Speaker 1: Just before we get started, we'd like to acknowledge and
Speaker 1: pay respect to Australia's Aboriginal and torrest Rate islander peoples.
Speaker 1: They're the traditional custodians of the lands, the waterways and
Speaker 1: the skies all across Australia. We thank you for sharing
Speaker 1: and for caring for the land on which we are
Speaker 1: able to learn. We pay respects to elders past and present,
Speaker 1: and we share our friendship and our kindness.
Speaker 2: She's on the Money, She's on the Money. Hello, and
Speaker 2: welcome to She's on the Money, the podcast for millennials
Speaker 2: who want financial freedom. Welcome back to another one of
Speaker 2: our shot back Money Diary mondays, where we get to
Speaker 2: chat to one of our beautiful community members, learn about them,
Speaker 2: their money, their life, and ask all the juicy details
Speaker 2: that Victoria Vine you love to know them.
Speaker 3: I am so pervy.
Speaker 2: Well, let me tell you all about our diarists, so,
Speaker 2: she said. My dad is the son of Polish refugees.
Speaker 2: I am one of ten children and we grew up
Speaker 2: in an overcrowded working class home. I have always had
Speaker 2: social justice in my heart. I worked three to four
Speaker 2: hospital jobs while studying political science and was the first
Speaker 2: of my siblings to earn a degree. In my mid twenties,
Speaker 2: I had a daughter in a relationship which has long
Speaker 2: since ended. When I was thirty three, my daughter was
Speaker 2: six years old, I landed my first CE equivalent role.
Speaker 2: The job was a non for profit membership organization of
Speaker 2: fifty two thousand and when I left two weeks ago,
Speaker 2: it was almost eighty two thousand people strong. It was
Speaker 2: my dream job and aligned completely with my values. I
Speaker 2: also had taken up roles on a number of different
Speaker 2: boards and have been honing my skills and have a
Speaker 2: growing interest in good governance. Five years ago I met
Speaker 2: a climate change campaigner who I married and had a
Speaker 2: second baby with, and my story continues to grow.
Speaker 3: I love this.
Speaker 1: How cool you're literally living your own dream.
Speaker 3: Welcome to the show.
Speaker 4: Hi, thanks for having me.
Speaker 1: Oh my gosh, now, thank you for coming on. I'm
Speaker 1: really excited to hear about your journey. Congrats on being
Speaker 1: the first of your siblings to get a degree.
Speaker 3: How cool.
Speaker 5: Yeah, well it was really great, but it was because
Speaker 5: it was so drummed into us to never accumulate ditch
Speaker 5: that no one else wanted to get a student loan.
Speaker 1: So oh yeah, that makes so much. Ye, I'll take
Speaker 1: it right, Well, you'll take it.
Speaker 3: I love that.
Speaker 1: Let's get straight into this because I want to learn
Speaker 1: all about you. The first question is can you tell
Speaker 1: us a bit more about your money story?
Speaker 4: Yeah? Sure.
Speaker 5: So I was raised one of the metal children of
Speaker 5: ten and a family of twelve, and we grew up
Speaker 5: in a neighborhood kind of closely with our grandparents and
Speaker 5: some aunties and uncles and so on, and so money
Speaker 5: was always really tight in our family. We had a
Speaker 5: lot of Vidgy's grown in the backyard. My mum sowed
Speaker 5: our clothes and mended them and adjusted the hand me
Speaker 5: downs and that sort of stuff. But it was something
Speaker 5: my parents kind of argued about a little bit, and
Speaker 5: like I.
Speaker 4: Said, we were taught dick was a bad thing.
Speaker 5: However, I went off and got a student loan right
Speaker 5: after all, and my twenties were kind of a mixed
Speaker 5: bag of you know, living worth quite low wages, having
Speaker 5: my daughter trying to paid down my student loan, et cetera.
Speaker 4: And then eventually I worked my.
Speaker 5: Way into a senior role in a kind of four
Speaker 5: purpose not for profit area, which is where I always
Speaker 5: wanted to work.
Speaker 4: I always knew I would work for something that related
Speaker 4: to my values, whether that was paid or not paid.
Speaker 5: And I was very fortunate that that was paid work
Speaker 5: because it's allowed me to also have a great time
Speaker 5: in my thirties and then now going into my forties
Speaker 5: as well.
Speaker 1: Oh my gosh, it sounds like as much as money
Speaker 1: was a little bit tight growing up, that sounds really wholesome.
Speaker 1: Like I don't know, just the idea that you know,
Speaker 1: you had veggies growing in the backyard and your mum
Speaker 1: fixed things. It just sounds like it was a house
Speaker 1: full of love by the way that you are explaining it,
Speaker 1: And obviously everyone can't see your face, but like you
Speaker 1: just glowed when you said that.
Speaker 3: I was like, how sweet.
Speaker 5: And I love my siblings, which is not you know,
Speaker 5: something that's always the case in a large family. But yeah, right, upbringing,
Speaker 5: I didn't have a lot, but we were happy.
Speaker 1: Yeah, no, that is so sweet and I definitely got
Speaker 1: that vibe for him when you were explaining it, I
Speaker 1: was like, oh, like, I love this. I wish i'd
Speaker 1: don knew then. All right, next question, I want to
Speaker 1: know more about your work. What do you do for
Speaker 1: work and how much money do you earn?
Speaker 5: So I've been an underutilized worker or unemployed for the
Speaker 5: last two months.
Speaker 4: I left my role back in March.
Speaker 5: And I was leading New Zealand's largest trade union at
Speaker 5: the time, WOW, which was a great honor. It was
Speaker 5: amazing to work with such an incredible bunch of people.
Speaker 5: And like I said, it was a dream job. Just
Speaker 5: a job you can't really do forever, I would say.
Speaker 5: And I had set myself a seven year goal and
Speaker 5: I reached about seven and a half years. I didn't
Speaker 5: anticipate COVID. That made it a little bit harder, but
Speaker 5: I was earning when I left one hundred and seventy
Speaker 5: thousand dollars for annim WOW. Which I've got to say,
Speaker 5: it feels.
Speaker 4: Very uncomfortable still for me to say out loud. I
Speaker 4: know that guilt about your own income.
Speaker 5: It doesn't remedy the inequalities and hero and capitalism and
Speaker 5: stuff like that. But it's difficult to say that knowing
Speaker 5: how much other people are struggling, especially right now.
Speaker 4: Yeah, but there it is.
Speaker 1: I totally get that. But I also look at it
Speaker 1: and go, well, your role was so impactful. That's absolutely
Speaker 1: worth it. And the time and the energy and the
Speaker 1: effort you put into it. I think there's a lot
Speaker 1: of guilt, but it's more because there's a level of
Speaker 1: comparison that you're drawing when you look at that, instead
Speaker 1: of looking at your own achievement where you're at. I
Speaker 1: think that when it comes to our own salaries really
Speaker 1: shouldn't be comparing it. We should just be looking at
Speaker 1: our own situations and what that means for us, and
Speaker 1: how that means that you can pour from an even
Speaker 1: more full cup. Right, Like, you're only able to do
Speaker 1: what you can do because you can look after your
Speaker 1: kids and look after your world. And I don't know,
Speaker 1: I feel like you deserve every cent of that. So
Speaker 1: I hate hearing that You're like, oh, but other people
Speaker 1: are doing badly. I'm like, yeah, that's why you do
Speaker 1: what you do, my love, that's why you're working in
Speaker 1: that industry, so you can change the world.
Speaker 4: To lift all the boats, you know, with your fide rises.
Speaker 3: Exactly, exactly, all right. I want to know what is
Speaker 3: your big money goal.
Speaker 5: I would have called this a lifestyle goal, but of
Speaker 5: course I need money to do it. So when I
Speaker 5: think of myself in twenty years time, in my six days,
Speaker 5: I want to work half of the year. I want
Speaker 5: to be obviously mortgage free, but I'd like to work
Speaker 5: six months of the year and then spend the other
Speaker 5: six months volunteering or doing some sort of passion project
Speaker 5: or visiting the grandchildren.
Speaker 4: I hope I'll have.
Speaker 5: Or you know, just traveling to meet friends overseas, you know,
Speaker 5: if that ever happens again. I don't want to have
Speaker 5: to work every day all day, and I want to
Speaker 5: enjoy my health while I have it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I love that. How are you working towards that
Speaker 1: at the moment?
Speaker 5: Well, I mean I'm pain obviously more than I have
Speaker 5: to off my mortgage, and it's sort of chipping away
Speaker 5: at it to help us to get mortgage free and
Speaker 5: maintaining our physical and mental health as well, so that
Speaker 5: we can play the long game. Because when you do
Speaker 5: work in kind of for purpose spaces and your activists,
Speaker 5: that can be quite easy to kind of work.
Speaker 4: Yourself until you burn out.
Speaker 5: Yeah, and so I think taking you know, being a
Speaker 5: bit more mature about our approach to say hour, I mean,
Speaker 5: mine and my husband, we're both in the space to
Speaker 5: sort of focus on, yeah, twenty years from now rather
Speaker 5: than next week.
Speaker 1: I think that's really smart because people who are in
Speaker 1: these spaces are so wildly driven and it ends up
Speaker 1: being to their own demise because you burn yourself out.
Speaker 1: You need to make sure that you are looking after
Speaker 1: you so that you can look after the world.
Speaker 3: I love it.
Speaker 1: I feel like your mindset around that is so important.
Speaker 1: Next question I have do you have any investments? If so,
Speaker 1: what are they?
Speaker 5: Yes, it currently have twenty thousand dollars in a managed fund.
Speaker 5: I did have more last year, but when I planned
Speaker 5: to take a year off work, we kind of reconfigured
Speaker 5: stuff and we could see that interest rates would be rising,
Speaker 5: and like I said, we're focusing on paying down the mortgage,
Speaker 5: so we took some of our investments and paid that
Speaker 5: down off the mortgage. So I'm interested in what you
Speaker 5: have to say about that, whether there was a good
Speaker 5: decision or not. But it could make me feel a
Speaker 5: little bit more comfortable about then stepping out of paid
Speaker 5: work for it for.
Speaker 1: The I feel like that's an important decision that you
Speaker 1: made that was in line with making you feel comfortable,
Speaker 1: and just the financial side of things doesn't make it
Speaker 1: the right decision.
Speaker 3: A lot of people always like what's the best.
Speaker 1: Outcome or what's the best investment Victoria, and it's like, well,
Speaker 1: it's actually very easy to work out what the best
Speaker 1: quote performing asset is because you can look up historical
Speaker 1: performance and you can see what that might look like.
Speaker 1: But that doesn't mean that for your situation, that's the
Speaker 1: right asset or the right decision to make sure that
Speaker 1: you're comfortable and thriving and doing everything that you want
Speaker 1: to do to achieve your goals.
Speaker 3: And that's where it's so hard to go.
Speaker 1: Well, I don't know if that was the right decision,
Speaker 1: but if you're really excited about it, it made you feel
Speaker 1: super comfortable and now you're doing what you said you
Speaker 1: were going to do. Like, that's not a bad decision,
Speaker 1: is it.
Speaker 4: No? Yes?
Speaker 1: Sorry, Sorry about the personal finance twist there, but it's
Speaker 1: one of those things. I don't know your entire personal
Speaker 1: financial situation. I am endeavoring to learn more on this
Speaker 1: episode of Money Darries. I promise we will dive a
Speaker 1: lot deeper than I would on a Facebook post in
Speaker 1: our group. But it's really important to understand that if
Speaker 1: that's the thing that made you super comfortable with taking
Speaker 1: a year off, then arguably that was the best decision
Speaker 1: for you.
Speaker 5: Yeah, because also not working, I wouldn't be contributing as
Speaker 5: much to the fund.
Speaker 4: So I just sort of thought if we had to
Speaker 4: refix at a.
Speaker 5: High mortgage rate, and I'm not feeding my investments, and
Speaker 5: maybe that's just something I can sort of sit and.
Speaker 4: Forget for the year. I don't know, I'll poke it
Speaker 4: back up when I'm in paid employment.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and that is absolutely fair. All right.
Speaker 1: Next question, you mentioned a mortgage. The answer is yes,
Speaker 1: but do you have any debts? If so, what are they?
Speaker 4: Yeah?
Speaker 5: So currently three hundred and fifty thousand dollars mortgages.
Speaker 3: Yep, that's a house.
Speaker 1: No credit card, no credit cards, no student, don't loan anymore.
Speaker 4: No go rid of bit when I was thirty two.
Speaker 3: Oh my gosh, how cool. All right?
Speaker 1: Next question, I know you're over in New Zealand, you're
Speaker 1: across the ditch, but do you shot back?
Speaker 4: No? I don't think we can you shot back over here.
Speaker 3: We'll rally for it.
Speaker 5: I do know of an app over here called Bennie,
Speaker 5: which is a similar idea to shop back, but it
Speaker 5: has an obligatory portion of it goes to a charity. Oh,
Speaker 5: co nominate your charity and so you can sort of
Speaker 5: accumulate your little fund of savings.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that is cool.
Speaker 5: Yeah, so it's called Bennie and they're just starting out.
Speaker 5: But I really like the idea of the ethos behind it.
Speaker 4: Yeah. I'm not much of an online shopper.
Speaker 3: Oh my gosh, how cool.
Speaker 1: All right, next question, I feel like you probably have
Speaker 1: a couple of these. What is your best money habit?
Speaker 5: Oh, I have to say it's that I'm a saver,
Speaker 5: you know, it's just boring.
Speaker 4: I've been saving for either.
Speaker 5: I do want to say though, that when I was
Speaker 5: in my minimum waged work, I wasn't supporting another human beings,
Speaker 5: it was a little bit easier.
Speaker 4: But I've always put.
Speaker 5: Aside money, even when I was in hospitality work. And
Speaker 5: occasionally it's been a bit rough and I haven't been
Speaker 5: able to, but as my income's crept up or jumped up,
Speaker 5: as it has over my life, I've tried to put
Speaker 5: it away more so that I'm ahead of.
Speaker 4: The kind of lifestyle creep. Yeah.
Speaker 5: So I've always been putting into superannuation, a little bit
Speaker 5: of investments, as you know, and a savings account if
Speaker 5: I can.
Speaker 3: So, Yeah, where did that come from?
Speaker 1: How did you know when you were younger that that
Speaker 1: was a priority because so many of us just don't
Speaker 1: have that level of financial literacy to go, this is important,
Speaker 1: and we end up just spending everything that comes into
Speaker 1: our accounts. Like, where do you think that came from?
Speaker 5: I think it really did come from that hard message
Speaker 5: from my parents that you should never get into get
Speaker 5: if you can help it, that if you.
Speaker 4: Want something, you should pay for it outright.
Speaker 5: And then the first thing I ever wanted to do
Speaker 5: was to travel overseas as a teenager. So it's not
Speaker 5: something you can hire purchase, right. I had to save
Speaker 5: up my money and pay for that ticket, and I
Speaker 5: just sort of got into the habit of if I
Speaker 5: wanted something, I would save for it and I would
Speaker 5: make it happen that way. So it is a bit
Speaker 5: weird because when I started retirement savings, it was before
Speaker 5: there was a compulsory superannuation scheme in New Zealand. So
Speaker 5: I kind of thank my younger self a little bit
Speaker 5: for having the foresight to go, Okay, I'm in a job,
Speaker 5: I should be putting something away for when I'm in
Speaker 5: my sixties, because that's not I think what most teenagers are.
Speaker 1: No, absolutely not, that's why. I'm like, where is this
Speaker 1: coming from? Because that's actually crazy smart, but not something
Speaker 1: that a lot of us do or even prioritize, because
Speaker 1: even I know when I was first working, there's no chance,
Speaker 1: like you could have told me exactly what it was.
Speaker 1: And we're in Australia, so superannuation from my entire career
Speaker 1: has been compulsory. And I still was like, that's waste money.
Speaker 1: I don't know why we're doing that.
Speaker 3: That's joke.
Speaker 1: And now I'm like, you put more in your super,
Speaker 1: my friend, you get it. So I think it's really
Speaker 1: important to talk at these things because it's funny when
Speaker 1: we compare ourselves to people like you Money direst. We'll go, well,
Speaker 1: she's doing so well. We're like, well, that's of course
Speaker 1: you started so long ago. And you said, oh, it's
Speaker 1: pretty boring. I'm just a really good saver. Like, yes,
Speaker 1: that's the best part of financial literacy. It can be
Speaker 1: really boring. There's no like magic wand or super exciting
Speaker 1: outcome that we have to discover. It's actually just a
Speaker 1: spend less than you earn and save regularly and consistently
Speaker 1: and think about investing and talk about super or talk
Speaker 1: about keyway saver or talk about whatever is going to
Speaker 1: put you in the best possible position, and.
Speaker 3: People like that can't be it. No, no, no, no,
Speaker 3: sit down. That's all we've got.
Speaker 1: So it is really exciting when you talk about it
Speaker 1: and people are it's boring. I'm like, no, no, actually
Speaker 1: that's the answer, Like that's perfect. Let's flip this though,
Speaker 1: what's your worst money have it?
Speaker 4: Okay?
Speaker 5: So I thought of two. In case you roll my
Speaker 5: first one out of order, I pull you out. My
Speaker 5: first one is that I'm not a risk taker. And
Speaker 5: this kind of goes to the whole boring plotting along saving,
Speaker 5: you know, dollar after dollar thing, which you know, was
Speaker 5: how I got into my first property and all of
Speaker 5: that sort of stuff. But when I think back to
Speaker 5: saving for my superannuation, as you know, in my early twenties,
Speaker 5: I was still going for like kind of balanced investments
Speaker 5: instead of and now I look back and I think
Speaker 5: that's the one time in my life I could have
Speaker 5: been a little less risk averse, you know, I mean,
Speaker 5: maybe then I wouldn't have had as much when I
Speaker 5: withdrew it to pay for my first property, you know,
Speaker 5: the deposit on my first property.
Speaker 4: But I don't know. I just there are a few.
Speaker 5: Decisions I've made over time that I look back on
Speaker 5: and think, maybe I could have been a little bit
Speaker 5: more you know, risk taking. I almost bought a studio
Speaker 5: apartment straight out of university that was going cheap in
Speaker 5: my neighborhood.
Speaker 4: I was a single woman and my first you know,
Speaker 4: full time.
Speaker 5: Job, and I talked to myself out of it, going
Speaker 5: I know, I will never resell a studio apartment.
Speaker 4: It's too small. You know, it's on a main road,
Speaker 4: blah blah blah. And of course, you know the way
Speaker 4: that Auckland property, no property would have been.
Speaker 1: Like a studio apartments basically all people can afford now
Speaker 1: in Auckland, So that makes sense.
Speaker 5: Yeah, it would have been a great investment for me
Speaker 5: at that time and a place to live. Of course,
Speaker 5: I had some dodgy flat mates been there. Made a
Speaker 5: bad decision, but yeah, so I mean maybe I could
Speaker 5: have taken a few more risks.
Speaker 1: I find that super interesting as well, because hindsight's twenty twenty.
Speaker 1: Imagine if the flip happened and you were like, I'm
Speaker 1: so glad that I was really risk averse because it
Speaker 1: saved my butt. If something bad had happened in the
Speaker 1: economy financially, Like, I just think that you would have
Speaker 1: been really grateful for that. So I think that looking
Speaker 1: back at past decisions that we've made, it doesn't help us,
Speaker 1: but it means that you can actually look at it
Speaker 1: now and go, how does this shape the decisions I
Speaker 1: make tomorrow or the decisions I make for future me
Speaker 1: Because I think too many times we reprimand past selves
Speaker 1: by being like, oh, I could have just been more risky,
Speaker 1: or I could have done that better, or I wish
Speaker 1: I just saved more. Like I think we all look
Speaker 1: at it like I look at it. Sometimes I'm like,
Speaker 1: I wish that I just wasn't an idiot with my
Speaker 1: money in right, I just wish I made good decisions.
Speaker 1: But you do what you can with the tools and
Speaker 1: resources that you had at the time. And I'm so
Speaker 1: beyond impressed that you even thinking about retirement while you
Speaker 1: were working in your hospital job and at UNI, Like,
Speaker 1: absolutely not on my radar. So you're miles ahead of
Speaker 1: me in when it comes to mindset next question, because
Speaker 1: I do want to deep dive into that dotgy flatmate
Speaker 1: you had and how that impacted you financially. But I
Speaker 1: want to ask you, what grade would you give yourself
Speaker 1: if you were forced to give your money habits?
Speaker 3: A grade A B.
Speaker 5: Why Well, I think I'm fairly literate and good at
Speaker 5: managing my own finances.
Speaker 4: But I think it's about you know, you don't know
Speaker 4: what you don't know.
Speaker 5: But when I go to board meetings, I print out
Speaker 5: the financials and I read them three times and I
Speaker 5: put knots on the margins and I have to go
Speaker 5: through it carefully. And I'll get into these meetings and
Speaker 5: there'll be people who can just read financial reports and
Speaker 5: see the trends like it's spot stuff, like it's nothing,
Speaker 5: and it's like it's natural to them.
Speaker 4: It's not natural to me.
Speaker 5: So I know that there's a lot for me to learn,
Speaker 5: which is why I listen to your podcasts, and so
Speaker 5: I think there's always room to grow and learn.
Speaker 4: So I would say a BEE because there's a room
Speaker 4: for improvement.
Speaker 1: I love that, and I love that You're like, I
Speaker 1: don't understand why people are just natural at this. This
Speaker 1: is so rude, but you're there going, you know what,
Speaker 1: I'm going to pour over this and really get it.
Speaker 3: And that's just tenacity. That a lot of people lack.
Speaker 1: My friend, I have a lot of questions for you
Speaker 1: after we go to this quick break. Yeah, up, next on,
Speaker 1: she's on the board meeting. All right, let's get back
Speaker 1: to it. I want to understand a little bit more
Speaker 1: about the imposter syndrome that you seem to be suffering from,
Speaker 1: because you are fierce, you are so wildly passionate about
Speaker 1: what you do, You're on boards, you are so impressive,
Speaker 1: and you're sitting in a room of people who are
Speaker 1: arguably being paid exactly what you're being paid, or very
Speaker 1: similar because these things in your industry are quite quite
Speaker 1: set out. From my understanding, where's this imposter syndrome come from?
Speaker 1: And why are you still struggling with it when you
Speaker 1: are so wildly powerful?
Speaker 4: Hey, that's a very frank question.
Speaker 3: Thanks, I'm very frank.
Speaker 4: Sorry, No, no, it's a great question.
Speaker 5: So for all of us, whether where work can they're
Speaker 5: not for profit space or in the private sector or wherever.
Speaker 5: You know, every room of decision making has come from
Speaker 5: a kind of patriarchal, colonial background, right, so the composition
Speaker 5: of that room will probably not look like you, r I.
Speaker 5: They probably won't have refugee backgrounds. They may not have
Speaker 5: brown skin, they're probably not woman, and so that feeling
Speaker 5: of never seeing yourself and the spaces can make it
Speaker 5: a bit of an awkward space to enter and to
Speaker 5: stay in. And I think that we have to together
Speaker 5: support each other to either pull up a chair to
Speaker 5: those tables or to get somebody to give up their
Speaker 5: chair for the voices that aren't in the room, because
Speaker 5: if we don't change that composition, we will just continue
Speaker 5: to have people feel like outsiders into the future as well.
Speaker 4: So, yeah, if I'm.
Speaker 5: Showing you I have a bit of imposter syndrome, maybe
Speaker 5: it's because when I started in my firsty equivalent role,
Speaker 5: I was a thirty three year old woman, and a
Speaker 5: lot was made of my youth in particular, but probably
Speaker 5: my gender as well. And I certainly had a unique background,
Speaker 5: so there weren't others like me, and.
Speaker 4: I was aware that I wasn't fitting the mold.
Speaker 5: And I really hope that what I've done over the
Speaker 5: years in those spaces is to try to normalize having
Speaker 5: new voices and new ways of thinking, and new ideas
Speaker 5: and new ways.
Speaker 4: Of expressing your thoughts as well.
Speaker 5: Coming up in those decision making forums, I hope that
Speaker 5: makes sense.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it does.
Speaker 2: Have you seen that shift over the time that you've
Speaker 2: worked in their space, because obviously as a society, we've
Speaker 2: definitely shifted to be more vocal about the need for
Speaker 2: diversity across all industries and the need for representation can
Speaker 2: see themselves in those rooms and can get a seat
Speaker 2: at the table. Have you seen any change happen in
Speaker 2: the time that you've worked in this space.
Speaker 4: Yeah? Absolutely.
Speaker 5: I mean in the Union movement where I was working,
Speaker 5: there were some very deliberate changes and constitutional changes being
Speaker 5: made within organizations to make sure that we could never
Speaker 5: have a lack of diversity again, which is kind of
Speaker 5: impressive to see. But there are still other kind of
Speaker 5: you know boards where it's still very dominated by men,
Speaker 5: older men, and men who are from European backgrounds. So
Speaker 5: it's a mixed bag. I'll say, there's some really good
Speaker 5: advances being made, and I have to say that even
Speaker 5: though I want to get into that governance space a
Speaker 5: lot more and I really do love it, and I
Speaker 5: say importance of good governance. I think everybody who goes
Speaker 5: onto that space needs to ask themselves, if I get
Speaker 5: that seat, who am I getting it in spite of
Speaker 5: what other voices, maybe even more marginalized, aren't going to
Speaker 5: be heard if I pick that set up. And unfortunately,
Speaker 5: I think there are certain people who aren't really born
Speaker 5: or have not accrued that mindset over their lifetime, who
Speaker 5: sort of feel more entitled to that space. And that's
Speaker 5: still the case in ol Tito, in New Zealand, it's
Speaker 5: probably as well as Australia, i'd expect.
Speaker 3: I agree.
Speaker 1: I sit on a board as well, and this is
Speaker 1: a conversation that we as a board have all the time.
Speaker 1: I sit on a board for a charity called TLC
Speaker 1: for Kids and I'm their treasurer. So I talk about
Speaker 1: the financials all the time. And just to let you know,
Speaker 1: it's not that easy. You're right, like you do have
Speaker 1: to pour over the financials to like pull out the
Speaker 1: story and see what's going on the people. Honestly, I
Speaker 1: don't know between you and I the people that just
Speaker 1: get it. I'm like, no, you researched this before you
Speaker 1: came into the room, Like there's no way, there's no
Speaker 1: way that you just saw that story and the financials,
Speaker 1: Like I had to spend two and a half hours
Speaker 1: looking at these to pull that out there's no way.
Speaker 4: They just it makes me feel so good to know
Speaker 4: that no.
Speaker 1: Nope, nope, I have to literally pour over the financials
Speaker 1: and you can obviously see just really clear things. Right,
Speaker 1: you can be like loss impressive, but when you're trying
Speaker 1: to drag out the story and go, okay, well what
Speaker 1: does this mean and how has this been flowing and
Speaker 1: how long has this been happening and what are the impacts?
Speaker 1: Like we've been doing a lot of impact research on
Speaker 1: what does this mean for our charity having gone through
Speaker 1: COVID and we've been supported a little bit through having
Speaker 1: job keeper and things like that, but what are the
Speaker 1: actual impacts and what can we see them becoming? Like
Speaker 1: that takes a lot more time than just having a
Speaker 1: quick look at the P and L. Anyway back to this,
Speaker 1: I feel like boards aren't often discussed in our community,
Speaker 1: and when they are, it's about gender diversity. But let's
Speaker 1: step back a little bit because this is a really
Speaker 1: important conversation, or I believe it's a really important conversation.
Speaker 1: Let's define money diarist, what's the purpose of a board, Like,
Speaker 1: let's share with us she's on the money community exactly
Speaker 1: what that means and then exactly why diversity is so
Speaker 1: important on a board?
Speaker 5: Oh yeah, So the board is at a high level
Speaker 5: checking that the organization has everything in order for that
Speaker 5: organization to fulfill its purpose. So the purpose is normally
Speaker 5: set out and like a constitution if it's not for
Speaker 5: proper or in some kind of strategy somewhere, if it's
Speaker 5: for profit, and the board is tasked with making sure
Speaker 5: that the money, the decisions, that everything is geared to
Speaker 5: make that happen.
Speaker 1: And there's a lot of responsibility with a board. It's
Speaker 1: not just a room full of fluddy duddies who just
Speaker 1: talk about the business stuff filters down from the board.
Speaker 1: And I genuinely believe that the dynamic of a board,
Speaker 1: and I'm sure you're the same is what impacts the
Speaker 1: culture of an organization and the way that they step
Speaker 1: forward and actually lead change.
Speaker 3: So from my perspective, having.
Speaker 1: Diversity, having different voices, having different people in that board
Speaker 1: means that everything is going to be taken into consideration.
Speaker 3: And I think it's it's you know, like my opinion
Speaker 3: on the Minister for Disability.
Speaker 1: I genuinely believe that Minister should have a disability Like
Speaker 1: you need to understand that circumstance deeply to bring to
Speaker 1: the table things that can facilitate good and solid and
Speaker 1: sustainable change. And you know, as we see, you know
Speaker 1: in Australia and obviously in New Zealand.
Speaker 3: We are making changes.
Speaker 1: But what do you think that we can do as
Speaker 1: a community to demand that that is taken more seriously?
Speaker 1: Because board roles are often quite you know, don't want
Speaker 1: to use the word elitist, but they often are. How
Speaker 1: do we, you know, as the shees on the money
Speaker 1: community support that change positively because we know how much
Speaker 1: of an impact it can have.
Speaker 5: I think that's a really good point to raise up
Speaker 5: in these discussions that you're having and with your audience.
Speaker 5: I mean, first of all, on the point you made
Speaker 5: about culture, I think that's so important. And if the
Speaker 5: culture is if it's a monoculture, that's going to sense
Speaker 5: you know, reports throughout the organization as well and sort
Speaker 5: of reinforce that idea about what a decision maker looks like,
Speaker 5: if you know what I mean. So yeah, board positions
Speaker 5: are of course quite tightly held. I fell into a
Speaker 5: few by virtue of them, position that I held for
Speaker 5: my day job, you know, So it was because of
Speaker 5: that that I was asked to participate in different things. However,
Speaker 5: I then kind of expanded because I wanted to learn
Speaker 5: how different organizations worked. I think there are In New
Speaker 5: Zealand we have groups like the Institute of Directors where
Speaker 5: you can pick up training and you can learn some
Speaker 5: governance skills. I know that the ACTU in Australia does
Speaker 5: some really great governance training and resources for at least unions,
Speaker 5: but there must be other places that you can go
Speaker 5: to for training and even starting out. I want to
Speaker 5: say small, but it is really significant stuff. It's usually
Speaker 5: the unpaid board roles. Like in New Zealand we have
Speaker 5: boards associated with our schools, with boards associated with sports
Speaker 5: clubs and so on. There might be other parts of
Speaker 5: your community that people can just start practicing and learning
Speaker 5: and watching what it's like. And often they're desperate for
Speaker 5: volunteers as well, because these aren't roles that people necessarily want.
Speaker 4: Because maybe those first roles aren't paid roles.
Speaker 5: Yeah, absolutely, but I do think they're still with and
Speaker 5: you'll learn from operating on boards with other more experienced
Speaker 5: governors as well or directors, and.
Speaker 4: Yeah, soak it up.
Speaker 5: And the other point I wanted to make because I
Speaker 5: think I gave the you know, the white men I
Speaker 5: had time before is that some of my best mentors
Speaker 5: have been white men, and that's exactly what's happened. I've
Speaker 5: got to sit around tables with them and watch and
Speaker 5: learn and ask questions of them outside the room if
Speaker 5: I think they're too stupid to say across the table.
Speaker 5: And I've been really grateful for that kind of you know,
Speaker 5: confidence and mentorship that they've given me.
Speaker 1: And I think that that's important as well, because I'm
Speaker 1: exactly the same, Like I work in financial services, like
Speaker 1: it's all white men. I went to a conference the
Speaker 1: other day and I was sitting around a bad room
Speaker 1: table and I kind of just put my head in
Speaker 1: my hand and I was like, oh my gosh, like
Speaker 1: this is everything that I.
Speaker 3: Tell my community.
Speaker 1: I dislike I was the only woman in the room
Speaker 1: who was a financial advisor, and I was just so
Speaker 1: shocked that that was circumstance. But then I reframed my
Speaker 1: thinking and I was like, actually, all these people champion me,
Speaker 1: all these people have my back, all these people want
Speaker 1: to see me flourish. All these people want diversity and inclusion,
Speaker 1: and they understand the difference between equality and equity, and
Speaker 1: that's so important, and I think too many times we
Speaker 1: give you know, white men a really hard time when
Speaker 1: so many of them want to champion us and push
Speaker 1: us forward. So I think it's about embracing that change,
Speaker 1: not crucifying what exists, because what exists has always been
Speaker 1: for the greater good as well. We just can do better.
Speaker 1: We now know that diversity is incredibly important. It always
Speaker 1: has been, but it's never been embraced, and now it is.
Speaker 1: I think we have a job to make sure that
Speaker 1: that happens. And I think so many of these people
Speaker 1: on boards see that as well. I've had conversations with
Speaker 1: people being like, if someone came along and they were
Speaker 1: better suited for my position, I would give it up.
Speaker 3: In a heartbeat.
Speaker 1: And I think that that's so powerful because often you
Speaker 1: think of board members as people who are there because
Speaker 1: it's the power trip, and some people are there for
Speaker 1: that reason, and that's absolutely the wrong reason to be
Speaker 1: on a board. So I think that you're right embracing
Speaker 1: it's really important, and I think asking questions of businesses
Speaker 1: to make sure that you know their boards are inclusive
Speaker 1: and diverse in when they're not asking why that's the case,
Speaker 1: because it could be for exactly the same reason as
Speaker 1: the conference.
Speaker 3: I was at the other day.
Speaker 1: It's that that is what the industry is saturated with,
Speaker 1: and there are so few female voices that all of
Speaker 1: us are jumping up and down about it. But we
Speaker 1: need the other roles to be filled too, So I
Speaker 1: think it's important to not just crucify and go, oh
Speaker 1: my gosh, I cannot believe they don't have a fifty
Speaker 1: percent female board, Like, let's understand why that's the case
Speaker 1: first before crucifying it, and then if there's good reason
Speaker 1: understanding that, and how do we move forward?
Speaker 5: Can I too you that a few he listeners who
Speaker 5: are on board and that example you just gave, you know,
Speaker 5: where there aren't other men about and in a space
Speaker 5: opens up and we get another woman or or somebody
Speaker 5: who's voice hasn't been heard there to make sure that
Speaker 5: they feel supported and I'm mentored as well by you,
Speaker 5: because that's been something I found a little bit difficult
Speaker 5: over time, because there was always the young one in
Speaker 5: the room is realizing that in some spaces, I've got
Speaker 5: more knowledge than others and can act to better mentor
Speaker 5: and help other people feel comfortable, and that's how you
Speaker 5: kind of keep.
Speaker 4: The ladder down and keep pulling everyone up.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's so important.
Speaker 1: I could talk about mentoring for ages, and I will
Speaker 1: talk about mentoring on the podcast at some point because
Speaker 1: just like you, I went to use your name, Money Diarrest.
Speaker 1: Just like you, I'm a very firm believer that mentoring
Speaker 1: isn't about age or tenure. It's actually about skill sharing
Speaker 1: and if you've got a skill, then you can be
Speaker 1: a mentor. Like it's absolutely not about how old you are.
Speaker 1: In fact, I've learned so much, especially in my online business,
Speaker 1: from people who are significantly younger than me, and it
Speaker 1: humbles me every day exactly. But I think that this
Speaker 1: has been a really powerful chat. Definitely hasn't gone down
Speaker 1: the route that I thought it Money Diarist, but I'm
Speaker 1: really grateful for it because I feel like these are
Speaker 1: the conversations I want to be having with our community
Speaker 1: so that they understand that roles like yours exist and
Speaker 1: what that does and how that works, and how important
Speaker 1: it is for companies to have a board of governance
Speaker 1: to make sure that companies are doing the right thing,
Speaker 1: because ultimately it's for you, like it's for the community,
Speaker 1: like it's to keep you safe and secure and happy,
Speaker 1: and yeah, I'm just I'm really passionate about this area.
Speaker 3: So I'm glad we got to have this chat before
Speaker 3: we go.
Speaker 2: I just wanted to ask you mentioned that your last
Speaker 2: role was your dream role, and obviously you've stepped away
Speaker 2: from that.
Speaker 3: What's your plan going forward?
Speaker 2: Are you planning on taking a bit of a significant
Speaker 2: leave of absence. Are you setting yourself up to kind
Speaker 2: of do that hybrid six month in six month out?
Speaker 2: What are you looking to do now?
Speaker 5: Yeah, well, the six month and six month out was
Speaker 5: longer time plan for twenty years or so. I think
Speaker 5: I will have to get back into full time work.
Speaker 5: It's some sage all will want to. My son's three,
Speaker 5: and he's had health issues over his life so far,
Speaker 5: short life, so I'm really happy to take the rest
Speaker 5: of the year. So I planned from March till November
Speaker 5: without work and just to sort of take that time
Speaker 5: to figure out what to do next and just feel
Speaker 5: so just so happy that I'm in the position to
Speaker 5: be able to do that. You know, it's a bit
Speaker 5: of a dream just to say I'm going to take
Speaker 5: some time out and sit back and see what comes
Speaker 5: or what drives.
Speaker 4: Me after that. But every day is a bit different.
Speaker 5: At the moment, I know it's going to be something
Speaker 5: that relates to social justice, and that is for the
Speaker 5: good of the environment, for women, for people, and for
Speaker 5: economic justice. Probably, I know that that's what drives me. However,
Speaker 5: what shape or format takes, I don't know. I work
Speaker 5: up a few days ago and decided I wanted to
Speaker 5: go to.
Speaker 3: Med school, so oh my god.
Speaker 5: I mean, you know, I dismissed that after I realized
Speaker 5: I'd be like fifty by the time I was in
Speaker 5: general practice.
Speaker 3: So that's that's all right, No such things too late.
Speaker 4: I'm just having some wild ideas about what I'm not
Speaker 4: doing next secually. To be honest, the.
Speaker 2: World is your oyster, though, and I think that that's
Speaker 2: something that's really good to see, is being like, there's
Speaker 2: not an age limit on deciding that you want to
Speaker 2: change your path. You could be seventy years old and go, oh,
Speaker 2: actually I want to learn a new skill or I
Speaker 2: want to try something different, and we get really set.
Speaker 2: I think in the idea that your career path is
Speaker 2: direct and linear, and I know for me personally that
Speaker 2: hasn't been the case at all, And I think it's
Speaker 2: really refreshing to be like, oh my god, I woke
Speaker 2: up one day and I wanted to do this thing
Speaker 2: and that's valid, Like that's not a whim. Maybe it
Speaker 2: just means that you've awoken a passion that you hadn't
Speaker 2: recognized before, and now that you know that it's there,
Speaker 2: why not pursue it?
Speaker 3: Why not?
Speaker 5: H thank you, thank you for not saying it's my
Speaker 5: mid life crisis.
Speaker 4: No.
Speaker 1: No, I think that it's interesting as well, because you
Speaker 1: were probably looking at that and going all right, well
Speaker 1: I wouldn't be in practice until I'm fifty, and you go, wow,
Speaker 1: like imagine how many years after that, Like you will
Speaker 1: probably still be in practice another twenty years after that,
Speaker 1: plus like if you've got your health now, Like why
Speaker 1: would that not be the case? Like that's twenty years
Speaker 1: of really impactful work that you would be doing.
Speaker 3: That it is absolutely worth it.
Speaker 1: But I'm very much embrace what you want to do,
Speaker 1: because there's no such thing as too late.
Speaker 5: Stop at you all encouragement to do it, do it,
Speaker 5: go to medical, go to medschool.
Speaker 1: But it's one of those things where if that's your passion,
Speaker 1: do it, follow it because it's not about what you earn,
Speaker 1: it's actually about how you feel. And there's a lot
Speaker 1: of research to say, you know, as much as we can,
Speaker 1: you know, loop back to what you said before, like
Speaker 1: you had a really high income, that's not the thing
Speaker 1: that sparks joy. There's research to say that that actually
Speaker 1: caps out after about eighty thousand dollars, your happiness doesn't increase.
Speaker 1: So what can we do to fulfill our lives in
Speaker 1: every other way? And obviously we didn't get time to
Speaker 1: talk about your son today, but like if you're saying
Speaker 1: he's not well, like, it's really important to be embracing
Speaker 1: the things in our life that really spark joy and
Speaker 1: that make us happy and make us feel like we're
Speaker 1: having an impact. And I just think that you're doing that.
Speaker 1: And I'm really proud to say that you're a part
Speaker 1: of our community. So thank you for sharing your story
Speaker 1: and hanging out with us today and ranting about boards
Speaker 1: with me.
Speaker 4: Thank you so much. It's been such a pleasure.
Speaker 2: It's been incredible. And if you want to have more
Speaker 2: of those conversations, you can join our Facebook group. We
Speaker 2: have conversations like that every week. Search She's on the
Speaker 2: money and we're on Instagram and TikTok now as wow.
Speaker 3: Gosh, don't talk about a day. Dan still on TikTok
Speaker 3: the other day in that.
Speaker 4: Ce fantastic, thank you, thank you.
Speaker 3: So it was terrible. It took a lot of shots
Speaker 3: and then it wasn't even right.
Speaker 1: I was like, we're just calling it, We're just putting
Speaker 1: it out, we're calling it.
Speaker 2: So So she's on the money, aus. But don't forget, guys,
Speaker 2: that the advice shared on shees on the money is
Speaker 2: general in nature and just not consider your individual circumstances.
Speaker 2: She's on the money exists purely for educational purposes and
Speaker 2: should not be relied upon to make an investment or
Speaker 2: a financial decision. And we promise Victoria divine and She's
Speaker 2: on the money. Are authorized representatives of Infocused Securities Australia
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Speaker 1: See you on Wednesday, guys, Bye the Sea