our list out loud to the other people in our group and it was a completely transformative experience for me,” she reflected. “To hear myself say out loud the things that I was saying silently brought me to tears. I not only recognised how cruel I was being to myself, but how I was internalising this cruelty, too.” 

Lewinsky offered her own personal strategies for overcoming negative self-talk, describing them as “The three Rs” — recognise, reflect and refocus. 

“Recognise that you’re saying negative things to yourself, reflect on whether you’d say these negative things to someone you loved, and if these negative thoughts aren’t serving you in some way, then refocus.”

“Our most intimate relationships are valuable because they remind us of who we really are,” she concluded. “And our most intimate relationship is with the person we talk to our entire lives: Ourselves.” 

The social advocate and filmmaker has spent the last few years calling for safer social media culture and tackling public shaming, digital resilience, privacy, and equality.

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A post shared by Monica Lewinsky (@monica_lewinsky)

Her 2015 Ted Talk “The price of shame”, where she deconstructs the contemporary online culture of humiliation, has been viewed almost 22 million times. 

Her latest campaign website includes startling statistics on how people view themselves, including the figure that almost 80 per cent of children and young people are unhappy with how they look, and the frightening links between repetitive negative thinking and suicidal thoughts among individuals with major depressive disorders. 

It also includes seven tips for averting negative self-talk, including practising self-gratitude, reaching out for help, soothing self-talk and reframing emotion through logic. 

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They’ve commenced the litigation against Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek for failing to accept the climate harm of new coal and gas to the environment, pursuing it as the latest step in legal intervention compelling the minister to reconsider the climate risks from nearly all coal and gas proposals currently awaiting her approval.

They’re representing a small volunteer environment group in the process, the Environment Council of Central Queensland, and together argue that the science is clear: with new coal mine expansions posing serious and irreversible threats to the climate and thousands of threatened animals, plants and places.

They pursue this action as part of a broader fight for climate justice, which Kerwin says sees them mostly working at the intersection of climate harm and social justice.

Kerwin’s team at EJA is part of a rising global trend in global climate change litigation that is pushing governments and corporate actors to pursue more ambitious climate change mitigation and adaption targets, with the women-led EJA pursuing multiple cases in Australia.

If successful in the above litigation against the Minister, the effects will be game-changing, likely transforming how the current environment minister and future such ministers will assess climate risks.

Kerwin is Principal Lawyer with EJA, working alongside Co-CEOs Nicola Rivers and Elizabeth McKinnon, as well as Chief Operating Officer Thea Lange, and a diverse board.

“It is an absolute highlight to see the bravery of our client and the skills of the climate team at work,” Kerwin said.

“Backed by thousands and thousands of community voices and organisations — they raise crucial legal questions in Court about whether our Federal Minister for Environment is required to recognise the asserted climate impacts of new gas and coal on thousands of protected places and species in Australia.”

We checked in with Kerwin, one year after she was named the Emerging Leader on Climate Action winner at last year’s Women’s Agenda Leadership Awards.

On accepting the award you noted that “…we all benefit from women and non binary folk in our lives who hold us up and make us stronger and encourage us on to new things”. 

Has anything changed or strengthened your feminism in the last 12 months? 

I guess there are two strands to this. In my personal life, we are in the process of building a new kitchen. 

My partner, our kids, my Mum and a team of mostly women and non-binary tradies are working together to turn a corner of our little flat into a place to make food for many years to come! It is an inspiring thing to watch – creative, collaborative, problem solving with mutual respect. A model for all our different ways of living full lives!

The other pressing thought for me is about the ongoing need to reject increasing harmful transphobia. A combination of witnessing this bigotry, and its effects, has made me think hard about how I show up in my workplace, at home and as a citizen. 

For me, too, mostly working at the intersection of climate harm and social justice, Judith Butler’s analysis that the renewed rising moral panic about gender and identity reflects (among other things) a misplaced anxiety about different, truly destructive, forces that do exist and need our attention, including climate change, resonates strongly.    

What are you most concerned about now in 2023, regarding challenges facing women in law? 

Increasing meaningful representation of affected communities in climate advocacy and policy roles, including First Nations people and people of colour.

What’s the best piece of advice you’ve learned when it comes to leadership?

I think this might change week by week! But, over the last week I’ve had three conversations with people about our different experiences of imposter syndrome. 

Something I’ve been thinking about, which is a piece of advice from earlier this year, is to be very conscious of where our inputs come from at work about our different strengths, especially when I’m finding leading challenging.

Any advice for those who might be hesitating about putting their hand up for an opportunity – whether it’s for an award, a promotion or something else?

Do it! Also, don’t feel like you have to do it! Opportunities will come around again and you might very sensibly choose to wait this one out including so you can have richness in another part of your life.

Photo credit: Emma Byrnes

The post On the climate litigation front, with thousands beside her: Lawyer Hollie Kerwin appeared first on Women's Agenda.

In 2022, Murthy Mittinty was named the Emerging Leader in Health at the Women’s Agenda Leadership Awards. Since then, she has been further advocating for addressing the stigma associated with chronic pain, and has also shared her insights with Sandra Sully and Ali Aitken on the Channel Ten podcast Short Black, speaking about ways of staying true to one’s values.

As the Senior Lecturer at College of Medicine and Public Health at Flinders University, she has also recently completed an advanced translational global research fellowship program with Harvard Medical School – a 12-month program designed to enhance the expertise of researchers across multiple disciplines.

We check in with the scientist and asked her a few questions about her latest thoughts around leadership, pain science and putting yourself forward. 

On accepting the award you noted that mental health and chronic pain were two factors you urged people to talk about more, and to read up on — have any of your ideas around this issue changed in the past 12 months?

In the last year, I have been invited to present at various forums, meetings and seminars. This has led to deeper conversations around the need to focus on pain and mental health together for enhanced wellbeing of the individual living with pain.

Working alongside industry partners such as Wellbeing SA, ReturntoWorkSA and ANMFSA (Australian Nursing and Midwifery Federation) and family forums through Arthritis NSW has further validated the need to intervene early to support individuals engage meaningful in work, social and family life to manage pain.   

This important work requires organisational-level support and can be achieved with meaningful integration with organisations with employer wellbeing at its core agenda. I am available and looking for synergistic collaborators to drive this work further.

What are you most concerned about now in 2023, regarding challenges facing women in science and academia? 

Due to the immense amount of work put in by organisations such as Women’s Agenda championing women’s leadership, there is certainly more invitation to be seated at leadership tables that previously women, especially women of colour, did not have access to. 

However, what I see and what concerns me a great deal is that there are still discrepancies in the opportunities these appointments lead to. Women often feel confined due to lack of support for scholarship in these roles. A lot of talent and drive is unutilised when it does not get supportive environment.  

What’s the best piece of advice you’ve learned when it comes to leadership?

The best piece of advice I believe that has resonated with me for years is to stay true to your core values. Life and work can sometimes present you with unfathomable challenges, but if you manage to stay true to your core values, you will find your way.

Also, surround yourself with people who bring out the best in you.

Do you have any advice for those who might be hesitating about putting their hand up for an opportunity – whether it’s for an award, a promotion or something else?

I would truly encourage you to apply for any opportunity. I don’t deny that it can lead to heartache and disappointment, but courage is like a muscle that needs exercising to fully flex. 

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“I do see myself differently, and I do see that independence, and I see the longing always– the curiosity and the longing for the adventure of pursuing,” McCarthy tells Women’s Agenda’s on the It Takes Boobs podcast, a conversations initiative in partnership with Stella Insurance.

“Curiosity is a big part of my life and sometimes that means I went on boards where I had absolutely no qualifications – that I could see– but someone else saw something in me. And what I say to the young women: when anyone asks you to do something and they think you can, you probably can,” she says.

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An influential business leader, advocate, author and founding member of the Women’s Electoral Lobby, McCarthy first started off her career studying education and becoming a teacher.

“I knew that I’d always be a teacher of some sort,” says Wendy. “And of course I didn’t realise then that the trap for young women like me was that we were so thrilled with our teachers’ college scholarships that we didn’t have to pay a bond back if we got married.”

“It was only about ten or fifteen years later that I realised they were actually giving women jobs and men careers,” she says.

“We were so happy to be educated that I don’t think we thought about it until we suddenly got sidelined if we had a child.”

In her transition from teaching to political lobbying and advocacy for women’s rights, Wendy established the New South Wales branch of the Women’s Electoral Lobby in 1972. 

Through this work, she is well-known for her successful fight to get hospitals to allow husbands into the labour room during their wife’s birth. Wendy has also been a fierce advocate for abortion law reform in the women’s liberation movement in Australia.

“So, with the Women’s Electoral Lobby, I couldn’t wait for the revolution,” says McCarthy. “I wanted reform right now and that’s still me.”

“And really, no woman can be successful unless she’s in charge of her reproductive rights– unless she has reproductive rights. That’s the big movement, and I got there in tiny steps, but they were winning steps.”

In 1978, McCarthy crossed the divide between lobbying into politics when she was appointed to the Women’s Advisory Council to advise Malcolm Fraser. 

Her voice has also been loud regarding getting women employed at the ABC. In 1983, she asked them why they’d never employed a female and they responded that women’s voices weren’t authoritative enough– to which McCarthy replied that her voice was so ‘let’s change it’ and she did. 

Detailing her extraordinary journey, Wendy’s memoir ‘Don’t Be Too Polite,Girls’ came out in March 2022. She says she largely wanted it to be “a personal social history” that honours the truth and the people who helped her get to where she is. 

“There’s something redemptive about belonging to a long line of women who question where they fit and decide to redesign it,” she says. 

Far too often, women’s stories of resilience and leadership go untold. And we know that so often, it’s women at the forefront of the brave push for progress. With this new Women’s Agenda podcast series, ‘It Takes Boobs’, supported by Stella Insurance, we’re challenging the typical sexist trope of it “taking balls” to get big things done.

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“The dialogue would be so much better than it was in real life!” Crabb beamed. “Wouldn’t that be the great strength of having him write anything for you — you’d be like, Suddenly, I’m a genius and I just speak in witticisms!”

Crabb turned fifty earlier this year and decided to mark the milestone by narrativizing her own life on stage at the Adelaide Fringe in a one-woman show called 50 Odd Years of Crabb.

Most of her fans would argue that Crabb doesn’t need the verbal gymnastics of Sorkin to enrich her storytelling. She’s a “nationally adored columnist” and television star, notable for her wry political commentary, 47,9000+ loyal podcast followers she shares with Sales, along with its spawning Facebook community and her 137000+ Instagram followers.

Sydney audiences will get to experience her sharp, bodacious humour this November when the celebrated journalist and cultural icon takes her performance to the Sutherland Centre in Sydney’s south.

The show will offer an elixir of Crabb’s dark humour and verbal self-poking as she delivers snapshots of her life. There are stories from her time growing up on a farm in South Australia, to the “important life lessons” she learned in her first journalism gig at the Adelaide Advertiser.

More than anything, Crabb wants to give audiences a good time.

“I’ve never had a problem telling embarrassing stories about myself in public and that’s mainly what this show is,” she says. “There are sad bits, but even sadness, I’ve found, can be consistent with laughter. Black humour has been my saviour at a few key points.”

Her joyful memoiristic performance also contains some painful lessons about grief and loss. Crabb’s humility and tenderness on stage will likely send audiences reaching for tissues.

Last year, Crabb’s older brother James took his own life — a tragedy that Crabb described as “very sudden” and “shocking.”

“When something like that happens, it upends everything you ever assumed about life,” she said.

“The resultant cocktail of pain, shame, guilt, anger, confusion – it’s impossible to navigate without re-examining yourself. There’s no shortcut through that stuff. But if you work hard and pay attention and, I don’t know, just hang on, you do get somewhere,” she says.

“If you do it right, you can come out the other end – not fixed or anything, but definitely more aware and better at relationships and better at looking pain in the eye and not turning away, which is probably the most important human trait I increasingly think.”

Crabb’s family suffered another harrowing loss this year, when her beloved sister-in-law Anisa died from cancer.

“It was an unbearable thing to watch,” Crabb said. “[It was] unbearable to be unable to avert what was coming for her and her young family, unbearable to have to tell my own children that they were going to lose another important person in their lives, but also Anisa taught me a lot about grief and pain.”

“She talked about these things openly and generously and wisely, to me and to my children, and that lessened the fear for us I think. It was a mighty thing that she was able to do in that sense, and it filled me with awe and gratitude and love for her.”

When I met Crabb a few weeks ago, she was in the midst of post-production for Kitchen Cabinet and had just wrapped up sold-out shows of Chat 10 Looks 3 Live in Canberra, Brisbane and Sydney.

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Throughout our conversation, she wore a default expression of alert curiosity. Her affable warmth calmed me and gradually eased into the sphere of sparkly inquisitiveness she is known for.

I can’t think of another Australian media figure who is so universally loved and admired, especially by the country’s women. How does she move so fluidly between hard-hitting political analysis and gossiping about the hot women on “F-Boy Island”?

“I don’t see them as very different,” she said. “I genuinely love doing a bunch of different things all the time. My true nightmare would be to have a job where I go to the same desk every day and have a manageable and predictable workload that is the same every day. My brain cooks along at its best when it’s juggling eight different things.”

My first encounter with Crabb happened in 2016, when a friend sent me a link to an ABC show called “When I get a Minute”. The 8-part series is essentially a shorter video version of their podcast. What struck me immediately about the first episode — the one where they eat at the historically iconic Chinatown food court and where Crabb talks about Aaron Sorkin, is the way they banter — it was the first time saw the kind of friendship between women I most valued, captured visually.

It represented the sort of friendship I always sought. The kind where you talk about a piece of artwork to get closer to the humanity of another person: Art as a means towards human connection.

Also — Crabb is very funny. And I prize humour, above and beyond any trait.

Around that time, my sister pressed onto me The Wife Drought — Crabb’s feminist manifesto, published a year earlier, which became one of the most influential texts in strengthening my own feminism.

To this day, the book and its author retain a singular, indelible quality that defines its enduring relevance. “I’m a curious person,” Crabb reflects. “I find the deepest pleasure in looking at the world outside my head, not inside it.”

How does she feel about turning fifty?

“I guess turning 50 is a kind of classic “ding ding” moment for reflection,” she said. “I’m a much better writer and clearer thinker at 50 than I was at 40 or 30. I know a lot of shit. I’ve come to understand the things I’m really good at (writing, talking to people, not judging people, being curious) and I’ve stopped kicking myself around so much for the things I’m bad at – answering correspondence in a timely way, admin of any kind, saying ‘No’.”

“I know whose opinions I care about, and I can genuinely laugh off critiques from absolute frauds, who I’m also pretty great these days at spotting. I’m comfortable with the way I look, and I’m not anxious about ageing because I’ve never made a living from being beautiful, and I often feel sorry for people who have because I think in that situation ageing must be very hard. I’ll be super annoyed if my brain goes though.”

Her fuel for her brain remains reading books— a source of great joy throughout her life.

“I’ve always loved reading since I was a little kid,” she said. “Reading gives me intense joy and enlightenment, and one of the greatest privileges of my fortunate life has been to get to meet some of the writers I most admire, and kind of hit them up for insight freebie.

“Helen Garner probably has the best eye and ear of any writer in Australia. I’ve learned so much from her about being a good writer and about being a human. Her recent piece about what she’s learned about happiness at age 80 fills me with delight. I rely on reading for so much —pleasure, enlightenment, provocation, the whole works.”

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In the next few months, Crabb has many projects on the horizon — the latest season of Kitchen Cabinet drops on August 15; she’ll be touring Chat 10 Looks 3 Live show with Leigh Sales in Adelaide, Perth and Melbourne, and she has her one-woman show in Sydney in November.

Further ahead, Crabb is looking forward to watching her children grow into adults.

“My eldest daughter is 16 and my youngest is 10. I’ve never fretted about whether my children will be, you know, astronauts or Nobel laureates or neurosurgeons or whatever… the one fear I ever had about being a parent was that I would end up with a kid who wasn’t kind,” she says.

“But all my kids are kind people, and watching their brains grow into adulthood is the best fun; watching the books they choose to read, the movies they like, the thoughts and opinions taking shape. I’m looking forward to more of that.”

“50 Odd Years of Crabb” is playing from November 25 — November 29 at The Pavilion Performing Arts Centre. Book your tickets here.

Kitchen Cabinet’s new series is airing at 8pm, August 15 on ABC TV and ABC iview. This season features Karen Andrews, Lidia Thorp, Linda Burney, Peter Dutton, Dai Le, Bridget McKenzie, Jordon Steele-John, and Anika Wells.

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But then she tried writing on a topic that was a little more meaningful for her. And that topic was meaningful work.

“Unlike other books I had tried to write before, I couldn’t stop with this one. I got obsessed,” she said.

Nina Mapson Bone is the Managing Director of Beaumont People, the President and Chair of Recruitment, Consulting and Staffing Association of Australia and New Zealand and Chair of the Development Committee of the North Foundation.

Now, to that impressive resume, she can add ‘author’ after launching her new book Meaningful Work: Unlock your unique path to career fulfilment.

The book features six inspirational stories on how others have applied the theory of meaningful work, developed by Beaumont People’s world-first research, into their career and working lives. It also gives readers advice and exercises to find meaningful work within their own lives.

Mapson Bone held a book launch event on July 20. Five of the people featured in her book sat on a Q+A panel for people to learn more about what meaningful work is.

World-first research

Before beginning her development of the concept, Mapson Bone found there was no research anywhere in the world that defined what meaningful work is.

This inspired her and her team at Beaumont People to take action. They conducted research and produced the 2023 Beaumont People’s Meaningful Work Insights Report.

The researchers found 70 per cent of respondents strongly agreed they would ‘leave an organisation’ if they didn’t feel safe physically, mentally and emotionally. This figure increased by nearly 10 percentage points from data in 2019, before the COVID-19 pandemic.

What’s more, 58 per cent of respondents strongly desire to make a difference and contribute to society, up from 52 per cent in 2019.

From this research, Mapson Bone realised meaning and purpose in work is important to Australians, but perhaps they didn’t realise it themselves.

“I was trying to think of the best way to get this message out,” Mapson Bone said.

“And I thought writing a book is an easy way to get the message out.”

In her book, Mapson Bone defines ‘meaningful work’ as the importance one places on work in the context of their societal and cultural environment.

“Meaningful work is unique for every individual,” she said.

“But there are factors to break down to see what it means for you.”

These are the individual, job, organisational and societal factors. Assessing your personal interests, abilities and goals, the quality and quantity of your work, the leadership and culture in your workplace and your ‘needs and wants’ in your career help you find meaningful work.

Mapson Bone said many people aren’t able to figure out what meaningful work is for them. Some get stuck in a cycle where they leave a job they dislike after a short period of time, but end up in the same place as they were before, because they don’t know what they want out of their working life.

Her research and methods of assessing meaningful work helps people answer this all-important question.

“Nobody’s job is meaningful all the time,” she said.

“But it’s about getting the balance right.”

‘It can change your life.’

Meaningful work can change overtime based on how your values and circumstances change. This is certainly the case for Pamela Bishop, the Chief Operating Officer at Blooms the Chemist.

Bishop began working in a pharmacy in Ireland when she was 17 years old and has worked in the industry ever since, joining Blooms the Chemist when she moved to Australia. But the idea of meaningful work has shifted since she was a teenager.

“What’s important to me now is different to what was important to me then,” she said.

And at 17, after finishing high school, what was important to her was hanging out with her friends, shopping and her boyfriend. 

Even though Bishop values different things out of her work now, she has learned a lot from working in the same industry for 17 years, and with the one company, Blooms the Chemist, for her whole working life in Australia.

One of those things is, if someone is considering leaving their job, they must figure out if they are leaving the job or if they are leaving the company. If the company is good, but the job itself is unfulfilling, Bishop said people need to have a conversation with their boss to figure out how to make their job more meaningful and more fulfilling.

“It’s not an easy conversation and it requires lots of courage,” she said.

“But if you do it, it can actually change your life.”

‘It’s not what I do – it’s why I do it.’

Courage is extremely important in establishing an individual’s meaningful work, something that Mimi Naylor has always had in her working life. 

In fact, it was the reason she was fired from her first job at age 16.

Naylor, now the founder and clinical director of Talkshop Speech Pathology, was volunteering in a residential home. One day, she spotted one of the residents, who had been sitting down all day. His legs were purple and swollen.

Naylor lept into action without thinking. Within two minutes, she had him on the floor doing physio exercises to get his legs moving.

“Out of the corner of my eye, I see this stern look from my supervisor,” she recalled.

Even though she lost her volunteering gig for doing work “outside of her job description”, it was a very important turning point for Naylor.

“From that experience, I found I needed to be there and help when someone needed help. That was meaningful work for me,” she said.

“Meaningful work is the ability to be completely myself, helping and connecting with other people and allowing them to express themselves.

“It’s not what I do – it’s why I do it.”

Naylor now owns and runs her own private speech pathology, where she can work the way she wants, pursuing a career in helping people, just as she helped that man when she was 16 volunteering at the residential home.

“If you’re passionate about something, then pursue it. If it’s in your heart, then why stop?” she said.

‘We are all juggling so much.’

Sometimes, circumstances in your life, social stigmas and other workplace barriers can make prioritising meaningful work challenging.

Shirley Chowdhary has had an extensive career in a range of industries, from journalism to finance to work in the non-for-profit sector. In 2019, among many other accolades, she was named by the Australian Financial Review as one of its 100 Women of Influence. She sits on the board of the Australian Associated Press, the Royal Australian Institute of Architects and other organisations.

But after taking a 10-year career break to raise her children, Chowdhary faced a number of obstacles finding a job.

“Even after listing all the things I’ve done, it’s the 10-year gap after having kids that resonates with people the most,” she said.

“Most recruiters can’t look beyond what they see in front of them.”

So when she was looking for work after taking time to raise her family, finding meaningful work was impossible when simply finding a job was proving difficult.

But Chowdhary learned a lot about herself and what meaningful work is to her during this period of time. 

“I’ve learned the best lessons from the jobs I disliked the most,” she said.

“We are all juggling so much – whether it be kids, ageing parents or whatever it may be – that you can’t always prioritise meaningful work.”

However, going through periods of work without meaning allows you to find what meaningful work is for you, Chowdhary said.

“Now I am in a privileged position that I can (prioritise meaningful work),” she said.

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When it comes to new technological advances, we can’t escape the growing impact of AI and its frightening reaches.

For distinguished Professor Fang Chen from the UTS’ Data Science Institute, the most critical aspect in working towards transformative impact is embracing inclusivity and diversity in AI. 

Dr Chen believes that inclusive leadership needs to be the kind that is adaptive to changes while also enabling women to embrace their leadership potential.

“Today, not only do we see more challenges in leadership, we also see more technological challenges, and these transformations need to be made so that they no longer perpetuate inequality,” she said. 

“How are we going to disrupt the status quo to foster some positive changes?”

Dr Chen has combatted bias perception in the past by focusing on her own skills and capabilities rather than on her gender. 

Several years ago, Chen was introduced by a male speaker on a panel with a question — “As a female, how you convince people to trust the business intelligence?”

Chen hit back, saying that such a question simply diminishes her complex personhood. 

“I’m not only female, I’m also Asian, and English is not my first language and I’m skinny as well, I’m short, relative to other people, but I prefer to focus on the skills I’ve acquired,” she said.

Despite this, she adds that women are perhaps more observant, and “better at looking at things from a different angle.”

Chen, who won the Australian Museum Eureka Prize in 2018 for Excellence in Data Science, started out as an electrical engineer before pursuing a PhD in AI focusing on speech recognition. 

She emigrated to Australia and is now one of the world’s leading AI and Human-Machine Interaction expert, promoting ethical, human-centred AI.

In the years she has worked in the industry, she has seen a remarkable shift in the perception of women in AI. 

“Even back in 2013, I was often the only woman at the table talking to all male colleagues,” she said.

“Now, AI is absolutely a welcoming atmosphere, and the boundary of the profession is blurring. In the past, AI was very strictly just about computer science, but now…there are different skills involved, and women bring a range of very unique strengths to the field.”

Chen commends Australia’s tertiary education system for leading the way in global AI research, though admits that we are also “a very risk averse nation…we tend to follow the suit of a lot of people rather than trying to jump on being the leader.”

“We can do better,” Chen says. 

As an internationally-recognised leader in AI and data science, Chen has mentored many young scientists and budding PhD candidates. 

She tells her students the importance of never underestimating their abilities, and to notice self-doubt when it creeps up on them.

“Nothing can save you more if you keep your focus in doing what your heart wants, and trusting you can do it,” she said. “My advice is to trust yourself. You’re not less capable than anyone else.” 

You can see Dr. Fang Chen speak at the YWCA She Leads Conference on August 4. Book your tickets here. 

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But because of the taboo associated with the condition, she was embarrassed to share her story, even after winning the World Championships. 

It wasn’t until many years later that she finally opened up about her incontinence to a women’s group and realised it was powerful for other women to hear that an elite athlete had struggled with the same thing as them– incontinence can affect anyone, particularly women. 

In Australia, around 1 in 4 adult Australians are affected and the Continence Foundation of Australia says women make up 80 per cent of people who report living with incontinence, with many experiencing problems after childbirth and menopause. 

With so many affected, Dr Pittman says we need to start talking unashamedly about incontinence to encourage more people to seek help. 

“Breaking the stigma surrounding taboo subjects can be difficult, but it is something we as individuals, parents, friends, and colleagues need to work together to replace shame with understanding and empathy,” she says. 

An Olympic champion, women’s health expert, author and mother of six children, Dr Pittman is now using her platform to advocate for better awareness and smash the stigma of incontinence.

Read Dr Pittman’s full story below. And subscribe to our Women’s Health News newsletter to get the latest health stories sent to your inbox. 

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Can you describe your personal journey with incontinence as a female athlete? 

My first experience with incontinence was back when I was an elite athlete. I had my first child when I was 22 and went back to racing before I had retrained my pelvic floor well enough, but it was my job and I didn’t at that stage have the right knowledge. I ran the 400m which is a very difficult race where you must push your body extremely hard to win and I would often have an accident in the final 100m. I didn’t even tell my sports doctor or my coach at the time, just kept it to myself, I was so embarrassed. Before every race, I would go as far as to pour a bottle of water over myself pretending I was hot but knowing that it would cover up the incontinence at the end of the race. I even remember during the victory lap after winning the ‘World Championships’ in front of a huge crowd – I was again incontinent, but nobody noticed! On that day I was the greatest athlete in the world but suffering in silence. 

What were some things you personally did to help manage your incontinence in the everyday? 

There are exercises that you can do to help strengthen your pelvic floor, such as pelvic floor exercises, and workout routines like Pilates to help strengthen your core and pelvic muscles, however this is not a guaranteed fix for everyone! Sometimes, exercises can only help so much, and you need to see a specialist. In fact, the majority of women don’t do them correctly, so seeing a women’s health physio is always a good idea. In the meantime, it’s always super helpful to have products that subtly help support incontinence. Modibodi is Australia’s original leak-proof brand, and has a great range, called Ultra, which can support full incontinence in both men and women. Its innovative technology offers the highest level of absorbency (250ml) within the Modibodi range, and the floating gusset technology allows for greater air flow and ensures a quicker dry time. This range is exceptionally helpful to those of us who experience or have experienced post-birth incontinence. I was so happy to find Modibodi because I wanted to just be a normal mum running around with my kids. I didn’t want to be worrying about sneezing or coughing, so to have a product that I felt so happy and comfortable in, but also knew that if I had a bit of incontinence no one was going to notice, was the best. 

How has going through this experience led you to be an advocate for other women experiencing the condition? 

For so many years I didn’t say anything, until a speaking gig around five or six years ago. I was talking to a women’s group when I spoke openly about my experience with incontinence for the first time. A couple of women afterwards came up to me saying how grateful they were that I shared that message. They had watched me win years before and said they had felt bad about themselves because they had stopped exercising due to incontinence, but now were reconsidering. This happened again after the episode of SAS where I experienced postpartum bladder leakage. When the episode aired there was a lot of support and championing of my experience in the media and on Twitter, and so many people were calling for postpartum bodies to be normalised. It’s funny, at the time I was worried I’d get judged for it, but it actually opened a huge conversation around incontinence in women. I must admit I was embarrassed at the time, but for the conversation it stimulated, it was well worth going through it. It has since opened the conversation about how we need to get help with physios, that we shouldn’t be suffering in silence and that there are products like Modibodi leak-proof apparel out there to help. 

Why do you feel it’s important to get more Australians speaking openly about incontinence? 

We need to talk about incontinence unashamedly! Get help yourself, see a women’s health physio or doctor. Then share your story! By speaking openly, the more women realise how common it is, the more women will seek the help they need. 

Considering that incontinence can often be a very lonely and alienating experience, what advice would you give to other women with the condition? 

My advice first and foremost is that you should just be open and honest – you’d be surprised at how receptive people are and how many of those around you have shared lived experiences just like yours. All you need to do is gently start the conversation – perhaps discussing your experience with someone you trust and feel comfortable with – and grow your confidence to speak more openly and freely from there. Starting open and honest conversations around taboo topics needs to begin with education and collaboration. Breaking the stigma surrounding taboo subjects can be difficult, but it is something we as individuals, parents, friends, and colleagues need to work together to replace shame with understanding and empathy. For everyday support, it’s always super helpful to have products that are comfortable, subtle and help support incontinence, just like Modibodi. With Modibodi, you’re able to comfortably get on with your day without fear of leaks.

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