Good morning and thank you for the invitation to present my thoughts on parity and empowerment on this day, International Women’s Day.As an empowered women I split my time between my day job and my passion project. My day job is Marketing Director for Elcom Technology, we build websites, intranets and portals and our clients include many well known brands and around 20 Australian schools. My passion project is The Heads of Innovation Forum which I started in 2013 to bring together senior executives, researchers, smes, start-ups, governments and entrepreneurs. I will talk more about this later.

So today I’m going to talk about parity, ESTEAM, networking, collaboration and innovation

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Prior to my current role at Elcom I spent 11 years at the Smart Services Cooperative Research Centre connecting researchers with industry and governments to collaborate and innovate.

During this time I met an Australian start-up called Zeetings and it is their technology I’m using here to share my presentation with you and to run live polls, you can also post up any questions you would like me to address at the end if we have time. If you open your browser and go to www.zeetings.com/Annette you can follow the presentation and participate in the polls.

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Let’s consider for a minute the theme for International Women’s Day “Pledge for Parity” and the different ways in which we can contribute:

I chose to help women and girls achieve their ambitions with my first commitment being to mentor a young women, Amy, who launched a start-up called Innovation Firebug and is struggling to get through the doors of Corporate Australia.

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I think Amy’s platform looks great and so on Friday at my next Heads of Innovation Forum, which is being hosted by NSW Government, I am putting her in front of 50+ senior contacts from government, corporate Australia and the entrepreneurial community to present and demo. Before, during and after the Forum I will actively encourage members of the forum to engage with Amy and assist her – after all I created the forum and built up this network of people for this very reason, to see how we can we assist each other and the broader innovation community to drive positive change.

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The reason I’m sharing this with you is to make the point that anyone of you or group of you can drive change and shape the future, I don’t have any special skills. All it takes is an idea, a network of people to collaborate with, courage & determination. I will talk more about this later but first let’s reflect on Parity and how far we have come.

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While the video is funny and mocks the idea that women are vastly different to men and less capable I think this is a more accurate representation. But now let’s take a look at the serious side of parity

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I recently saw the movie Suffragettes, which was very good by the way, and at the end when they rolled the credits and the dates when certain countries gave women the right vote, here a just a few of those dates. I wassurprised at Switzerland coming so late in the seventies and pleasantly surprised to see NZ and Australia leading the way and again I’m reminded how lucky I am to live here.

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We owe a huge debt of gratitude to the courageous women that fought the hardest and died for change in those early years. Thankfully today we do not have to throw ourselves under horses to seek the attention of the media and people of influence, we have the power of the internet, social media, user generated content as well as professional journalism, mobile technology and our human nature to share globally and get behind a great cause.

And in Australia we all need to keep driving for legislative change, attitude and behavioural change to bring parity and equality to women and to our indigenous communities.

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I recently attended the CareerTrackers awards night with 1500 other people, career trackers runs an indigenous internship program and they signed up 10 universities and 10 major corporates for 10 years including ING and Qantas, providing degrees and work experience. At the awards night some of the stories from the female students were horrendous, fathers pulling daughters out of school and a caring environment and pushing them into prostitution, absolutely horrific but this particular story did have a happy ending, this women had a vision for a better future for her and her son, she was courageous and determined and against the odds she is now completing a degree and interning at ING. What was also wonderful was to hear the ambitions of the young female student of the year and the response from the CEO of Qantas. The young women made the comment that it would be great to think that an aboriginal female could one day be the Prime Minister of Australia, in response CEO of Qantas Alan Joyce said “Well if a gay Irish man can be the CEO of Qantas I don’t see why not” – it was a beautiful moment met with great applause.

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In 2016 the age of digital disruption and innovation our circles are local and global and we need to pay attention and support change for many of the atrocities women and girls face in other less fortunate parts of the world, mutilation, forced marriages, slave labour, human trafficking and appalling health services.

So look to your own contacts, friends, families, networks, social groups etc and think about what you can do, sign the petitions, raise money, encourage others to the do the same. Even the smallest contribution or adjustment in how people think and behave can have far reaching positive consequences.

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Thinking about what parity means in Australian today I reached out to my network of senior women in business, CEO’s, Board Directors, Entrepreneurs and asked them what Parity meant to them and what they thought it meant for the future of their young daughters and nieces, here are some of the comments I collected

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Ele makes a great point about the power within.

Karen mentions the word negotiation, this is an important skill to learn, in my current job at Elcom I negotiated my contract to include enabling me to continue with my passion project, the heads of innovation forum, I even included that Elcom would pay for the catering at these events.

Interestingly we are all born with negotiation skills, the baby cries to be fed, the toddler chucks a tantrum to get their toy back, the teenager trades good behaviour for more time on line. This is a skill you need to build on so that when combined with your self confidence you can negotiate exactly what you deserve based on capability not gender -no discrimination.

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Anne-Marie reminds us we have the right to pursue and live the life we dream

Michelle mentions gender neutrality and value being the only currency

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Paulina comments on the need for the genders to work together and complement each others strengths. She also raises the importance of nurturing future generations.

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Katherine gives us a vision for the future when discussions around parity are no longer needed.

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We are not there yet, there are still issues of parity to be resolved and is up to us leverage our networks and today’s technology to drive change.

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With all the resources available today, such as mentor networks, co-working spaces, incubators and accelerator programs this is not as daunting as you think and with our pro innovation government this is the best time to take charge and create the world you want to live in. Malcolm Turnbull keeps reminding us these are the most exciting times for Australia and in the context of innovation and supporting entrepreneurs I agree.

If I was 16 today I would be looking around my peer group and building a team of smart people that cover the key areas of expertise for creating a business for example: the science/tech nerd who can invent, code and build the most amazing online platform, mobile application or robotic device that every household needs, the maths genius who could run the financial side of the business, the communicator who could run marketing & PR, the organiser who could run operations and the natural born leader who can bring in partners, customers, private equity, VC investment etc. Then I would get us all together to think about what problems we want to solve and how we might build a network of mentors and collaborators to help us so we can ultimately start our own business.

I suspect that among your friends you already have the makings of a great team and if you nurture that there is no limit to what you can achieve.

So what skills do you need to thrive in these exciting times?

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You may be aware of the programs across government, academia and R&D organisations that encourage more school students to consider courses in the STEM topics – that is Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths, and you may be aware that STEM has evolved to become STEAM as we see a growing trend across major organisations with a focus on innovation looking to employ students that combine skills in Art & Design.

Well a few of us have taken this further and have put a E in front to transform STEAM to ESTEAM and that is to recognise the importance of cross discipline studies that include entrepreneurial skills as well as art and design with the rest of STEM.

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A very esteemed colleague and collaborator, Kim Chandler-McDonald, published an article last week on the topic of ESTEAM powering the collaborative, innovative careers of today and tomorrow. Kim is also the Author of books that share interviews with some amazing innovators around the world, in her most recent publication many are female.

I’d like to share with you some of the ideas from Kim’s article and I encourage you to read the rest online

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Empowering entrepreneurial skills is an educational and economic imperative for Australia. Studies in any ESTEAM topics are important for anyone looking to participate in an innovative, collaborative economy – I am assuming that could be the goal for most of you here today.

there is increasing awareness that entrepreneurially minded women are essential, economic drivers

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That’s quite a gap and another reason why women should get equal chance at the top jobs

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The believe is that by adding cross-disciplinary studies which include artistic and entrepreneurial electives Australia will unleash a generation of empowered individuals that will invent, innovate and commercialise through companies they start and build up to be sustainable economic success stories.

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Our government also recognize how important you are to the future of Australia

It’s a good start

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Mark is right, any female that so desires can be the next successful inventor and entrepreneur, start her own business and be in charge of her own future

You could be the next…

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Bianca Kristallis, the founder and CEO of Pamper Hamper GiftsMel Perkins, the co-founder and CEO of CanvaJodie Fox, co-founder, Shoes of PreyPascale Helyar-Moray, founder of StyleRocks

Without technology none of these businesses would exist – a career in technology does not have to be boring. Whether you are the developer coding, the UX designer or systems architect you can produce beautiful solutions for online businesses, it could be your own business.

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I’m not sure you believe me that learning to code can lead to an exciting career, Renee Noble and Liz Gilleran are two awesome up and coming rockstars in the world of technology at Dat61, both in their early twenties.

Renee made a cool video which I will show you in a minute http://www.crinklingnews.com.au/2016-01/video-computer-coding/

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For women in business today there is an increasing number of networks you can join and events you can participate in. Building your network of potential collaborators, influencers and customers is something you can and should start immediately, chances are you are already part of a few networks based on your hobbies and topics of interest but think beyond that to your future and career choice and consider the nature of the networks and resources you might find useful to achieve your ambition.

Do remember though the importance of reciprocity, women are wonderful at helping others but do expect at least that you pay it forward. I have benefitted from the advice and help of a number of women throughout my career and I pay it forward by using my skills and experience to mentor young women today.

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National Association of Women in Operations is a good network group for females in male dominated industries and operates in most states.

Inspiring Rare Birds empowers women entrepreneurs to connect and develop from one another

Heads Over Heels’ mission is to increase the representation of women entrepreneurs leading high growth businesses

Womens network’s purpose is to champion you with opportunities to connect with like-minded women, tap you into live and online events designed to hone your skills and teach you how your business can take flight in the most amazing way.

And of course there is the unique Like Minded Bitches Drinking Wine an informal community of current and aspiring female entrepreneurs who celebrate each other’s successes, commiserate over setbacks, and share tips and advice on how to grow –preferably over a glass of wine.

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As Former US secretary of state Madeleine Albright reminded the world last month, there’s a special place in hell reserved for women who don’t support other women.

Start thinking about building your professional network, explore the various groups out there and also consider creating your own, the meetup.com is a great way to start

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I mentioned earlier In my last job I spent 11 years driving digital R&D initiatives with industry, researchers and government partners from conception to commercialisation, including projects across digital media, education, health & financial services. I worked with some really smart people to solve some really interesting and important problems.

For example: working with Fairfax we improved the algorithms for the RSVP dating site to better match people to people, which is very hard because they say one thing but do another. We also changed the way people search for new cars based on lifestyle choices. We developed the airlink solution that connected the printed pictures and headlines in newspapers to videos on a mobile a device, this is called markerless technology or signal processing.

Working with doctors and researchers at Austin Hospital we found a way to use the pathology laboratory data (blood work) to determine the likelihood of a patient having an adverse event such as cardiac arrest. This system sends an early alert to the nurse so the patient is attended to before the event occurs. So you see computer science & software engineering, data mining, machine learning all this unexciting terms can actually mean really exciting and worthwhile projects and careers.

So I’m going to finish by pointing you to some of the tools I’ve used to help me and my network of collaborators to innovate

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These tools are not complex and as I mentioned early I encourage you to look at your peers, widen the search if you need to, and find a team to work with you on developing ideas for what could be your own start-up business. Once you have your team these tools will help you organise your thoughts.

Let your imagination run wild then consider if your ideas fit into the realm of probability.

One way of approaching the ideation process is to look at existing processes, the way things are delivered for example, and how to improve that process, or take an existing product and seek to improve it. The biggest risk can be creating something completely new and finding paying customers who don’t yet know they need it!

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Another way to come up with ideas is to imagine the future in 3 or 5 or 10 years from now, think about all aspects of life and build scenarios based on these 6 types of futures, it can be a lot of fun, I’ve been in workshops with AMP, News.com, AIMIA and many others using this exercise to think about future problems, challenges and opportunities and to start solving them today. It’s a tool used by many futurists to strategize.

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There are many tools you can find on line to help you organise your thoughts around an idea for a new business, product or service, or how to remodel an existing business to be more successful.

I was very fortunate to be invited to attend a workshop with Yves Pigneur one of the authors of the business model generation and creator of the original business model canvas. I was invited for free as a result of having a great network that I spend time cultivating. Build your network so opportunities can also come to you.

These tools are logical and intuitive and easy to use however the Lean canvas which is an adaptation is more suitable for start-ups and perhaps for you.

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It doesn’t matter if you don’t have all the answers, you fill out what you can and ask for advice for the rest – this is where your team of collaborators and your network can help

The main thing is you can get your ideas down on one piece of paper and start building your story

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A great way to test your ideas and validate them with a potential market is to start talking about it as if it exists, tell someone and then listen to what they say when they tell someone else. This can often illustrate what potential customers might consider to be the most important features or value.

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This is a process used inside Fairfax Media that you could use in your newly formed teams to create a new product or service for your new start-up

Think about the current environment for a new brand or product – is there heavy competition, a market leader impossible to catch or is there room for something newWhy would people change to your product or service, what would motivate themIs your audience stuck in the past and resistant to change or are they keen to try the latest gadgetStart to develop your ideas, what is it, what does it do, what does it look like etcCould your idea change the way people think about this kind of product or service and shift the marketIf someone else tried to disrupt you what might that look like – you might need to launch the anti-product one day before someone else steals your customers

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Women are awesome, people are awesome.

Build your network, gather your smartest collaborators, think about the future, make the right choices for furthering your education so you have the skills you need to innovate, take charge of your future and create the world you want to live in.

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I hope you found this interesting and useful. Please feel free to connect with me and let me know if I can be of any assistance.

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