I have been asked to write a series for the Fairfax papers – these columns appear regularly in The Age, Sydney Morning Herald and Courier Mail… The editor asked me to write something that was insightful but educational.. and he inferred entertaining too. As I thought about it I realised that the lessons learned – or things that ‘I wish I knew’ would probably the most useful… so I have republished them here – because not everyone has a subscription…
Tag Archives: Female Entrepreneur
Coming Up this week 5 March 2012
It seems that International Women’s day started early this year. I have had a busy week sharing my thoughts on women in leadership and innovation. In addition to the panel mentioned in the previous blog, I did a keynote for the Testra marketing team and chatted to Linda Mottram on ABC 702 Sydney on the current state of ‘service’ in Australia. I attended the Head over Heels event – profiling three entrepreneurial women as they shared their vision. Caroline Rafferty…
Chaos is Normal
I found myself part of a panel at the Australian British Chamber of Commerce International Women’s day event. I look around me: Ticky Fullerton of ABC Lateline is interviewing Cathy Harris AO PSM – Chairman Harris Farm Markets, Helen Conway, Director of the Equal Opportunities for Women in the Workplace Agency… and myself. We have been asked to share our views on how we see the world of women in business. I feel privileged and humbled to be part of…
I wonder what my legacy will be?
It was my birthday this week , and it is always a good time to reflect. I have taken a break (everyone at RedBalloon get’s there birthday off)… but I have taken 11 days for this birthday, (justifying that this is my eleventh year at RedBalloon) to travel back to the place where my career began. My first job after finishing my undergraduate degree was with IBM in New York. I had my 21st birthday at the restaurant ‘Windows of…
3 insights on why we lack women leaders
I was forwarded a news article this week about Facebooks #2 leader: Sheryl Sandberg. She had been at the World Economic Forum in Davos Switzerland – on the eve of Facebooks listing announcement. She has been quoted as saying women need to aim high “Keep your foot on the gas pedal.” I was curious to understand what she meant by this. I definitely don’t believe that women need to ‘give up their femininity’ to succeed. In fact there is nothing…
628th Blog Post….
I am often asked why I blog; Is it because I want to promote RedBalloon? Is it to increase search results? Is it to build my own brand? The reality is that none of the above reasons are in fact true for me. I write my blog because I continue to learn from; books, business leaders, attending conferences – and each of these lessons or insights I need to store somewhere so I don’t forget them. I use my blog…
New Year – Mentoring
We are now on the final countdown as we rush into Christmas. I don’t seem to have many minutes to rub together, so as I race from one thing to the next I steal a moment to reflect on what an amazing year we are having at RedBalloon – how fantastic it is that we will continue to be frantically busy until 2.00pm on Sunday when people sit down to Christmas lunch – and then the RedBalloon elves will also…
Leaders come in all forms
On Monday I had the fortune of participating in the Growth Faculties Leadership Summit. Six leaders, with different styles and methods took to the stage to share what they had learned about leadership. Martha Stewart at 70, gave an energetic and passionate insight into her life and the creation of her personal brand. She did speak of how her role now is about rebuilding the business after the decline following her incarceration. Though she believes that her brand remains what…
Coming up this week 12 December 2011
Last week at RedBalloon we were full of the joys of Christmas. The IT team hosted our final company meeting of the year and were massively creative with their festive theme ; including beaming in their colleague Dave from Perth to have him appear in a cut out Santa via Facetime – (I guess you had to be there). As part of the planning process and moving my role to be Founding Director I needed to update my job description…
PR is everything to leadership: Purpose and Responsibility
I’m regularly asked about leadership and I have my views about it – things that I have learned from trial and error (and there have been many errors over the years) – but I was delighted to attend a PwC event which hosted Dr Fred Kofman author of ‘Conscious Business’ this week. Kofman’s basic premise is two fold: Firstly that great leader’s take responsibility for their actions, as well as how they choose to react to any situation that presents…
Imagine running a business based on fun - that's what I decided to try when I left a very serious corporate career in marketing to set up RedBalloon...
