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Speaker 1: Now, spouses of current and former ADF personnel in the

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Speaker 1: Northern Territory are set to benefit from a new program

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Speaker 1: which has been designed to boost well being and unlock

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Speaker 1: career opportunities. This program, which is already operating in Adelaide,

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Speaker 1: Perth and canbra is soon going to be delivered in

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Speaker 1: Darwin and Catherine after receiving support from the Northern Territory Government.

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Speaker 1: Now joining me on the line is the co founder

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Speaker 1: of the program, Claire Harris, the director of Human Quotient Group.

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Speaker 1: Good morning to you.

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Speaker 2: Hello, Hello, thanks for having me.

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Speaker 1: Lovely to have you on the show. Now, Claire, tell

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Speaker 1: me a little bit about how this program works.

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Speaker 2: Yes, so it's a face to face group program. We

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Speaker 2: bring spouses together and if they have small children, we

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Speaker 2: provide childcare for them as well, and they come together

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Speaker 2: and they go through I guess, a transformative experience where

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Speaker 2: they're able to pursue their own own career development, so

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Speaker 2: anything related to work and employment that could be business study,

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Speaker 2: job or looking for volunteering, etc. And we focus on

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Speaker 2: their well being and basically just they can learn from

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Speaker 2: each other. They get access to local supports and they

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Speaker 2: find out particularly if they're new to Darwin, new to

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Speaker 2: the top end. They get to find out about all

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Speaker 2: the services and all the great things to do, all

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Speaker 2: of the the activities and community connections that they can

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Speaker 2: take up as well.

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Speaker 1: So I understand it's been operating in Adelaide, Perth, Canbra,

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Speaker 1: but it's soon going to be for us here in

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Speaker 1: Darwin and also Catherine. Why has it taken so long?

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Speaker 1: I suppose might be the question some are asking.

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Speaker 2: Oh, well, we can always ask those kinds of questions,

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Speaker 2: I guess. Look, there's been a growing awareness of the

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Speaker 2: importance around employing the partners of current serving AIGHTF members

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Speaker 2: and veterans. So there is a growing awareness that actually

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Speaker 2: to boost well being of families, we often need to

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Speaker 2: have two parents. If we're talking about a traditional family structure,

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Speaker 2: we need two parents working. But also employment and meaningful

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Speaker 2: employment and having a career, having a purpose is very

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Speaker 2: much linked to well being. And so we're seeing a

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Speaker 2: greater awareness of that now, which is fantastic, and I

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Speaker 2: think that's a broader awareness across the country. We are

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Speaker 2: a very small, very small social enterprise and I co

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Speaker 2: founded a business with my husband who's ex Navy, and

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Speaker 2: so we've seen I guess that defense lifestyle from the inside.

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Speaker 2: And we've seen all of these incredible, incredible people that

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Speaker 2: are you know, the spouses who are just talented educated,

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Speaker 2: often very very educated, and they're moving around the country,

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Speaker 2: and you know, it just seems like a missed opportunity

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Speaker 2: to not support them in their professional undertakings. And so

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Speaker 2: I stepped in and created the program about six or

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Speaker 2: so years ago. And I've been doing my best to

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Speaker 2: get the word out there, but as you know, it's

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Speaker 2: often challenging because there's so much going on.

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Speaker 1: Oh it's so hard as well, you know, when it

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Speaker 1: is something that you know that he's done private level

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Speaker 1: or you know by some by an individual, and and

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Speaker 1: you're really trying to get it out there and push

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Speaker 1: it out there to everyone. What's it been like for

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Speaker 1: you since you created this program as well, and seeing

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Speaker 1: it roll out in some of those other locations and

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Speaker 1: now obviously seeing it roll out in the Northern Territory,

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Speaker 1: and you know, tell me a little bit about some

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Speaker 1: of what you've kind of you know, what you've seen

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Speaker 1: in a real practical sense with some of these these

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Speaker 1: wives and children.

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Speaker 2: Yes, I guess what it's been like. It's been absolutely

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Speaker 2: incredible to meet diverse spouses across the country. So he

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Speaker 2: mentioned Adelaide. We've run in Adelaide for three years and

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Speaker 2: we'll be running in twenty twenty six, so we've got

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Speaker 2: a really good footprint there meeting the different spouses. I mean,

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Speaker 2: I've met people that have PhDs, I've met people that

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Speaker 2: work in all sectors. So we have a very diverse

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Speaker 2: group of people. And as part of our model as well,

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Speaker 2: we employ spouses in the local area to actually run

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Speaker 2: the programs. So that's important. Yeah, so that's an important aspect.

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Speaker 2: So it's actually it's incredible to run the program, bring

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Speaker 2: spouses together. And for some of these individuals, they have

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Speaker 2: been out of the workforce for you know, years, it

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Speaker 2: could be even you know, fifteen years. We've had some

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Speaker 2: people because they've really experienced that typical defense lifestyle of

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Speaker 2: moving around a lot and also taking on the caring

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Speaker 2: responsibilities and so being kept I guess out of the

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Speaker 2: workforce or finding it very difficult to find jobs that

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Speaker 2: are related to their areas of expertise. We've had people

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Speaker 2: come into the programs who are starting, you know, they're

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Speaker 2: reimagining what they could do next, so they're looking for opportunities.

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Speaker 2: They're rethinking if they want to change careers or if

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Speaker 2: they want to use the existing skills that they have.

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Speaker 2: And we've also found that people are actually very isolated,

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Speaker 2: and I think this is a theme that we see

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Speaker 2: in general across Australia. We do have a loneliness epidemic.

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Speaker 2: People talk about that, but we see that quite often

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Speaker 2: within the defense community, simply because people are moving around

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Speaker 2: and then I think even as families transition and move

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Speaker 2: out of defense service, they are then needing to reconnect

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Speaker 2: with a new community potentially and sort of re establish

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Speaker 2: themselves to work. So we've had people come into the

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Speaker 2: program that you know, haven't had a job. They haven't

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Speaker 2: they don't feel confident looking for a job, and yet

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Speaker 2: they work with our career mentors, they get the peer

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Speaker 2: support from the group around them and they start to

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Speaker 2: apply for jobs. And we've had people that have found

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Speaker 2: jobs during our six or eight week programs and they've

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Speaker 2: kept those jobs for years and they've just felt that

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Speaker 2: absolute blossoming within themselves. They've regained their confidence, they've made friends,

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Speaker 2: you know, they've just powerhouses.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, how good? Now, when is this when is it

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Speaker 1: going to launch? In the Northern Territory and where can

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Speaker 1: people go to find out a bit more info.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, yes, so we're actually getting pretty close mid October,

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Speaker 2: so we're coming up very soon. But the best place

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Speaker 2: to look is we're on social media under the profile

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Speaker 2: cowork Coplay, but we have a website as well, so

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Speaker 2: that's Coworkcoplay dot com dot au and they'll be able

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Speaker 2: to navigate to the NT programs from there.

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Speaker 1: Wonderful stuff. Well, Claire Harris, lovely to talk to you

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Speaker 1: this morning. I really appreciate you having a chat with us.

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Speaker 1: I know we've got a lot of defense families that

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Speaker 1: listen to the show, so I know that they will

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Speaker 1: appreciate that information.

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Speaker 2: Awesome, Thank you so much for having me.

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Speaker 1: Wonderful, Thanks so much, Thank you for your time. Thanks Claire,