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Speaker 1: You know. I remember sitting in these clients being like,

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Speaker 1: I have no idea what I'm talking about. And when

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Speaker 1: you're applying for some big job that you're not sure

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Speaker 1: if you're qualified for, you're like, well, you know, I've

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Speaker 1: kind of been doing work for the last five years

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Speaker 1: that I haven't really been qualified for and convincing people

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Speaker 1: the direction of everything is like putting these pressure on

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Speaker 1: younger people to kind of decide earlier and specialize earlier.

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Speaker 1: And even while we're at Union twenty, like, we're just

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Speaker 1: trying to keep these options open for ourselves, aren't we.

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Speaker 1: Because you're kind of aware that you have no idea.

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Speaker 2: Welcome to the seas the Yay Podcast. Busy and happy

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Speaker 2: are not the same thing. We too rarely question what

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Speaker 2: makes the heart seeing We work, then we rest, but

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Speaker 2: rarely we play and often don't realize there's more than

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Speaker 2: one way. So this is a platform to hear and

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Speaker 2: explore the stories of those who found lives. They adore

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Speaker 2: the good, bad and ugly. The best and worst day

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Speaker 2: will bear all the facets of seizing your yay. I'm

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Speaker 2: Sarah Davidson or a spoonful of Sarah, a lawyer turned

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Speaker 2: funentrepreneurshos wapped the suits and heels to Cope, matcha Maiden

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Speaker 2: and matcha Milk Bar. CZA is a series of conversations

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Speaker 2: on finding a life you love and exploring the self doubt, challenge,

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Speaker 2: joy and fulfillment along the way. Hello, lovely yighborhood.

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Speaker 1: We are back to our regular.

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Speaker 2: Programming after the Soul Diaries last week with a Ripper

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Speaker 2: guest kickstart November. How are we in November already? Oh

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Speaker 2: my god, I am so thrilled to have Verve Money

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Speaker 2: CEO and co founder Christina Hobbs in your ears this week.

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Speaker 2: Whose path ya blew me away? Christina is not your

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Speaker 2: average financial CEO, although she did happen to found Australia's

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Speaker 2: first ethical superfund by women for women. By investing in Verve,

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Speaker 2: members have ensured over two hundred and seventy million dollars

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Speaker 2: in superannuation. Is not directly invested in fossil fuels or

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Speaker 2: other harmful industries, which is already a cool enough story

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Speaker 2: of an industry disruptor. But to hear that she came

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Speaker 2: up with the idea in a shipping container in Baghdad,

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Speaker 2: Iraq during her work with the United Nations World Food Program,

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Speaker 2: where she eventually became head of operations. I mean, tell

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Speaker 2: me more, all right, what an amazing story. And that's

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Speaker 2: just ten percent or maybe even less, of the amazing

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Speaker 2: story that she has to tell. So I will do

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Speaker 2: just that.

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Speaker 1: I will let her.

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Speaker 2: Tell you the wild and wonderful story herself. But she

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Speaker 2: is just such a fascinating woman doing incredible things in

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Speaker 2: a pathier that continues to take amazing twists and turns.

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Speaker 2: I just hope she inspires you as much as she

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Speaker 2: does me. Chrissy, Welcome to CZA.

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Speaker 1: Thanks so much for having me on.

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Speaker 2: Oh thank you so much for coming on. As anyone

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Speaker 2: who has listened to the show for a while will know,

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Speaker 2: I think they sort of by now understand parts of

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Speaker 2: my brain and the kind of people I fan girl,

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Speaker 2: and so your story in so many ways and for

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Speaker 2: so many different reasons. Just I'm already found gelling you

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Speaker 2: and all the things you've done, so I'm very excited

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Speaker 2: to have you on the show.

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Speaker 1: Oh that's so lovely.

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Speaker 2: I mean, you have an incredible story and I can't

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Speaker 2: wait to get into it. But I think one of

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Speaker 2: the things that often happens is, particularly with someone like yourself,

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Speaker 2: who's a CEO, a really high level, high achiever. It's

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Speaker 2: easy to forget that you started somewhere, and I'm sure

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Speaker 2: there are parts of your life that are very relatable

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Speaker 2: and normal.

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Speaker 1: It's funny to like, yeah, I guess here as well

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Speaker 1: when people are sort of like a CEO like you,

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Speaker 1: and then it's sort of like I'm sitting here, like

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Speaker 1: you know, in my bedroom, I'm like, you know, eiding

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Speaker 1: a bit months pregnant, are you? Yeah, I mean like

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Speaker 1: a sweat jumper, and like it's like, oh, yeah, that's right.

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Speaker 1: I am a CEO. Like I just feel that.

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Speaker 2: Is oh my gosh, I'll.

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Speaker 1: Show you my bum. You won't be able to see

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Speaker 1: it on the on the show obviously, but you know

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Speaker 1: there it.

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Speaker 2: Is, Oh my gosh, Chrissy, you do not look pregnant

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Speaker 2: at all when you're sitting down.

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Speaker 1: I know. The funny thing is that I'm actually in

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Speaker 1: the process of negotiating this really big business deal. I'm

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Speaker 1: sort of constantly with all these lawyers and like em

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Speaker 1: a lawyers, and you know the other day that was

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Speaker 1: in this meeting, there was a lot of swinging going

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Speaker 1: on and I was just like, guys, I'm giving birth

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Speaker 1: in three weeks. This has to sort of stood up

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Speaker 1: and show my belly and mother than you. I was

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Speaker 1: pregnant and they were just like, what the hell.

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Speaker 2: Oh my gosh, it's funny said that because I used

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Speaker 2: to be an m and a lawyer in my first life,

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Speaker 2: and I know the dick swinging. I know exactly what

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Speaker 2: you mean.

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Speaker 1: I'd never seen before, so I was shocked, but I

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Speaker 1: was like, I know how to solve this one, my

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Speaker 1: massive belly. Oh my god.

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Speaker 2: Well, yeah, I love starting every episode with that kind

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Speaker 2: of eyesbreaker question because there's always something going on that

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Speaker 2: is not what you would expect for the title. You know,

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Speaker 2: we often sort of get introduced to people by their

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Speaker 2: titles first and have all these preconceptions about how glamorous

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Speaker 2: your life must be, and also forget that you know,

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Speaker 2: you're also a mum doing all this, like that's wild.

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Speaker 2: Yeah yeah, yeah, Well that was a very relatable beginning,

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Speaker 2: so thank you.

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Speaker 1: So pretty much.

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Speaker 2: The first part of the show is called Your Way Ta,

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Speaker 2: which is tracing back through really from the very beginning,

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Speaker 2: back to childhood when you sort of had no idea

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Speaker 2: where you'd end up, and tracing through all the chapters

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Speaker 2: really that make the pathway that leads you to the

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Speaker 2: life you have today. And I think if people meet

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Speaker 2: you now, it's very easy to assume, you know, you

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Speaker 2: know what you're doing, you're incredibly successful, you kind of

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Speaker 2: can you know, hold your own in a boardroom and

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Speaker 2: negotiate big deals, and it's I think easy to forget

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Speaker 2: that there were a lot of times I'm sure of

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Speaker 2: self doubt or loss of direction or totally different careers

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Speaker 2: in your case, which is my favorite kind of story.

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Speaker 2: So can we go back to the beginning and trace

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Speaker 2: through all the chapters of Chrissy, like right back to

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Speaker 2: maybe even before school, Like what were you like, what

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Speaker 2: were your first dreams and hopes and what did you

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Speaker 2: think you'd be.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, it's a really good question. I was definitely. I

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Speaker 1: have these really early memories of you know, training for

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Speaker 1: athletics carnivals in primary school and going on runs, and

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Speaker 1: I just remember like as I'd be running, I'd be

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Speaker 1: like giving these speeches in my head, which, like now

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Speaker 1: they look back, is like a really weird thing to

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Speaker 1: have done, but like pretend I was somebody in and

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Speaker 1: to like be making up speeches as I was like

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Speaker 1: practicing for my school cross country and things. So I

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Speaker 1: think I sort of like, I don't know, I guess

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Speaker 1: I must have always had an ambition to at least

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Speaker 1: be someone was going to be making speeches. I love that, Yeah,

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Speaker 1: But I don't think I thought much about work. You know,

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Speaker 1: I grew up in Canberra, and I was a very

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Speaker 1: like outdoorsy camping kind of hiking you know, just living

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Speaker 1: or you know, in the outdoors sort of kid, which

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Speaker 1: was really my priority a lot of sport. But I guess, like,

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Speaker 1: you know, if I think back, my sort of like

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Speaker 1: weird career journeys did start quite young. I was, you know,

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Speaker 1: an eleven year old doing a paper on which you know,

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Speaker 1: looking back, was sort of slight child labor type.

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Speaker 2: ESK, definitely earlier than the fourteen and nine months that

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Speaker 2: I think.

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Speaker 1: It was like my my friend's older brother got a

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Speaker 1: paper on an he like subcontracted it to us, which

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Speaker 1: meant that like the hourly rate went form about three

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Speaker 1: dollars an hour for delivering pamphlets to about a dollar

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Speaker 1: fifty or something. But you know, we thought it was wonderful.

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Speaker 1: So you know, I was sort of doing that and

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Speaker 1: then it was like working as a swim instructor, working

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Speaker 1: at a sort of like a kid's indoor place, and

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Speaker 1: to do kids' birthday parties. So I sort of had

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Speaker 1: always these like really random jobs that you know, just

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Speaker 1: kind of kept progressing. I ended up during UNI being

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Speaker 1: at Parliament House and I was working as a gym

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Speaker 1: trainer there for some of the politicians. Like so I

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Speaker 1: sort of very like eclectic kind of early career. And

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Speaker 1: I guess I really, you know, just loved all those

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Speaker 1: sort of random experiences that I had.

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Speaker 2: I love that so much because I feel like I

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Speaker 2: also kind of had a lot of random things and

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Speaker 2: none of the dots connected really at the time. And

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Speaker 2: I love that when you're a kid that don't really

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Speaker 2: need to you just kind of do the things that

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Speaker 2: you think are interesting and that you enjoy, or that

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Speaker 2: just come up because like a friend of a friend

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Speaker 2: has a paper run and I just I love that

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Speaker 2: kind of Later you can start to trace through, like

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Speaker 2: the themes of the reasons why you were good at

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Speaker 2: those things are the reasons why you like them. But

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Speaker 2: it's it's so cool because there are so few people

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Speaker 2: who go at five, I want to be a doctor,

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Speaker 2: and then they become a doctor and now it's sort

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Speaker 2: of like you've founded your own superannuation fund, but like

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Speaker 2: super wasn't even on your mind, and that that whole

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Speaker 2: finance world was just not even playing a part back then.

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Speaker 2: And I think that's so cool to remind people.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I think, I think definitely, And like how you

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Speaker 1: even kind of get there is like quite interesting thing

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Speaker 1: as well, And obviously we'll talk about it more, but

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Speaker 1: you know, how do you even get from that step

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Speaker 1: from step from step? And then you know, even if

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Speaker 1: I think the two years before, probably even eighteen months before,

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Speaker 1: a year before I did start that find if someone

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Speaker 1: had told me that's what I was going to do,

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Speaker 1: I would have been like what would It's kind of

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Speaker 1: like really weird even to me, So which.

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Speaker 2: Is also why the story is so cool, because I

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Speaker 2: love that it doesn't have to be something that, as

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Speaker 2: again you know, has been twenty five years in the making.

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Speaker 2: You can actually do wild amazing things that you know,

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Speaker 2: some people prepare their whole lives for, but a lot

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Speaker 2: of people don't, and they still make a really amazing.

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Speaker 1: Success of it. So I think it's cool.

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Speaker 2: Like even looking at UNI, for you, I'm like science,

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Speaker 2: you did science, like science and commerce of course, but

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Speaker 2: like science commerce, it's like what is that equal? You know,

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Speaker 2: what did you think that was going to be? How

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Speaker 2: did you choose that? Yeah?

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Speaker 1: I mean that one was an interesting one and it

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Speaker 1: probably seems almost less random now, like I remember at

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Speaker 1: the time, like people were like, this is just super weird.

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Speaker 1: It was basically because I wanted to study psychology, so

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Speaker 1: I did psychology under a science degree, and I sort

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Speaker 1: of had the opportunity to do obviously in your first

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Speaker 1: year like different subjects, and I cannot remember why. I

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Speaker 1: think it was something like my mum sort of you know,

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Speaker 1: her mentality is very much like what is going to

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Speaker 1: get your job after university? And I think she was like,

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Speaker 1: you need to study like accounting, like I don't remember,

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Speaker 1: which is like so weird because like, you know, me

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Speaker 1: and my one of my best friends now I met

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Speaker 1: in this accounting degree and we just laugh like we're

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Speaker 1: just like what the hell were we doing studying accounting?

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Speaker 1: Like this is so weird. But I ended up doing this,

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Speaker 1: like you know, one accounting unit and it was quite

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Speaker 1: in my first year of UNI. And then that was

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Speaker 1: just quite interesting because I think the science side was

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Speaker 1: very like it was very theoretical. It was very like

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Speaker 1: not applied in it was like big picture thinking kind

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Speaker 1: of a study, whereas like the accounting and going into

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Speaker 1: economics and finance and was very much you know, it's

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Speaker 1: extremely practical and applied in a way. What I was

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Speaker 1: studying it was like these numbers on this balanchine and

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Speaker 1: this is how you do this, and this is how

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Speaker 1: you do this. And I really loved that kind of

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Speaker 1: having both elements of that and A and ul studyings

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Speaker 1: have had a great opportunity to just do a two

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Speaker 1: degrees in four years. So for me, I really quickly

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Speaker 1: decided like I wanted to do the two degrees. And

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Speaker 1: I think probably what appealed to me was is that

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Speaker 1: I could really quickly see how that applied to work.

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Speaker 1: And I think for me, like I'm a much more

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Speaker 1: practical person and more of a theoretical person, so I

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Speaker 1: think I found that quite exciting. And then in my

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Speaker 1: second year of Union actually got a fantastic job as

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Speaker 1: a bookkeeper, so you know, my friends were still slaving

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Speaker 1: it out of it, like the fish and chip shop

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Speaker 1: where I had been working, and I remember going into

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Speaker 1: this interview as as a bookkeeper, and you know, I've

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Speaker 1: been like prapping with my mom and I was going

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Speaker 1: to ask them for like I think I was like

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Speaker 1: twenty dollars an hour and role played that and they

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Speaker 1: were like to pay expectation of being like twenty dollars

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Speaker 1: an hour and they were like, oh, we were going

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Speaker 1: to pay you forty. So like that also was quite

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Speaker 1: inspiring at the time because like, you know, getting paid

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Speaker 1: like forty dollars an hour, like even now that so

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Speaker 1: I was quite good. But this was like, you know,

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Speaker 1: twenty years ago at UNI, like I was like, my

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Speaker 1: life is made. And then I was like I love

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Speaker 1: this accounting business. That sort of inspired me to, Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I guess do those duel degrees.

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Speaker 2: Oh my gosh, I did law arts and I think

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Speaker 2: I kind of did dual degrees more as like it

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Speaker 2: allowed me to like make less decisions about my future.

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Speaker 1: I think that too. I think it's so funny how

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Speaker 1: like I feel like the direction of everything is like

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Speaker 1: putting these pressure on younger people to kind of decide

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Speaker 1: earlier and specialize earlier. And then yeah, like of course,

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Speaker 1: like you know, even while we're at Union at twenty,

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Speaker 1: like we're just trying to keep these options open for ourselves,

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Speaker 1: aren't we Because you're kind of aware that you have

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Speaker 1: no idea what you want to do.

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Speaker 2: And you also don't even know the jobs that exist,

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Speaker 2: then yeah, you don't know until you get into the workforce.

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Speaker 2: You can't see all the gray areas in between the

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Speaker 2: like professions that we kind of learn about. But even

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Speaker 2: if you do, I mean, you're an amazing example that

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Speaker 2: even if you do pick one pathway, it's also okay

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Speaker 2: to change at very normal and healthy to change your

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Speaker 2: mind later and like swop to something completely different. So

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Speaker 2: I think that's also something that I try and like

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Speaker 2: hammer home a lot in these interviews is to, you know,

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Speaker 2: talk to people who have done lots of different things

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Speaker 2: and that don't necessarily they're not necessarily different things in

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Speaker 2: the same industry either. They're just like you do one

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Speaker 2: thing and then later you realize it's time to do

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Speaker 2: something else. And I think that's something I definitely want

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Speaker 2: to focus on a lot with you, is like knowing

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Speaker 2: when the time is to change or and then coping

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Speaker 2: with the novelty and lack of comfort and familiarity. But

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Speaker 2: before we get there, I mean, it's funny that we

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Speaker 2: both kind of started in very corporate context. How did

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Speaker 2: you end up at Deloit? And I mean most of

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Speaker 2: my friends who went into management consulting still can't explain

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Speaker 2: to me what that is. So how did you end

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Speaker 2: up there? And what was that as like a platform

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Speaker 2: for your career?

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Speaker 1: Yeah, it was really interesting. I just remember being at

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Speaker 1: UNI one day and I think it was Bin. One

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Speaker 1: of the management consulting companies had come and they were

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Speaker 1: doing a talk on you know, working there. And I

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Speaker 1: don't even know how I got to that talk, but

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Speaker 1: I remember going and you know, obviously they would have

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Speaker 1: done a great sales pitch and I was like, this

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Speaker 1: sounds amazing, and so I applied with them and I

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Speaker 1: didn't get the role, but I was quite excited about

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Speaker 1: the idea of management consulting. And I think probably looking back,

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Speaker 1: you know, I'm a complete ADHD person, and so I imagine

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Speaker 1: what probably inspired me. It was this idea of just

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Speaker 1: like you know, working across different clients and doing like

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Speaker 1: really varied work. So you know, really, if I think

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Speaker 1: about Deloit, it was like I just remember at the time,

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Speaker 1: like I was like, okay, I didn't get that one,

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Speaker 1: and who else is still open? And I just remember

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Speaker 1: that they just happened to be open and you know,

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Speaker 1: were closing soon. And I think it's like a really

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Speaker 1: it's quite interesting because for me, you know, I think

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Speaker 1: it also just speaks to like, you know, privilege and

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Speaker 1: the kind of universities you go to. Like I was

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Speaker 1: really lucky to even find out about that career path

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Speaker 1: and to actually find out about it before you know,

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Speaker 1: there was still some companies that had applications open, Whereas

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Speaker 1: I remember when I started, and you know, some of

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Speaker 1: my colleagues I was starting with that had gone to

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Speaker 1: like Sydney UNI. You know, they had all actually been

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Speaker 1: in feeder programs from the university where they'd been like

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Speaker 1: already working doing internships in management consulting firms. They'd found

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Speaker 1: out about it so in their first or second year

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Speaker 1: of school and like had like tailored their whole careers

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Speaker 1: towards that. And you know, it just sort of like

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Speaker 1: really highlighted to me this kind of I didn't you know,

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Speaker 1: Camera is not a business community place. It's a public

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Speaker 1: service town. Even the concept of like business or what

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Speaker 1: that means and what those job opportunities are, like, it's

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Speaker 1: we don't have that in our culture. And you know,

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Speaker 1: I think that just really highlighted that divide. And obviously

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Speaker 1: if you're, you know, someone startying in a rural area

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Speaker 1: of you're from an even more disadvantage family. It really

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Speaker 1: just highlighted to me that you know, even just to

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Speaker 1: know what those jobs are and to be preparing for

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Speaker 1: them is such an advantage in itself. So yeah, that's

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Speaker 1: how I found about DELAY. You know, I applied for

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Speaker 1: the job. We did sort of all those interview rounds,

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Speaker 1: and you know, by that point, you think you're very

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Speaker 1: very special for getting that job because you've gone through

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Speaker 1: like six interview rounds, and you think, because you're so

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Speaker 1: special for that job, like that must just also be

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Speaker 1: like a very special job if they're going to make

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Speaker 1: it that hard to get in as well. So they

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Speaker 1: did well with that psychology, I must say.

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Speaker 2: I think it was a very special job though, because

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Speaker 2: the more I was one of those people who didn't

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Speaker 2: apply to Baine or McKinzie or anything, because I didn't

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Speaker 2: ever hear about management consulting. Even now, it's kind of

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Speaker 2: like such a vague thing to describe to people. Like

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Speaker 2: one of my best friends was at BCG and I'm like,

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Speaker 2: tell me how you explain it? So I can explain

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Speaker 2: it to other people, Like you go into companies across

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Speaker 2: all different industries and you spend x amount of time

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Speaker 2: there making spreadsheets and doing models of financial thing Like

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Speaker 2: you know, I couldn't even explain it to you, But

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Speaker 2: every consultant that hasn't stayed in consulting has done something

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Speaker 2: so cool because the skills that you learn of analysis

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Speaker 2: of just everything in the world. I don't know, I

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Speaker 2: just feel like it's this amazing. It is a really

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Speaker 2: special job. You get taught to think in this crazy way.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I think you get taught to think in a

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Speaker 1: good way. And I think also what it trains you

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Speaker 1: for is it is sort of like sink or swimm

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Speaker 1: in terms of make it or fake it. I remember

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Speaker 1: my first you know, as a graduate. I was getting

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Speaker 1: paid something like forty grand a year in that graduate job,

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Speaker 1: and I remember it straight out of UNI. They were

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Speaker 1: billing me out at like nine hundred dollars a day,

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Speaker 1: and you're like really consciously aware of that. So it's

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Speaker 1: sort of like, you know, I remember sitting in these

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Speaker 1: clients being like, I have no idea what I'm talking

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Speaker 1: about or what these people are talking about, but I'm

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Speaker 1: really consciously aware that they're paying this much money for me,

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Speaker 1: and so already from day one, you're like know, faking

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Speaker 1: it essentially. And I think it's also those skills that

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Speaker 1: then go on to help people later because like, you know,

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Speaker 1: then when you're applying for some big job that you're

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Speaker 1: not sure if you're qualified for, you're like, well, you know,

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Speaker 1: I've kind of been doing work for the last five years,

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Speaker 1: i haven't really been qualified for and convincing people, so

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Speaker 1: you know, like I think it kind of builds that

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Speaker 1: skill set as well. And I think, you know, definitely

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Speaker 1: to be a successful consultant in the early days, you

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Speaker 1: need to just be able to convince people that you're

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Speaker 1: bringing a lot of value even when you may not

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Speaker 1: be bringing that much value to the table to being

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Speaker 1: a management consultant.

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Speaker 2: So I'm sure you are bringing a lot of value,

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Speaker 2: maybe just that you don't necessarily believe that you're bringing

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Speaker 2: a lot of value.

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Speaker 1: Except I remember, like I got this one really funny

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Speaker 1: story that just comes up all the time where I'd

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Speaker 1: gone to work it. It was a rail corp actually

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Speaker 1: for the New Southwest government, and it was actually a

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Speaker 1: technology focused product. And this was back in the day

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Speaker 1: where technology was called it and so anyway, and I

398
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Speaker 1: was like in the project, I was it was a

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Speaker 1: first meeting or se commedty with the clients, and it

400
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Speaker 1: was like meeting and the partner a couple of people

401
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Speaker 1: sitting around the room, and they kept talking about ICT,

402
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Speaker 1: which like obviously today everyone knows information communication technology, which

403
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Speaker 1: is just like what you call it. But I think

404
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Speaker 1: that concept was just coming through at that time. I

405
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Speaker 1: remember when I it was like IC two ict IC

406
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Speaker 1: and then I was like, you know what, Christiana, there

407
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Speaker 1: is no such thing as a stupid question, and you

408
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Speaker 1: just need to talking about And I remember being like,

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Speaker 1: thank you, you know, this is all making sense, but

410
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Speaker 1: because someone just explained to me what ICT means. And

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Speaker 1: I remember the director what sort of spunniest chair around

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Speaker 1: and pointed to his door where it was like he

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Speaker 1: was like director information communication Technology and was like information

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Speaker 1: communication technology, and I was like, and the partner sort

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Speaker 1: of like looked to me and his like like the

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Speaker 1: color all drained out of his face, and I was like,

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Speaker 1: I guess there might be suchleep.

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Speaker 2: It was a stupid question after yes, And it was

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Speaker 2: probably that one.

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Speaker 1: That was kind of like the last time I decided

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Speaker 1: to let my guard down.

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Speaker 2: Oh my god. That's a really really good point about

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Speaker 2: the idea that you know, it's a really important skill set,

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Speaker 2: not necessarily to always have confidence, but to be able

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Speaker 2: to like work through the fact that you don't have

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Speaker 2: confidence and kind of even just fake it until you

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Speaker 2: do have more confidence. Like that's the whole I think,

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Speaker 2: like one of the big keys to success is literally

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Speaker 2: just the ability to deal with yourself doubt in a

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Speaker 2: productive way rather an unproductive way. And I'd love to

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Speaker 2: tie that into sort of how you from management consulting

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Speaker 2: then made a big jump, but not kind of a

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Speaker 2: jump that you know a lot of people would make,

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Speaker 2: like into a different bank or into something that's very

435
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Speaker 2: business startup focused. You kind of went to the United

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Speaker 2: Nations in disaster zones and conflict hotspots in the world,

437
00:19:50,400 --> 00:19:54,840
Speaker 2: and like a massive, massive jump from any any kind

438
00:19:54,840 --> 00:19:57,760
Speaker 2: of career, but particularly from outside of the UN, from

439
00:19:57,840 --> 00:20:01,719
Speaker 2: outside of diplomacy or or war zones or you know.

440
00:20:02,040 --> 00:20:05,320
Speaker 2: I think this is another reason why I'm so excited

441
00:20:05,320 --> 00:20:07,680
Speaker 2: about this interview, because if I hadn't gone into business,

442
00:20:07,760 --> 00:20:09,560
Speaker 2: the way I would have hoped to use my law

443
00:20:09,600 --> 00:20:11,520
Speaker 2: degree was with the UN and we went to visit

444
00:20:11,560 --> 00:20:15,280
Speaker 2: the war tribunals in Arusha for a wander, and like

445
00:20:15,359 --> 00:20:18,560
Speaker 2: that area of I don't love conflict, but I love

446
00:20:18,760 --> 00:20:22,639
Speaker 2: the idea of kind of applying the skills that you

447
00:20:22,720 --> 00:20:24,840
Speaker 2: learn in a conflict zone. And so to talk to

448
00:20:24,880 --> 00:20:27,440
Speaker 2: you is just so unbelievably exciting for me. So how

449
00:20:27,440 --> 00:20:31,800
Speaker 2: did you make such a gigantic jump and what brought

450
00:20:32,040 --> 00:20:34,520
Speaker 2: it about for you? And then of course going into

451
00:20:34,560 --> 00:20:37,040
Speaker 2: a totally different industry, how did you deal with that

452
00:20:37,359 --> 00:20:38,400
Speaker 2: lack of familiarity.

453
00:20:38,640 --> 00:20:40,760
Speaker 1: Yeah, so I think, yeah, it was sort of also

454
00:20:40,760 --> 00:20:42,560
Speaker 1: something that happening in stages, so I didn't really make

455
00:20:42,600 --> 00:20:46,880
Speaker 1: that conscious decision to kind of completely end up doing

456
00:20:46,880 --> 00:20:48,919
Speaker 1: the really extreme work that I ended up doing right

457
00:20:48,960 --> 00:20:51,240
Speaker 1: at the beginning. But you know, essentially, I think i'd

458
00:20:51,240 --> 00:20:54,080
Speaker 1: always heard about this program that the Australian government did.

459
00:20:54,119 --> 00:20:56,280
Speaker 1: It still does it. I'm not sure what it's called today,

460
00:20:56,320 --> 00:20:58,600
Speaker 1: but it was essentially at the time, it was called

461
00:20:58,600 --> 00:21:00,760
Speaker 1: Youth Ambassadors for Development, and I'd heard about it for

462
00:21:00,760 --> 00:21:04,520
Speaker 1: a long time and it was essentially placing people that had,

463
00:21:04,680 --> 00:21:07,159
Speaker 1: you know, some form of work experience into not for

464
00:21:07,200 --> 00:21:10,040
Speaker 1: profits for a year sort of on a volunteer salary

465
00:21:10,200 --> 00:21:12,560
Speaker 1: funded by the Australian government, and so I'd kind of

466
00:21:12,560 --> 00:21:14,440
Speaker 1: heard about this and was always a bit excited about

467
00:21:14,440 --> 00:21:16,359
Speaker 1: the concept, but you know, it was always in the

468
00:21:16,359 --> 00:21:19,359
Speaker 1: back of my head. And then you know, probably I'm

469
00:21:19,359 --> 00:21:21,240
Speaker 1: sure you have a really similar experience of when you

470
00:21:21,280 --> 00:21:23,720
Speaker 1: decided to leave law. But I was living in Bondi

471
00:21:23,840 --> 00:21:25,600
Speaker 1: and Sydney at the time, and I just had this

472
00:21:25,680 --> 00:21:29,080
Speaker 1: one day where it was like thirty degree beautiful sunny

473
00:21:29,119 --> 00:21:31,199
Speaker 1: day and I was in my like suit waiting for

474
00:21:31,240 --> 00:21:33,960
Speaker 1: the bus and it was like crammed on the bus

475
00:21:33,960 --> 00:21:36,560
Speaker 1: on one day road. Everyone's sweating on you standing out,

476
00:21:36,600 --> 00:21:38,399
Speaker 1: you can't get a seat, and then you sort of

477
00:21:38,560 --> 00:21:40,800
Speaker 1: pile off the bus like little lemmings onto the train,

478
00:21:40,920 --> 00:21:43,000
Speaker 1: and then got off the train at Martin Place and

479
00:21:43,040 --> 00:21:46,200
Speaker 1: sort of piled out again and walked down, you know,

480
00:21:46,280 --> 00:21:48,960
Speaker 1: with another like one hundred co working office people to

481
00:21:49,040 --> 00:21:51,720
Speaker 1: like our building, and you know, squashed into an elevator

482
00:21:51,760 --> 00:21:53,879
Speaker 1: and went up the elevator and you know, got out

483
00:21:53,920 --> 00:21:55,919
Speaker 1: into the open plan room and there's two hundred of

484
00:21:55,920 --> 00:21:58,200
Speaker 1: my colleagues and their suits sitting at their computers and

485
00:21:58,640 --> 00:22:02,040
Speaker 1: I just almost his punnic attack of like, oh my god,

486
00:22:02,119 --> 00:22:04,480
Speaker 1: is this like my life, Like I just cannot do

487
00:22:04,600 --> 00:22:07,240
Speaker 1: this any longer, Like I'm sorry, this is so not me.

488
00:22:07,840 --> 00:22:10,200
Speaker 1: And I think I'd really enjoyed like the first couple

489
00:22:10,200 --> 00:22:12,800
Speaker 1: of years of you know, buying my first suit and

490
00:22:12,840 --> 00:22:15,400
Speaker 1: buying my first hair straightener and like you know, buying

491
00:22:15,440 --> 00:22:17,280
Speaker 1: a pair of heels and kind of doing the power

492
00:22:17,320 --> 00:22:20,359
Speaker 1: woman thing. And I'd enjoyed that sort of like you know,

493
00:22:20,400 --> 00:22:23,040
Speaker 1: Friday evening drinks. And but I think at some point

494
00:22:23,200 --> 00:22:25,159
Speaker 1: that novelty had worn off, and I was just like, oh,

495
00:22:25,160 --> 00:22:27,520
Speaker 1: it's just not really me, Like I'm just this isn't

496
00:22:27,560 --> 00:22:30,640
Speaker 1: really who I am. And you know, just making money

497
00:22:30,680 --> 00:22:34,159
Speaker 1: for big companies isn't really like motivating me. And so

498
00:22:34,200 --> 00:22:36,199
Speaker 1: I started having a look at you know, just daydreaming.

499
00:22:36,240 --> 00:22:39,359
Speaker 1: Really I was daydreaming about intrepid holidays in Vietnam, and

500
00:22:39,359 --> 00:22:42,320
Speaker 1: then I was daydreaming about looking up this youth ambassador

501
00:22:42,320 --> 00:22:44,840
Speaker 1: program and looking at placements, and you know, I just

502
00:22:44,880 --> 00:22:47,320
Speaker 1: saw this placement one day that literally sounded like me.

503
00:22:47,440 --> 00:22:51,000
Speaker 1: It was like looking for like economists in a market

504
00:22:51,040 --> 00:22:55,240
Speaker 1: analyst position living in Katman doing Nepal, and I'd actually

505
00:22:55,320 --> 00:22:57,639
Speaker 1: just been on a holiday to Captvin doing Nepal. And

506
00:22:57,640 --> 00:22:59,760
Speaker 1: I have no recollection of this, but the friend that

507
00:22:59,760 --> 00:23:03,320
Speaker 1: I with swears that we were sitting down one day

508
00:23:03,320 --> 00:23:04,840
Speaker 1: and a un car went past and I said to

509
00:23:04,920 --> 00:23:06,159
Speaker 1: him when I'm going to come back and work for

510
00:23:06,200 --> 00:23:09,040
Speaker 1: the un I have no memory of it, but it

511
00:23:09,080 --> 00:23:11,000
Speaker 1: was like six months later and there was this un

512
00:23:11,080 --> 00:23:14,359
Speaker 1: job like in Nepal that seemed really aligned to my

513
00:23:14,400 --> 00:23:17,360
Speaker 1: skill set, so I just applied for it. And actually

514
00:23:17,400 --> 00:23:19,920
Speaker 1: the biggest part of this decision ended up being that

515
00:23:20,520 --> 00:23:23,040
Speaker 1: I'd also been nominated for the Young business Woman of

516
00:23:23,080 --> 00:23:25,719
Speaker 1: the Year award at Deloitte, and of course me at

517
00:23:25,720 --> 00:23:28,159
Speaker 1: this point thinking that like Deloit was like one of

518
00:23:28,160 --> 00:23:32,000
Speaker 1: the pinnacle sort of this was in the entire world,

519
00:23:32,480 --> 00:23:34,480
Speaker 1: and that, you know, me being a Young Businesswman of

520
00:23:34,480 --> 00:23:37,879
Speaker 1: the Year was like extremely important. I just around the

521
00:23:37,920 --> 00:23:39,680
Speaker 1: same time that I had to accept this application, found

522
00:23:39,680 --> 00:23:41,600
Speaker 1: out that I was going to be the winner of

523
00:23:41,600 --> 00:23:44,920
Speaker 1: that for Australia, but they obviously weren't going to award

524
00:23:44,960 --> 00:23:47,239
Speaker 1: it to me if I was about to leave. I

525
00:23:47,280 --> 00:23:50,160
Speaker 1: remember this was like the biggest stressfulest thing, which now

526
00:23:50,200 --> 00:23:52,960
Speaker 1: in your retrospect, I'm like what it was, but at

527
00:23:53,000 --> 00:23:55,040
Speaker 1: the time it felt like I was giving up so

528
00:23:55,240 --> 00:23:58,040
Speaker 1: much and so but yeah, I made the decision basically

529
00:23:58,119 --> 00:24:03,120
Speaker 1: to go, and I did look back sometimes. I don't

530
00:24:03,160 --> 00:24:05,719
Speaker 1: look back today, like there was you know, certain periods

531
00:24:05,760 --> 00:24:07,040
Speaker 1: where I was like, oh my god, I gave up

532
00:24:07,080 --> 00:24:10,040
Speaker 1: that great opportunity, but no, like now in your prospector,

533
00:24:10,040 --> 00:24:12,159
Speaker 1: I was like, you know, like I wouldn't even think that,

534
00:24:12,240 --> 00:24:14,760
Speaker 1: but yeah, and so off I went. It was supposed

535
00:24:14,800 --> 00:24:17,199
Speaker 1: to be a year long program. A year sounded like

536
00:24:17,240 --> 00:24:19,879
Speaker 1: a really long time to me at that time, but

537
00:24:19,920 --> 00:24:23,520
Speaker 1: of course I settled into this crazy life in Katmandu,

538
00:24:23,560 --> 00:24:25,880
Speaker 1: which was like walking to work with like elephants walking

539
00:24:25,880 --> 00:24:28,399
Speaker 1: down the street. And you know, it was I was

540
00:24:28,400 --> 00:24:31,280
Speaker 1: supposed to be this market analyst reviewing at the time,

541
00:24:31,359 --> 00:24:33,840
Speaker 1: it was the high food price crisis, so working with

542
00:24:33,840 --> 00:24:36,640
Speaker 1: the World Bank looking at the impact of food prices

543
00:24:36,680 --> 00:24:39,479
Speaker 1: on small farmers. And it was sort of my second

544
00:24:39,520 --> 00:24:42,439
Speaker 1: week there where I was in a meeting and you know,

545
00:24:42,440 --> 00:24:45,240
Speaker 1: they were discussing like somebody has to go and fly

546
00:24:45,440 --> 00:24:49,800
Speaker 1: in a helicopter and do monitoring of these remote mountainous sites,

547
00:24:49,880 --> 00:24:52,040
Speaker 1: and like nobody wanted to know, like and a Parlis

548
00:24:52,040 --> 00:24:54,240
Speaker 1: all like had their heads down, like trying to hide

549
00:24:54,280 --> 00:24:57,320
Speaker 1: behind these colleagues, like you know, my kind of western

550
00:24:57,359 --> 00:24:59,840
Speaker 1: colleagues that had already been to these areas were like,

551
00:25:00,080 --> 00:25:01,760
Speaker 1: you know, I'm not interested, Like you know, there's no

552
00:25:01,840 --> 00:25:04,280
Speaker 1: running water, you have to sleep in people's houses. And

553
00:25:04,320 --> 00:25:07,800
Speaker 1: I was like pick me. And so you know, I

554
00:25:07,800 --> 00:25:09,320
Speaker 1: don't have been in the job for a few weeks

555
00:25:09,320 --> 00:25:11,679
Speaker 1: when like I was being like flown by helicopter and

556
00:25:11,720 --> 00:25:14,199
Speaker 1: it was like with a local newparlot colleague, and it

557
00:25:14,280 --> 00:25:16,639
Speaker 1: was like basically the job was like you need to

558
00:25:16,760 --> 00:25:19,919
Speaker 1: trek for the next like three weeks from village to village,

559
00:25:20,080 --> 00:25:22,680
Speaker 1: monitor that like our food acisms has got there, and

560
00:25:22,680 --> 00:25:24,919
Speaker 1: then we're gonna give you some coordinates where Helle's coture

561
00:25:24,920 --> 00:25:26,560
Speaker 1: they're gonna pick you up from at the end. And

562
00:25:26,640 --> 00:25:29,959
Speaker 1: I was just like people paying like twenty thousand dollars

563
00:25:29,960 --> 00:25:31,720
Speaker 1: to this kind of trekking adventure and.

564
00:25:31,760 --> 00:25:33,760
Speaker 2: Like, yeah, this is my job.

565
00:25:34,040 --> 00:25:37,320
Speaker 1: I was like I'm sold. Like I couldn't have been

566
00:25:37,400 --> 00:25:41,240
Speaker 1: like more excited or and so that kind of yeah,

567
00:25:41,400 --> 00:25:43,119
Speaker 1: was sort of how that started. And you know, I

568
00:25:43,119 --> 00:25:45,800
Speaker 1: spent about three years in Nepal and it just was

569
00:25:45,800 --> 00:25:50,399
Speaker 1: a really random career where I started it at this

570
00:25:50,560 --> 00:25:55,000
Speaker 1: time where the whole humanitarian environment was going through a

571
00:25:55,080 --> 00:25:58,840
Speaker 1: drastic shift, which was shifting away from giving people things

572
00:25:59,880 --> 00:26:02,920
Speaker 1: like giving people food or giving people shelter in a disaster,

573
00:26:03,160 --> 00:26:07,080
Speaker 1: or giving people water to just trying to where markets

574
00:26:07,119 --> 00:26:09,959
Speaker 1: are functioning, give people cash and letting them sort it out,

575
00:26:10,040 --> 00:26:13,040
Speaker 1: which just seems so obvious today, but it was this

576
00:26:13,200 --> 00:26:16,359
Speaker 1: huge shift that was going on. And the agency I

577
00:26:16,440 --> 00:26:18,879
Speaker 1: was working for called the World Food Program. It's the

578
00:26:18,960 --> 00:26:22,520
Speaker 1: largest humanitarian agency in the world, but it was probably

579
00:26:22,600 --> 00:26:25,960
Speaker 1: at that time about ninety percent men. So the entire

580
00:26:26,000 --> 00:26:29,120
Speaker 1: workforce and the people that made up senior leadership, they

581
00:26:29,119 --> 00:26:33,000
Speaker 1: were logisticitions largely. So it was people that had come

582
00:26:33,040 --> 00:26:34,879
Speaker 1: out of the army that were really good at like

583
00:26:34,960 --> 00:26:37,239
Speaker 1: in a natural disaster there's like a broken bridge, like

584
00:26:37,600 --> 00:26:39,280
Speaker 1: getting a bridge up so they can get a truck

585
00:26:39,280 --> 00:26:41,480
Speaker 1: across it. All people that had come out of sort

586
00:26:41,480 --> 00:26:43,880
Speaker 1: of conflict negotiation where if you're in like a conflict

587
00:26:43,880 --> 00:26:46,800
Speaker 1: and there's five or six different factions, you have to

588
00:26:46,840 --> 00:26:49,680
Speaker 1: deal with negotiating with those factions to get food through.

589
00:26:49,760 --> 00:26:53,200
Speaker 1: And so it was this extremely like masculine, male dominant

590
00:26:53,320 --> 00:26:57,440
Speaker 1: logistics focused organization now being told that they need to

591
00:26:57,760 --> 00:27:00,960
Speaker 1: bring everything into some form of finance you know, how

592
00:27:00,960 --> 00:27:02,600
Speaker 1: do you get cash to people? How can you use

593
00:27:02,680 --> 00:27:06,119
Speaker 1: like mobile technology, like how can you use thumb print technology,

594
00:27:06,200 --> 00:27:10,040
Speaker 1: iris scanning, like how do you get money into people's hands?

595
00:27:10,160 --> 00:27:12,080
Speaker 1: And so like, no one had any idea about money.

596
00:27:12,080 --> 00:27:13,840
Speaker 1: And at some point they were like, oh, Christina, like

597
00:27:13,960 --> 00:27:18,520
Speaker 1: you get economics, like you get like you set up

598
00:27:18,560 --> 00:27:22,200
Speaker 1: these like first systel. So I was like, not quite

599
00:27:22,240 --> 00:27:25,600
Speaker 1: my skill set, but okay. And so I was at

600
00:27:25,640 --> 00:27:28,600
Speaker 1: the real forefront of developing some of these first kind

601
00:27:28,640 --> 00:27:31,080
Speaker 1: of programs in the world. And then that sort of

602
00:27:31,160 --> 00:27:34,000
Speaker 1: just sucked me into this, like you know, suddenly kind

603
00:27:34,040 --> 00:27:35,520
Speaker 1: of the economics work and all that kind of went

604
00:27:35,560 --> 00:27:37,560
Speaker 1: to the side. I sort of got really sucked into

605
00:27:38,160 --> 00:27:42,280
Speaker 1: working in humanitarian emergencies, delivering cash transfers. So I went

606
00:27:42,359 --> 00:27:45,440
Speaker 1: from Nepal, then I went to Rome for a while,

607
00:27:45,440 --> 00:27:48,320
Speaker 1: where I was working where our headquarters were, but being

608
00:27:48,320 --> 00:27:50,560
Speaker 1: sent out to different disasters. So I worked sort of

609
00:27:50,920 --> 00:27:54,600
Speaker 1: in Somalia and North Kenya during the famine, and you know,

610
00:27:54,680 --> 00:27:57,639
Speaker 1: worked on a few different projects, and then eventually got

611
00:27:57,720 --> 00:27:59,840
Speaker 1: sent to Turkey to work on the Seria response. So

612
00:27:59,920 --> 00:28:04,000
Speaker 1: I spent the last sort of six years across Turkey, Jordan,

613
00:28:04,080 --> 00:28:07,359
Speaker 1: Lebanon in Syria, in Iraq working on like you know

614
00:28:07,400 --> 00:28:10,160
Speaker 1: what was the largest custure answer programs ever. So we

615
00:28:10,160 --> 00:28:14,199
Speaker 1: were distributing to millions of people cash, which you know

616
00:28:14,280 --> 00:28:16,400
Speaker 1: doesn't necessarily sound that complicated, but when you think about

617
00:28:16,400 --> 00:28:18,560
Speaker 1: the reality on the ground of you know, many of

618
00:28:18,560 --> 00:28:22,040
Speaker 1: these people never used bank accounts before. People fulle in conflict,

619
00:28:22,119 --> 00:28:26,159
Speaker 1: don't have their ID papers. There's anti terrorism legislation designed

620
00:28:26,160 --> 00:28:28,560
Speaker 1: by the US that if you even get one dollar

621
00:28:28,640 --> 00:28:31,639
Speaker 1: in the hand of somebody who's a terrorist that you know,

622
00:28:31,680 --> 00:28:33,359
Speaker 1: you can actually go to jail for that as a

623
00:28:33,359 --> 00:28:36,639
Speaker 1: person if you're working for the UN. So there's like

624
00:28:36,720 --> 00:28:42,600
Speaker 1: incredibly big challenges to try to resolve in really practical ways.

625
00:28:42,640 --> 00:28:45,000
Speaker 1: Sort of became the focus of what I was working on.

626
00:28:45,080 --> 00:28:48,040
Speaker 2: Then oh my god, I literally if you look at

627
00:28:48,080 --> 00:28:51,320
Speaker 2: your bio, it makes so much sense to go like

628
00:28:51,560 --> 00:28:56,680
Speaker 2: science calm, masters in economics, then Deloitte and then start

629
00:28:56,760 --> 00:28:59,280
Speaker 2: super fun. But then in the middle is just like

630
00:28:59,720 --> 00:29:04,560
Speaker 2: s Gaza, Iraq, Jordan Lebanon, head of operations based out

631
00:29:04,560 --> 00:29:08,840
Speaker 2: of Iraq. Delivery existence when everyone's under seed from isis

632
00:29:08,880 --> 00:29:14,280
Speaker 2: like so rando but incredible, And I think one of

633
00:29:14,280 --> 00:29:17,200
Speaker 2: the things that's really interesting is how male dominated that

634
00:29:17,360 --> 00:29:20,000
Speaker 2: environment is. I think when you think about hamanitarian work,

635
00:29:20,000 --> 00:29:23,000
Speaker 2: you just think about awesome humans helping other humans when

636
00:29:23,040 --> 00:29:26,040
Speaker 2: shit really is going down, But you stop thinking about

637
00:29:26,040 --> 00:29:28,920
Speaker 2: it as a normal workplace, which also has like gender

638
00:29:28,960 --> 00:29:32,040
Speaker 2: inequalities and power and balances and all that kind of thing.

639
00:29:32,120 --> 00:29:35,240
Speaker 2: So the fact that you became a really senior operator,

640
00:29:35,600 --> 00:29:40,280
Speaker 2: like heading up a department in a total totally different market,

641
00:29:40,760 --> 00:29:43,280
Speaker 2: in a totally different sort of set of circumstances than

642
00:29:43,280 --> 00:29:45,800
Speaker 2: you'd ever dealt with back here, how did the self

643
00:29:45,840 --> 00:29:49,000
Speaker 2: doubt play out over there? Like when you're getting becoming

644
00:29:49,000 --> 00:29:53,200
Speaker 2: more and more senior and in this context of like chaos,

645
00:29:53,360 --> 00:29:56,200
Speaker 2: and you know, the fear that most of us have

646
00:29:56,240 --> 00:29:58,560
Speaker 2: at work is like fear about failure or fear about

647
00:29:58,560 --> 00:30:01,400
Speaker 2: looking silly, you're also facing like actual fear about like

648
00:30:01,640 --> 00:30:04,680
Speaker 2: being shelled. And how was that environment?

649
00:30:05,040 --> 00:30:08,840
Speaker 1: It was absolutely crazy and absolutely rogue. I think that

650
00:30:08,960 --> 00:30:12,200
Speaker 1: was the people hear the un and they think one thing,

651
00:30:12,320 --> 00:30:15,760
Speaker 1: But the reality is it is an extremely vogue environment.

652
00:30:15,760 --> 00:30:18,760
Speaker 1: And the more kind of challenging the context, the more

653
00:30:19,000 --> 00:30:22,360
Speaker 1: rogue that that environment becomes. And there's a few aspects

654
00:30:22,360 --> 00:30:25,600
Speaker 1: of it I think that really reflecting compared to Australian culture.

655
00:30:25,680 --> 00:30:28,160
Speaker 1: So one is that it's virtually impossible to fire anyone

656
00:30:28,240 --> 00:30:31,200
Speaker 1: in the UN. It's a criminal level of responsibility. They

657
00:30:31,240 --> 00:30:35,120
Speaker 1: have to commit a crime essentially, So things like chronic

658
00:30:35,200 --> 00:30:39,400
Speaker 1: sexual harasses, chronic kind of bullying, workplace bullying, like these

659
00:30:39,560 --> 00:30:42,520
Speaker 1: not really fiable offenses in the UN. And then on

660
00:30:42,560 --> 00:30:45,640
Speaker 1: top of that, it's a really interesting culture because there's

661
00:30:45,720 --> 00:30:48,960
Speaker 1: no sort of country cultural norm Like if you're working

662
00:30:48,960 --> 00:30:51,800
Speaker 1: in Europe or you're working in Australia, you've got you know,

663
00:30:52,000 --> 00:30:54,800
Speaker 1: really strong cultures around like what those workplaces should be like.

664
00:30:55,200 --> 00:30:57,920
Speaker 1: But when you're operating like in a conflict zone, it's like,

665
00:30:58,000 --> 00:31:00,720
Speaker 1: what is the culture of that place? It's not the

666
00:31:00,760 --> 00:31:03,480
Speaker 1: culture of the country, it's not the culture of you know,

667
00:31:03,560 --> 00:31:06,200
Speaker 1: one of the you know, a European country. It's and

668
00:31:06,440 --> 00:31:08,960
Speaker 1: so I think it's sort of this these factors and

669
00:31:09,000 --> 00:31:12,640
Speaker 1: then just really extreme power imbalances. So one of the

670
00:31:12,680 --> 00:31:15,360
Speaker 1: problems with the UN was that they'd initially had these

671
00:31:15,440 --> 00:31:18,840
Speaker 1: really strong employment contracts, which means that people that are

672
00:31:18,840 --> 00:31:21,680
Speaker 1: permanent employees you cannot get rid of them. So as

673
00:31:21,680 --> 00:31:24,160
Speaker 1: an employment workforce, the way they sort of worked around

674
00:31:24,200 --> 00:31:27,920
Speaker 1: this is to them put everyone else on consulting contractor contracts,

675
00:31:28,280 --> 00:31:32,360
Speaker 1: which just makes these really big power imbalances between people

676
00:31:32,360 --> 00:31:34,760
Speaker 1: in leadership and everyone else in the workforce. And so

677
00:31:35,600 --> 00:31:38,720
Speaker 1: I think that all these factors combine, you get these

678
00:31:39,000 --> 00:31:41,160
Speaker 1: like things that happen in the workplace would just never

679
00:31:41,200 --> 00:31:44,440
Speaker 1: ever happened in Australia. That just shocked me. So for instance,

680
00:31:44,560 --> 00:31:48,000
Speaker 1: like I had every single country director, maybe bar one

681
00:31:48,040 --> 00:31:50,560
Speaker 1: who I worked for, like had tried to sleep as

682
00:31:50,560 --> 00:31:55,000
Speaker 1: an employee really overt way. It's like I had, you know,

683
00:31:55,200 --> 00:31:56,880
Speaker 1: this is like the most senior represent in the unit

684
00:31:56,880 --> 00:31:59,520
Speaker 1: in the country, like you know, smssing, like come over

685
00:31:59,600 --> 00:32:02,520
Speaker 1: to my house. So I'm like not even this, like

686
00:32:02,560 --> 00:32:06,080
Speaker 1: are you crazy, because you know, and this is bizarre,

687
00:32:06,400 --> 00:32:10,080
Speaker 1: Like I had to manage these kind of like harassments

688
00:32:10,120 --> 00:32:12,320
Speaker 1: and things that in Australia, Like you know, I remember

689
00:32:12,320 --> 00:32:15,360
Speaker 1: working at Deloit, like the officers were all glass for

690
00:32:15,400 --> 00:32:18,120
Speaker 1: the reason that you know, they didn't want any impropriety.

691
00:32:18,280 --> 00:32:20,320
Speaker 1: They were so concerned about these issues that you weren't

692
00:32:20,320 --> 00:32:22,320
Speaker 1: even you know, you had to be in glass meeting rooms.

693
00:32:22,320 --> 00:32:24,640
Speaker 1: You couldn't even be in private meeting rooms. And so

694
00:32:25,000 --> 00:32:28,160
Speaker 1: that was like you know, I think constantly throughout like

695
00:32:28,200 --> 00:32:30,520
Speaker 1: my seven eight years at Deloit, it was you know,

696
00:32:30,640 --> 00:32:32,600
Speaker 1: being the woman in that in that situation that so

697
00:32:32,600 --> 00:32:34,880
Speaker 1: many of us have been in where you're like trying

698
00:32:34,880 --> 00:32:37,880
Speaker 1: not to hurt people's egos, trying to like keep them

699
00:32:37,920 --> 00:32:40,120
Speaker 1: out of your whole to your hotel room. Like you know,

700
00:32:40,160 --> 00:32:43,680
Speaker 1: I had situations where like five male colleagues were like

701
00:32:43,840 --> 00:32:46,600
Speaker 1: trying to get my hotel room card from the front desk,

702
00:32:46,680 --> 00:32:49,000
Speaker 1: like because they were all doing trying to get into

703
00:32:49,040 --> 00:32:51,640
Speaker 1: a room, and like you know, the room calling me,

704
00:32:51,720 --> 00:32:54,360
Speaker 1: and then the personal reception feeling bullied, and I'm like,

705
00:32:54,920 --> 00:32:58,120
Speaker 1: you know, like it's just just really really extreme things

706
00:32:58,120 --> 00:33:01,719
Speaker 1: happening all the time in the workplace environment. And then

707
00:33:01,840 --> 00:33:03,479
Speaker 1: I think if you add on that the pressure of

708
00:33:04,000 --> 00:33:06,720
Speaker 1: over time, people that become really good at emergency work

709
00:33:06,800 --> 00:33:10,440
Speaker 1: kind of get stuck into emergency work, and so start

710
00:33:10,480 --> 00:33:12,920
Speaker 1: working for people who have spent the last seven years

711
00:33:12,920 --> 00:33:16,240
Speaker 1: in conflict zones. Their families obviously aren't there, they're in

712
00:33:16,480 --> 00:33:20,440
Speaker 1: locations nearby, so they're completely becoming separated from their friends,

713
00:33:20,520 --> 00:33:23,480
Speaker 1: their families, and the mental health effects on that, and

714
00:33:23,520 --> 00:33:26,120
Speaker 1: then what that leads to in the workplace. So just

715
00:33:26,200 --> 00:33:30,800
Speaker 1: also levels of bullying, like yelling, Like I started a

716
00:33:30,840 --> 00:33:33,680
Speaker 1: job one day, remember my really senior boss who was

717
00:33:33,720 --> 00:33:36,160
Speaker 1: also the head of the country at that time, picking

718
00:33:36,240 --> 00:33:38,520
Speaker 1: up a phone, ripping out the worlds, throwing at someone

719
00:33:38,880 --> 00:33:41,040
Speaker 1: and hitting the wall on my first day, like and

720
00:33:41,160 --> 00:33:45,000
Speaker 1: you just like, this isn't okay, Like everyone calm down.

721
00:33:45,760 --> 00:33:49,240
Speaker 1: So I think, like, yeah, the operating environment was really different,

722
00:33:49,880 --> 00:33:52,280
Speaker 1: and I think the reason I thrived was, you know,

723
00:33:52,400 --> 00:33:54,760
Speaker 1: it was hard, but I think also I was I

724
00:33:54,840 --> 00:33:58,400
Speaker 1: was really young and female for my role, really working

725
00:33:58,440 --> 00:34:00,719
Speaker 1: in the Middle East, and I think it actually ended

726
00:34:00,800 --> 00:34:03,320
Speaker 1: up working in my favor. So I was just really

727
00:34:03,360 --> 00:34:07,320
Speaker 1: able to negotiate well, work with governments well. And I

728
00:34:07,360 --> 00:34:10,279
Speaker 1: think in part it was because people just weren't used

729
00:34:10,280 --> 00:34:13,239
Speaker 1: to handling a young a young woman, and you would

730
00:34:13,239 --> 00:34:15,200
Speaker 1: think potentially that could work against you, but I think

731
00:34:15,239 --> 00:34:18,799
Speaker 1: it was very disarming people and you know, sort of

732
00:34:18,840 --> 00:34:21,719
Speaker 1: being out of those like ego wars that sometimes go on,

733
00:34:22,320 --> 00:34:25,200
Speaker 1: I felt I'd actually just get a lot done. So

734
00:34:25,960 --> 00:34:28,440
Speaker 1: I think it did work in my favor in the end.

735
00:34:28,480 --> 00:34:32,920
Speaker 1: But it was definitely just this wild context and you

736
00:34:32,920 --> 00:34:35,440
Speaker 1: know also what that you know, and I lived in

737
00:34:35,520 --> 00:34:37,560
Speaker 1: Iraq on the end I was living on a military

738
00:34:37,600 --> 00:34:40,560
Speaker 1: base with about two thousand men and there was three

739
00:34:40,640 --> 00:34:43,799
Speaker 1: or four with Oh my god, it was just like

740
00:34:45,160 --> 00:34:47,560
Speaker 1: luckily a bunch of them were they're fig and peacekeepers

741
00:34:47,600 --> 00:34:50,440
Speaker 1: who were just like amazing, but just like a really,

742
00:34:50,760 --> 00:34:54,560
Speaker 1: you know, a really different culture to what you would

743
00:34:54,560 --> 00:34:58,400
Speaker 1: be living in Australia in terms of a workplace, and

744
00:34:58,440 --> 00:35:00,200
Speaker 1: you know all the boys that go along with of

745
00:35:00,320 --> 00:35:02,560
Speaker 1: living with people and working with them and like being

746
00:35:02,560 --> 00:35:05,920
Speaker 1: in confined spaces with them at all times, and then

747
00:35:06,040 --> 00:35:09,200
Speaker 1: just the bizarreness of you know, the way that your

748
00:35:09,239 --> 00:35:11,440
Speaker 1: life looks like at that point is you work twenty

749
00:35:11,480 --> 00:35:13,279
Speaker 1: days on and then you have seven days off. And

750
00:35:13,360 --> 00:35:16,000
Speaker 1: so my life at that point looked on half Austrian

751
00:35:16,560 --> 00:35:19,000
Speaker 1: and so my life at that point looked like twenty

752
00:35:19,120 --> 00:35:21,800
Speaker 1: days on a military base, basically living in a bunker,

753
00:35:21,920 --> 00:35:26,480
Speaker 1: working in a bunker, bad Dad, and then traveling in

754
00:35:26,520 --> 00:35:29,240
Speaker 1: what's called a hippo which is like a bomb proof

755
00:35:29,840 --> 00:35:33,960
Speaker 1: vehicle to a airport, and then flying to Switzerland and

756
00:35:34,000 --> 00:35:36,320
Speaker 1: meeting my Austrian cousin and going skiing for seven days

757
00:35:37,440 --> 00:35:40,200
Speaker 1: and then coming back and it like I think, you know,

758
00:35:40,200 --> 00:35:42,200
Speaker 1: I loved that about the career at the beginning, like

759
00:35:42,280 --> 00:35:45,839
Speaker 1: I was like, this is like amazing, and then I

760
00:35:45,880 --> 00:35:49,240
Speaker 1: think by the time I was like getting ready to leave,

761
00:35:49,560 --> 00:35:52,600
Speaker 1: I was like, oh, this is just fucked up, Like

762
00:35:53,400 --> 00:35:56,480
Speaker 1: this is just like bad. Like I was like, you know,

763
00:35:56,640 --> 00:35:59,600
Speaker 1: my cousin's finishing her ski trip and going back to

764
00:35:59,680 --> 00:36:02,320
Speaker 1: her job. Actually she was a management consultants as well,

765
00:36:02,600 --> 00:36:04,759
Speaker 1: you know, in Vienna, And I was like, oh, that

766
00:36:04,800 --> 00:36:08,160
Speaker 1: sounds quite nice, you know yeah. And I think just

767
00:36:08,200 --> 00:36:10,120
Speaker 1: all that stuff at some point, like you can either

768
00:36:10,120 --> 00:36:12,080
Speaker 1: mentally deal with it or you can just never quite

769
00:36:12,120 --> 00:36:14,120
Speaker 1: reconcile these things. And I think I was always in

770
00:36:14,160 --> 00:36:17,400
Speaker 1: the place of like this is like a fun experience

771
00:36:17,480 --> 00:36:20,560
Speaker 1: or a different experience. But you know, Roo was calling

772
00:36:20,600 --> 00:36:21,800
Speaker 1: me as hom I think.

773
00:36:21,920 --> 00:36:26,000
Speaker 2: Hm, it's so interesting because even just in those two chapters,

774
00:36:26,040 --> 00:36:29,759
Speaker 2: it's like, what was gratifying and successful for you at

775
00:36:29,800 --> 00:36:34,920
Speaker 2: Deloitte then was like completely opposite in this globally meaningful

776
00:36:35,000 --> 00:36:39,279
Speaker 2: but like fast paced, crazy rogue environment you know, overseas.

777
00:36:39,400 --> 00:36:41,680
Speaker 2: And then there comes a point for many people, yeah,

778
00:36:41,719 --> 00:36:44,520
Speaker 2: when you're like okay, and now I need some normality.

779
00:36:44,560 --> 00:36:47,080
Speaker 2: But one thing I would love to know, and oh

780
00:36:47,120 --> 00:36:48,440
Speaker 2: my god, I can literally speak to you about that

781
00:36:48,520 --> 00:36:50,600
Speaker 2: chapter just for a whole separate episode. I'll have to

782
00:36:50,600 --> 00:36:52,279
Speaker 2: call you back one day because this stuff suspends me

783
00:36:52,320 --> 00:36:55,399
Speaker 2: so much. But the idea that like one of the

784
00:36:55,480 --> 00:36:58,520
Speaker 2: things I've found with friends who have been with the

785
00:36:58,600 --> 00:37:00,520
Speaker 2: UN or have been in the military and then like

786
00:37:00,560 --> 00:37:02,680
Speaker 2: come back, like get to the point in their life

787
00:37:02,680 --> 00:37:05,200
Speaker 2: where it's costing them too much and they want some

788
00:37:05,280 --> 00:37:09,040
Speaker 2: normality and they come home. But the pace of life

789
00:37:09,280 --> 00:37:11,520
Speaker 2: that your body has become used to, in the level

790
00:37:11,520 --> 00:37:14,799
Speaker 2: of adrenaline, it's almost like you get addicted to that

791
00:37:14,880 --> 00:37:16,880
Speaker 2: conflict zone and you get addicted to that minute to

792
00:37:16,920 --> 00:37:20,279
Speaker 2: minute thinking, and then it's really dull when you come

793
00:37:20,320 --> 00:37:22,640
Speaker 2: back to safety and it's hard to sort of Readjust

794
00:37:23,400 --> 00:37:27,759
Speaker 2: did you a kind of reach a point where you

795
00:37:27,880 --> 00:37:30,440
Speaker 2: just knew that you were done with that chapter? Did

796
00:37:30,520 --> 00:37:32,400
Speaker 2: you face that fork in the road again of like

797
00:37:32,440 --> 00:37:35,080
Speaker 2: what am I leaving behind to come back just to

798
00:37:35,280 --> 00:37:39,399
Speaker 2: just Australia kind of after like literally saving lives and

799
00:37:39,480 --> 00:37:42,759
Speaker 2: then yeah, that pace of chaos that you got used to,

800
00:37:42,800 --> 00:37:45,480
Speaker 2: you know, you came back to something that's superannuation is

801
00:37:45,560 --> 00:37:48,359
Speaker 2: kind of a very stable It's not like, I mean,

802
00:37:48,400 --> 00:37:52,320
Speaker 2: it's not stable, but it's a very stable topic in general,

803
00:37:52,360 --> 00:37:54,640
Speaker 2: you know, it doesn't involve a lot of global conflict

804
00:37:54,800 --> 00:37:59,560
Speaker 2: or bombs or living in bunkers. Like what was the adjustment?

805
00:38:00,800 --> 00:38:04,040
Speaker 1: Yeah, it was definitely those I had all those feels,

806
00:38:04,080 --> 00:38:06,680
Speaker 1: so like it took me really like two years to

807
00:38:07,280 --> 00:38:09,840
Speaker 1: really pull myself out. So I guess it was a

808
00:38:09,840 --> 00:38:11,960
Speaker 1: couple of stages. So because I've been working conflict for

809
00:38:12,040 --> 00:38:14,279
Speaker 1: quite a while, I ended up having to, I think,

810
00:38:14,360 --> 00:38:16,400
Speaker 1: take it. There was like a mandatory like six month

811
00:38:16,440 --> 00:38:19,279
Speaker 1: break or something that I had to take. And so

812
00:38:19,719 --> 00:38:22,319
Speaker 1: I actually at that time decided we'll take a year off.

813
00:38:22,360 --> 00:38:25,600
Speaker 1: And I was becoming really passionate about climate change and

814
00:38:26,040 --> 00:38:27,600
Speaker 1: climate actually, I guess having worked in a lot of

815
00:38:27,680 --> 00:38:30,480
Speaker 1: natural disasters, and so I made the decision. I had

816
00:38:30,520 --> 00:38:32,400
Speaker 1: money saved, I was like, I'll come back to Australia

817
00:38:32,400 --> 00:38:35,280
Speaker 1: for a year. I just wanted to volunteer in meaningful

818
00:38:35,280 --> 00:38:38,200
Speaker 1: climate work, which was this just amazing opportunity. So it

819
00:38:38,239 --> 00:38:41,239
Speaker 1: was like I came back and I just found like

820
00:38:41,560 --> 00:38:44,080
Speaker 1: really small enjuries that I thought we were doing really impactful

821
00:38:44,120 --> 00:38:47,239
Speaker 1: work and volunteered for them. That was a great thing

822
00:38:47,320 --> 00:38:48,719
Speaker 1: for a year, and I think in my head I'd

823
00:38:48,760 --> 00:38:50,120
Speaker 1: said I was gonna do this for a year. I'll

824
00:38:50,160 --> 00:38:53,560
Speaker 1: do this and then I'll stay. But towards the end

825
00:38:53,600 --> 00:38:57,239
Speaker 1: of that period, I couldn't quite reconcile my new life.

826
00:38:57,520 --> 00:38:59,480
Speaker 1: I was, yeah, I was struggling with pace. I was

827
00:38:59,520 --> 00:39:03,280
Speaker 1: struggling with with what felt meaningful. I felt really detached

828
00:39:03,320 --> 00:39:07,080
Speaker 1: still from my friends and family, like mentally detached a

829
00:39:07,080 --> 00:39:10,200
Speaker 1: bit from life in Australia. And so I did that

830
00:39:10,239 --> 00:39:12,640
Speaker 1: work and that was bizarrely what got me into superannuation

831
00:39:12,840 --> 00:39:15,440
Speaker 1: because I was working for a non profit Cord three

832
00:39:15,520 --> 00:39:17,920
Speaker 1: fifty dot org, and they were doing it's bizarre to

833
00:39:17,920 --> 00:39:19,680
Speaker 1: think about the six years ago, but they were trying

834
00:39:19,680 --> 00:39:22,920
Speaker 1: to campaign to get people to leave banks and put

835
00:39:22,920 --> 00:39:24,960
Speaker 1: pressure on their banks and super funds that were investing

836
00:39:25,000 --> 00:39:27,840
Speaker 1: in fossil fuels. And the biggest thing they had was

837
00:39:27,880 --> 00:39:32,440
Speaker 1: that in Australia, two Prenuation controls half the ASX or,

838
00:39:32,480 --> 00:39:34,400
Speaker 1: it owns almost half the Australian Stock Exchange, so that

839
00:39:34,560 --> 00:39:37,000
Speaker 1: is like the biggest pool of capital in Australia. And

840
00:39:37,040 --> 00:39:39,840
Speaker 1: at that time there was no superhannuation fund that wasn't

841
00:39:39,960 --> 00:39:44,000
Speaker 1: investing in fossil fuels at all, none, not one. We

842
00:39:44,040 --> 00:39:47,279
Speaker 1: were doing this really successful campaigning on the banking side,

843
00:39:47,320 --> 00:39:49,680
Speaker 1: like getting people to go into the banks and telling

844
00:39:49,719 --> 00:39:51,960
Speaker 1: staff we're gonna, you know, cutting up their credit cards

845
00:39:51,960 --> 00:39:53,720
Speaker 1: and something, we're leaving you and we're going to Bendigo,

846
00:39:53,760 --> 00:39:56,640
Speaker 1: bang Call, We're going to whoever. But there was we

847
00:39:56,680 --> 00:39:58,520
Speaker 1: couldn't do that on the superside because there was no

848
00:39:58,600 --> 00:40:00,960
Speaker 1: one and so bizally, what got me into Super was

849
00:40:00,960 --> 00:40:02,840
Speaker 1: that I met a couple of guys that were starting

850
00:40:03,239 --> 00:40:06,040
Speaker 1: the first fossil fuel free super fun called Future Super,

851
00:40:06,640 --> 00:40:09,160
Speaker 1: and so I ended up kind of working with them

852
00:40:09,239 --> 00:40:11,719
Speaker 1: to help them get that off the ground. Just sort

853
00:40:11,719 --> 00:40:14,799
Speaker 1: of threw like, Okay, well this seems impactful now on

854
00:40:14,840 --> 00:40:17,279
Speaker 1: this kind of year off what was bizarrely how I

855
00:40:17,320 --> 00:40:19,239
Speaker 1: got into Super in the first place and being on

856
00:40:19,280 --> 00:40:21,760
Speaker 1: their board. But yeah, I guess back to your question

857
00:40:21,960 --> 00:40:24,120
Speaker 1: was that once that was set up, I still had

858
00:40:24,160 --> 00:40:27,040
Speaker 1: this like what am I doing? Like I'm just working

859
00:40:27,080 --> 00:40:29,759
Speaker 1: back in an office. And at the same time, you know,

860
00:40:29,880 --> 00:40:32,640
Speaker 1: Syria was really a program that I'd tried to get

861
00:40:32,680 --> 00:40:35,719
Speaker 1: funding for I couldn't get funding for. Suddenly because all

862
00:40:35,760 --> 00:40:39,640
Speaker 1: these refugees were going into Europe, the European government decided

863
00:40:39,680 --> 00:40:42,440
Speaker 1: to They literally picked up a project proposal that I'd

864
00:40:42,480 --> 00:40:45,080
Speaker 1: asked for fifty million dollars for a pilot two years

865
00:40:45,120 --> 00:40:47,040
Speaker 1: before and said we're going to fund this with a

866
00:40:47,080 --> 00:40:50,520
Speaker 1: billion dollars. So it was like, you know, my old

867
00:40:50,520 --> 00:40:54,120
Speaker 1: boss was like, can you please come back? And then

868
00:40:54,239 --> 00:40:56,360
Speaker 1: I'd also just to throw in another thing that probably

869
00:40:56,360 --> 00:40:58,040
Speaker 1: wasn't even on my LinkedIn, but I just ran for

870
00:40:58,120 --> 00:41:03,040
Speaker 1: parliament at that point. Oh Chrissy. I'd just run for

871
00:41:03,080 --> 00:41:05,439
Speaker 1: the Greens in Canberra, and the main reason I'd run

872
00:41:05,480 --> 00:41:07,720
Speaker 1: that was that there was a really conservative, a liberal

873
00:41:07,719 --> 00:41:09,400
Speaker 1: senator I was trying to get out who was no

874
00:41:09,400 --> 00:41:11,360
Speaker 1: one of those guys that you know, brought a calling

875
00:41:11,400 --> 00:41:13,960
Speaker 1: to parliament. Anyway, at this point, I'd kind of gone

876
00:41:13,960 --> 00:41:15,879
Speaker 1: through my savings, not having worked for a year, done

877
00:41:15,880 --> 00:41:19,680
Speaker 1: a political campaign, done all my volunteering, helped seth with

878
00:41:19,760 --> 00:41:21,560
Speaker 1: super Fund, and then I was sort of like okay,

879
00:41:21,719 --> 00:41:23,960
Speaker 1: like I'm I think I hadn't settled, and I was

880
00:41:24,000 --> 00:41:26,759
Speaker 1: also like, you know, this job was there, and so

881
00:41:26,800 --> 00:41:29,880
Speaker 1: I went back and did and helped establish that. For

882
00:41:29,920 --> 00:41:32,240
Speaker 1: a couple of years. I knew I had to go home,

883
00:41:32,360 --> 00:41:34,879
Speaker 1: Like I knew that, like every time I was coming home,

884
00:41:35,080 --> 00:41:37,560
Speaker 1: I was feeling more detached and I knew that if

885
00:41:37,600 --> 00:41:41,440
Speaker 1: I couldn't stay now, I just would never be able

886
00:41:41,480 --> 00:41:44,040
Speaker 1: to go home. And so yeah, I did that for

887
00:41:44,080 --> 00:41:46,120
Speaker 1: a bit and then I came back and it was

888
00:41:46,120 --> 00:41:48,160
Speaker 1: actually when I came back that I'd been thinking about

889
00:41:48,200 --> 00:41:50,120
Speaker 1: the women Super Fun. So because I'd ended up on

890
00:41:50,160 --> 00:41:52,880
Speaker 1: the bard or this other Superhnoation fund, I guess I

891
00:41:52,920 --> 00:41:55,319
Speaker 1: was more becoming more passionate about like the power of

892
00:41:55,960 --> 00:41:58,680
Speaker 1: you know, being out invest capital in really good interesting

893
00:41:58,760 --> 00:42:03,080
Speaker 1: things apt investing, and had also another topic that wasn't

894
00:42:03,080 --> 00:42:05,840
Speaker 1: really being talked about then. Had become aware of the

895
00:42:05,880 --> 00:42:08,040
Speaker 1: super gap between men and women, which now is something

896
00:42:08,040 --> 00:42:10,040
Speaker 1: that we talk a lot about, but at that time

897
00:42:10,040 --> 00:42:12,520
Speaker 1: it wasn't really on the radar. And so I think

898
00:42:12,560 --> 00:42:14,960
Speaker 1: I'd been mulling this idea of like, well, what would

899
00:42:14,960 --> 00:42:17,719
Speaker 1: like an impact focus super fun look like that was

900
00:42:17,760 --> 00:42:21,600
Speaker 1: focused on women, focused around sort of financial education and coaching,

901
00:42:22,040 --> 00:42:24,680
Speaker 1: focused around advocacy, and then focus on like how can

902
00:42:24,719 --> 00:42:28,880
Speaker 1: we drive impact investing around gender. And I'd been thinking

903
00:42:28,880 --> 00:42:31,280
Speaker 1: about and mulling it, and I came back to Australia

904
00:42:31,320 --> 00:42:34,520
Speaker 1: on a holiday and you know, I started exploring that

905
00:42:35,000 --> 00:42:37,959
Speaker 1: opportunity and then I had that real slarting door moment

906
00:42:38,000 --> 00:42:40,640
Speaker 1: again where you and HCR had emailed me and there

907
00:42:40,680 --> 00:42:43,560
Speaker 1: was like this fantastic job in Kenya and we need you,

908
00:42:43,800 --> 00:42:45,480
Speaker 1: and you know, at the same time I was doing

909
00:42:45,480 --> 00:42:47,000
Speaker 1: all my medical tests to get ready to go to

910
00:42:47,040 --> 00:42:50,359
Speaker 1: that job. I was doing all the analysis and trying

911
00:42:50,360 --> 00:42:51,719
Speaker 1: to see if I'd be able to get this super

912
00:42:51,760 --> 00:42:55,160
Speaker 1: fund up. And it was this huge sliding door moment

913
00:42:55,200 --> 00:42:57,520
Speaker 1: of do I go or do S day? And I

914
00:42:57,560 --> 00:43:00,320
Speaker 1: think for me, yeah, it was this moment of a

915
00:43:00,480 --> 00:43:03,000
Speaker 1: I knew that if I didn't stay now, I'd probably

916
00:43:03,000 --> 00:43:05,520
Speaker 1: never come back, but b it was like I'd found

917
00:43:05,560 --> 00:43:08,440
Speaker 1: something that I was like, I think I can like

918
00:43:08,480 --> 00:43:10,480
Speaker 1: seek my teeth into this in Australia now, and I

919
00:43:10,480 --> 00:43:12,880
Speaker 1: think this is going to be really impactful. And so

920
00:43:13,040 --> 00:43:17,440
Speaker 1: that was like ultimately it was a big step to stay,

921
00:43:17,520 --> 00:43:19,839
Speaker 1: but I stayed, and yeah, that became.

922
00:43:20,080 --> 00:43:28,640
Speaker 2: Babies found your yayyay. I just get goosebumps thinking about

923
00:43:29,200 --> 00:43:33,879
Speaker 2: like how meaningful and how just perfectly suited you are

924
00:43:33,960 --> 00:43:37,560
Speaker 2: as the person to bring the first Subernovation Fund for

925
00:43:37,600 --> 00:43:41,640
Speaker 2: women to Australia, But how you could never have just

926
00:43:41,680 --> 00:43:43,239
Speaker 2: done that at the start of your career, Like it

927
00:43:43,280 --> 00:43:46,160
Speaker 2: took all of this to mull all of the things

928
00:43:46,200 --> 00:43:49,680
Speaker 2: that needed to happen for verb super to come to lie.

929
00:43:49,800 --> 00:43:51,600
Speaker 2: Like that just gives me goosebumps. That's just what I

930
00:43:51,680 --> 00:43:55,360
Speaker 2: love about these stories is that it took all of

931
00:43:55,400 --> 00:43:57,600
Speaker 2: your life experience to get you to this point where

932
00:43:57,640 --> 00:43:59,360
Speaker 2: it felt right and where there was the chance for

933
00:43:59,360 --> 00:44:01,840
Speaker 2: a sliding doors moment. That so much so that like

934
00:44:01,960 --> 00:44:03,840
Speaker 2: you know, a couple of months before you founded it,

935
00:44:03,880 --> 00:44:05,200
Speaker 2: you couldn't have known that you were going to do that,

936
00:44:05,239 --> 00:44:06,120
Speaker 2: And that to me is just.

937
00:44:06,080 --> 00:44:07,640
Speaker 1: Like so magical.

938
00:44:08,120 --> 00:44:09,840
Speaker 2: I will justly spent the whole episode not on the

939
00:44:09,840 --> 00:44:11,120
Speaker 2: thing that you do now, which is not what I

940
00:44:11,160 --> 00:44:13,560
Speaker 2: intended to do, but just because like it just it

941
00:44:13,600 --> 00:44:17,759
Speaker 2: makes me so excited that people do find the thing

942
00:44:17,800 --> 00:44:19,799
Speaker 2: that they're supposed to do, but that looks different at

943
00:44:19,840 --> 00:44:21,160
Speaker 2: lots of different chapters.

944
00:44:20,840 --> 00:44:22,799
Speaker 1: Of your life totally. And I think something that's really

945
00:44:22,800 --> 00:44:25,080
Speaker 1: funny about well, not really funny, but I do reflect

946
00:44:25,080 --> 00:44:27,600
Speaker 1: on it, is like I remember when we first launched Verve,

947
00:44:27,680 --> 00:44:29,360
Speaker 1: and I think for the first like three months, we

948
00:44:29,480 --> 00:44:33,839
Speaker 1: literally had more people contacting us saying congratulations, like we

949
00:44:33,920 --> 00:44:35,799
Speaker 1: had this idea. I had that idea as well, and

950
00:44:35,800 --> 00:44:38,040
Speaker 1: we never did it. Then we actually had new members

951
00:44:38,080 --> 00:44:43,040
Speaker 1: coming in. It was like like so many people reaching out,

952
00:44:43,160 --> 00:44:46,120
Speaker 1: and all I could reflect on was that, you know,

953
00:44:46,239 --> 00:44:49,319
Speaker 1: if i'd actually worked up through the Superinnuation system. I

954
00:44:49,320 --> 00:44:52,080
Speaker 1: think people that were in that system, so many of

955
00:44:52,120 --> 00:44:54,839
Speaker 1: them had the idea, but they could also see like

956
00:44:55,360 --> 00:44:57,960
Speaker 1: all the challenges and all the complexity, like way more

957
00:44:58,000 --> 00:45:00,719
Speaker 1: clearly than me because they were like more embedded in

958
00:45:00,719 --> 00:45:04,200
Speaker 1: the industry, whereas because I came into it sideways, Like

959
00:45:04,239 --> 00:45:07,080
Speaker 1: I did have an involvement in Superinnuation obviously at that point,

960
00:45:07,480 --> 00:45:09,680
Speaker 1: but I was completely unaware of how hard it was

961
00:45:09,719 --> 00:45:12,160
Speaker 1: going to be, Like I just, you know, I did

962
00:45:12,200 --> 00:45:14,319
Speaker 1: not know that. And also because I guess because I've

963
00:45:14,320 --> 00:45:16,239
Speaker 1: done all these other things, like I felt like, you know,

964
00:45:16,280 --> 00:45:19,239
Speaker 1: I can overcome challenges. But in the end, like I

965
00:45:19,239 --> 00:45:22,040
Speaker 1: think it was almost like a superpower because if I'd

966
00:45:22,080 --> 00:45:23,960
Speaker 1: known how hard it was coming, I don't know if

967
00:45:23,960 --> 00:45:25,000
Speaker 1: we would have done it. You know.

968
00:45:25,960 --> 00:45:29,360
Speaker 2: I often think that naivity is like a really important

969
00:45:29,480 --> 00:45:32,640
Speaker 2: ingredient sometimes in embarking on a new venture, because yeah,

970
00:45:32,719 --> 00:45:35,360
Speaker 2: if you're too aware of all the risks, like sometimes

971
00:45:35,360 --> 00:45:37,920
Speaker 2: it's better just rip the band tad and do it.

972
00:45:39,080 --> 00:45:43,040
Speaker 2: But I mean I've read it variously described as Australian

973
00:45:43,080 --> 00:45:46,280
Speaker 2: women retiring with about thirty seven percent. I've read forty

974
00:45:46,320 --> 00:45:49,440
Speaker 2: seven percent. Either way, Having you know, thirty to forty

975
00:45:49,480 --> 00:45:51,960
Speaker 2: to nearly fifty percent less super than men in this

976
00:45:52,040 --> 00:45:55,560
Speaker 2: country is like, I don't know how that statistic isn't

977
00:45:55,600 --> 00:45:58,759
Speaker 2: more widely known, and I think that's even an old statistic.

978
00:45:58,920 --> 00:46:01,520
Speaker 2: So and that it took till twenty eighteen really for

979
00:46:01,560 --> 00:46:04,560
Speaker 2: there to be a super fun for women is just alarming.

980
00:46:04,600 --> 00:46:07,279
Speaker 2: But you've gone on to like do such important work

981
00:46:07,280 --> 00:46:10,239
Speaker 2: towards leveling that playing field and also not just to

982
00:46:10,280 --> 00:46:15,360
Speaker 2: close that gap, but to ethically invest in super like Again,

983
00:46:15,400 --> 00:46:17,200
Speaker 2: I don't think many of us we all have super funs.

984
00:46:17,239 --> 00:46:20,399
Speaker 2: I don't think many of us, like know what. We're

985
00:46:20,440 --> 00:46:23,560
Speaker 2: not as sort of equipped or not that people aren't literal,

986
00:46:23,600 --> 00:46:25,839
Speaker 2: but it's just not something you think about. When you're younger,

987
00:46:25,880 --> 00:46:27,200
Speaker 2: you're sort of like, oh god, I've got to have

988
00:46:27,239 --> 00:46:29,840
Speaker 2: a super fun, Like they take some money every you know,

989
00:46:29,880 --> 00:46:32,480
Speaker 2: you don't think about it, and then suddenly you realize

990
00:46:32,680 --> 00:46:35,160
Speaker 2: your choices as a consumer are making a big impact

991
00:46:35,239 --> 00:46:38,920
Speaker 2: on like half the ASX. So I'm so sorry I've

992
00:46:38,960 --> 00:46:40,960
Speaker 2: run off so short of time, but very quickly tell

993
00:46:41,040 --> 00:46:42,080
Speaker 2: us about the verb chapter.

994
00:46:43,280 --> 00:46:47,239
Speaker 1: So essentially I decided to start the finest probably work

995
00:46:47,280 --> 00:46:49,600
Speaker 1: to it by myself for close to a year to

996
00:46:49,640 --> 00:46:51,680
Speaker 1: get it to the there's a lot of background works

997
00:46:51,920 --> 00:46:53,560
Speaker 1: to get it to the point of like is this

998
00:46:53,600 --> 00:46:56,120
Speaker 1: going to be viable? So like just the structures of

999
00:46:56,120 --> 00:46:59,480
Speaker 1: super innovation for really good measure, it's really hard to start,

1000
00:46:59,560 --> 00:47:02,120
Speaker 1: which I think he's a good thing because, like you know,

1001
00:47:02,160 --> 00:47:04,440
Speaker 1: the whole point of that is it's people's retirement savings,

1002
00:47:04,480 --> 00:47:06,320
Speaker 1: and so you know, I had to get an external

1003
00:47:06,320 --> 00:47:08,799
Speaker 1: trustee in place and external fund money. I had to

1004
00:47:08,800 --> 00:47:11,279
Speaker 1: get all these parties in place to agree to this.

1005
00:47:11,320 --> 00:47:13,040
Speaker 1: So there was a lot of that kind of negotiation

1006
00:47:13,120 --> 00:47:15,759
Speaker 1: and trust building. And then at that point I sort

1007
00:47:15,800 --> 00:47:17,319
Speaker 1: of decided, like I don't want to do this thing

1008
00:47:17,360 --> 00:47:20,600
Speaker 1: by myself, and so I found two amazing co founders.

1009
00:47:20,640 --> 00:47:23,160
Speaker 1: So one had been working in the industry and was

1010
00:47:23,200 --> 00:47:26,279
Speaker 1: just super passionate about like women and serving women. And

1011
00:47:26,840 --> 00:47:29,200
Speaker 1: she's also just her personality type. You know, when she

1012
00:47:29,320 --> 00:47:31,960
Speaker 1: had a bit of a career breakdown, she when it

1013
00:47:32,000 --> 00:47:34,120
Speaker 1: became a waitress for six months because she just gets

1014
00:47:34,160 --> 00:47:36,640
Speaker 1: so much joy from serving people. So I was like, okay,

1015
00:47:36,800 --> 00:47:39,480
Speaker 1: like that co founder I need because that does not

1016
00:47:39,520 --> 00:47:41,800
Speaker 1: bring me joy. I want my customers to be served

1017
00:47:41,960 --> 00:47:45,680
Speaker 1: like absolute queens. But me doing that no wrong person.

1018
00:47:46,960 --> 00:47:49,560
Speaker 1: So Alex was definitely the person for that. And then

1019
00:47:50,080 --> 00:47:52,239
Speaker 1: we knew that we wanted financial coaching to be be

1020
00:47:52,360 --> 00:47:54,840
Speaker 1: part of it, and so spent a long time trawling

1021
00:47:54,920 --> 00:47:57,440
Speaker 1: a lot of financial coaches at the time, and it

1022
00:47:57,520 --> 00:47:59,760
Speaker 1: was all very much like save money and buy shoes,

1023
00:47:59,800 --> 00:48:02,520
Speaker 1: and I was like, that's not my vibe. And so

1024
00:48:02,680 --> 00:48:04,839
Speaker 1: we had run a not for profit for a number

1025
00:48:04,840 --> 00:48:07,960
Speaker 1: of years and financial approach ten thousand women from across

1026
00:48:07,960 --> 00:48:10,560
Speaker 1: austarlier and just so I called her out of the

1027
00:48:10,840 --> 00:48:12,800
Speaker 1: blue one day. I found a number on a website

1028
00:48:12,800 --> 00:48:14,439
Speaker 1: and I was like, hey, I'm starting this super fun

1029
00:48:14,440 --> 00:48:16,840
Speaker 1: and she was like I'd been thinking about starting a bank.

1030
00:48:17,320 --> 00:48:20,360
Speaker 1: She was like literally doing some gardening in a rose garden,

1031
00:48:20,480 --> 00:48:23,759
Speaker 1: and like, without even like leaving the rose garden, had

1032
00:48:23,760 --> 00:48:26,279
Speaker 1: like agreed to basically like drive from Wagga where she

1033
00:48:26,360 --> 00:48:29,600
Speaker 1: lived to Canberra to like help me start this super fun.

1034
00:48:29,880 --> 00:48:31,719
Speaker 2: Oh my gosh.

1035
00:48:31,880 --> 00:48:33,759
Speaker 1: Yeah, we just kind of came together, I think like

1036
00:48:33,840 --> 00:48:36,000
Speaker 1: real values alignment, and off we went and you know,

1037
00:48:36,040 --> 00:48:38,480
Speaker 1: it was a it was a massive one of taking

1038
00:48:38,560 --> 00:48:41,440
Speaker 1: like it it is still you know, it is still

1039
00:48:41,520 --> 00:48:44,759
Speaker 1: extremely complex and hard. And you know, sometimes me and

1040
00:48:44,760 --> 00:48:46,359
Speaker 1: my co found us, we just dream and we're like,

1041
00:48:46,840 --> 00:48:49,640
Speaker 1: our next business is going to be like a tea business,

1042
00:48:51,320 --> 00:48:54,760
Speaker 1: sell aromatic teas on the internet, Like wouldn't that be lovely?

1043
00:48:54,960 --> 00:48:57,480
Speaker 1: Like but you know, I think what has kept us

1044
00:48:57,520 --> 00:48:59,640
Speaker 1: going is like we're really values aligned. We've got a

1045
00:48:59,680 --> 00:49:02,160
Speaker 1: really clear vision for what we want to achieve, and

1046
00:49:02,719 --> 00:49:05,120
Speaker 1: you know, it's really hard, but we get those breakthroughs.

1047
00:49:05,120 --> 00:49:07,920
Speaker 1: Like we've been able to invest some of our members

1048
00:49:07,920 --> 00:49:10,960
Speaker 1: Superrehnoation in micro finance pros in Asia in the South

1049
00:49:11,000 --> 00:49:15,000
Speaker 1: Pacific for instance. So we're using our Suprenoation fund to

1050
00:49:15,040 --> 00:49:19,360
Speaker 1: provide small loans to mostly women businesses in those areas

1051
00:49:19,400 --> 00:49:21,759
Speaker 1: so they can go their businesses. And we're able to

1052
00:49:21,800 --> 00:49:23,800
Speaker 1: do that with like good returns to the level of

1053
00:49:23,920 --> 00:49:26,759
Speaker 1: risk for our members and just being innovative like that

1054
00:49:26,840 --> 00:49:29,480
Speaker 1: instead of just putting it in a government some form

1055
00:49:29,480 --> 00:49:32,360
Speaker 1: of corporate bond, like putting it into something meaningful and

1056
00:49:32,480 --> 00:49:35,360
Speaker 1: like it's those things that you get that energy of

1057
00:49:35,400 --> 00:49:37,920
Speaker 1: like okay, great, like we're doing something you know, and

1058
00:49:37,960 --> 00:49:41,000
Speaker 1: I think we've really been able to drive advocacy on

1059
00:49:41,040 --> 00:49:44,600
Speaker 1: women's retirement outcomes and being really specific about some of

1060
00:49:44,600 --> 00:49:47,480
Speaker 1: the legislative changes that we need to see. So those

1061
00:49:47,520 --> 00:49:51,160
Speaker 1: moments can be quite few and far between in terms

1062
00:49:51,200 --> 00:49:53,440
Speaker 1: of just having to operate a business and grow a business,

1063
00:49:54,080 --> 00:49:56,360
Speaker 1: but it has really brought us a lot of momentum

1064
00:49:56,360 --> 00:49:58,520
Speaker 1: and allowed us to Yeah, I think I think really

1065
00:49:58,520 --> 00:49:59,680
Speaker 1: have the energy to keep going.

1066
00:50:00,400 --> 00:50:02,080
Speaker 2: In such a different way to the impact you were

1067
00:50:02,080 --> 00:50:04,759
Speaker 2: making in the last chapter. You are like disrupting an

1068
00:50:04,920 --> 00:50:09,560
Speaker 2: entire industry and allowing half the Australian population the choice

1069
00:50:09,640 --> 00:50:13,080
Speaker 2: that they didn't have pre twenty eighteen, which is enormous,

1070
00:50:13,239 --> 00:50:16,040
Speaker 2: and also at eight and a half months pregnant, like

1071
00:50:16,280 --> 00:50:18,800
Speaker 2: with already one child. Like if there is a wonder

1072
00:50:18,840 --> 00:50:22,120
Speaker 2: woman that walks this Australiana land that we are on,

1073
00:50:22,400 --> 00:50:23,200
Speaker 2: it is you.

1074
00:50:23,239 --> 00:50:25,680
Speaker 1: No, it is it is It is not. It's just

1075
00:50:25,719 --> 00:50:31,920
Speaker 1: like a big struggle. It is dislike a struggle you

1076
00:50:31,960 --> 00:50:34,720
Speaker 1: somehow get through. And also I don't particularly advise anyone,

1077
00:50:34,760 --> 00:50:36,319
Speaker 1: by the way, to do a startup at the point

1078
00:50:36,320 --> 00:50:38,400
Speaker 1: in time that they're choosing to start a family, like

1079
00:50:39,800 --> 00:50:44,480
Speaker 1: like the naivety right again, it's like exactly, I was

1080
00:50:44,520 --> 00:50:46,880
Speaker 1: single when I started V and I met my husband

1081
00:50:46,920 --> 00:50:49,080
Speaker 1: during COVID lockdown, and you know, there was a baby

1082
00:50:49,719 --> 00:50:52,400
Speaker 1: sort of conceived a few months later. It was like

1083
00:50:52,880 --> 00:50:56,080
Speaker 1: not particularly timed that, you know, I thought I'd be

1084
00:50:56,080 --> 00:50:57,640
Speaker 1: having a child at this point in my life. But

1085
00:50:57,680 --> 00:50:59,200
Speaker 1: you know, here we are so well.

1086
00:50:59,239 --> 00:51:01,600
Speaker 2: It seems like you are very good at doing a

1087
00:51:01,719 --> 00:51:05,640
Speaker 2: million things at once in pure chaos, and it seems

1088
00:51:05,680 --> 00:51:07,760
Speaker 2: not to be a barrier for you achieving wonderful things.

1089
00:51:07,800 --> 00:51:11,040
Speaker 2: So I'm sure there will be lots of listeners, particularly

1090
00:51:11,040 --> 00:51:13,560
Speaker 2: our female listeners in the neighborhood, who are keen to

1091
00:51:13,640 --> 00:51:16,000
Speaker 2: learn a little bit more about the ways they could

1092
00:51:16,200 --> 00:51:18,480
Speaker 2: be part of verb super and make a shift to

1093
00:51:19,200 --> 00:51:23,760
Speaker 2: have more transparency around where their retirement outcomes are going

1094
00:51:23,920 --> 00:51:26,840
Speaker 2: and where the money is going in their super accounts.

1095
00:51:26,840 --> 00:51:28,600
Speaker 2: So where can we find you? Where can we find

1096
00:51:28,600 --> 00:51:29,120
Speaker 2: out more?

1097
00:51:29,360 --> 00:51:31,319
Speaker 1: Probably the best is going to the website, which is

1098
00:51:31,360 --> 00:51:34,759
Speaker 1: the super Do comit Au. Otherwise we're on Instagram so

1099
00:51:34,800 --> 00:51:36,080
Speaker 1: you can check us out as well.

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00:51:36,640 --> 00:51:39,439
Speaker 2: Amazing, Well, Chrissy, thank you so much. I could speak

1101
00:51:39,440 --> 00:51:42,400
Speaker 2: to you for another like fifty five hours about every chapter.

1102
00:51:42,480 --> 00:51:44,520
Speaker 2: I feel like I literally just scratch the surf as

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00:51:44,560 --> 00:51:46,960
Speaker 2: you have such an interesting life. I can't wait to

1104
00:51:46,960 --> 00:51:49,200
Speaker 2: see what you do next. All the very best with

1105
00:51:49,239 --> 00:51:52,239
Speaker 2: baby number two. Thank you well baby number three kind

1106
00:51:52,239 --> 00:51:57,200
Speaker 2: of yeah, literally put me on the three. It's been

1107
00:51:57,239 --> 00:51:59,640
Speaker 2: an absolute delight and I'll include the links to everything

1108
00:51:59,680 --> 00:51:59,960
Speaker 2: in the show.

1109
00:52:00,480 --> 00:52:01,360
Speaker 1: Thank you so much.

1110
00:52:01,719 --> 00:52:04,000
Speaker 2: Okay, what an amazing human being. I think you can

1111
00:52:04,080 --> 00:52:06,720
Speaker 2: hear that I could have talked her ears off four days,

1112
00:52:06,920 --> 00:52:10,560
Speaker 2: maybe weeks. If you weren't thinking much about your superannuation

1113
00:52:10,800 --> 00:52:14,000
Speaker 2: before this episode, I'm sure you will be now as

1114
00:52:14,040 --> 00:52:16,319
Speaker 2: I did, and I've popped all the links to verb

1115
00:52:16,400 --> 00:52:18,600
Speaker 2: super in the show notes, as well as some more

1116
00:52:18,640 --> 00:52:22,680
Speaker 2: information on Christina herself. As always, please do share the

1117
00:52:22,719 --> 00:52:26,320
Speaker 2: episode and any learnings, lessons, or snippets that you enjoyed

1118
00:52:26,360 --> 00:52:29,360
Speaker 2: if it feels right. We so appreciate your help growing

1119
00:52:29,400 --> 00:52:33,800
Speaker 2: the neighborhood as far and wide as possible. In the meantime,

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00:52:33,840 --> 00:52:36,719
Speaker 2: I hope you're having a fabulous week and are seizing

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00:52:36,880 --> 00:52:50,839
Speaker 2: your yeay