This year's theme of #BREAKTHEBIAS for International Women's Day is particularly resonant with us as the stereotype for business success and leaders in business is still very much dominated by cis men.
Participation of women in business is vital for our economic recovery post-COVID, yet in Australia only 22% of startup founders are female, and women own only 31% of businesses.
The race to equality is certainly not over. Bias still exists, which means we still need to take action.
Back in 2019, we curated a list of incredible women-led businesses to follow and we are SO pleased to see some incredible growth and milestones from that list, such as:
One way to break the bias, is to champion people who are taking incredible action in the pursuit of equality.
You can't be what you can't see!
So, with that in mind, we've updated our list for 2022 to include some VERY inspiring people to keep your eye on.
Sarah Moran is cofounder of Girl Geek Academy, a movement to help inspire one million women into technology by 2025.
She is a woman wearing many hats who is also a regular expert on Channel 9’s Today Show, an active community contributor with the Leonardo group and Science Gallery Melbourne, sits on the Victorian Minister’s Advisory Council for Gender Equality, the Future of Work Summit advisory board, the RMIT Games Industry Advisory Committee, the Melbourne International Games Week Steering Committee and the VicHealth Youth Taskforce. Sarah is also an ambassador for Brisbane City Council’s youth program Visible Ink. So inspiring!
Mads is the Co-Founder of award-winning career education company girledworld, which has worked with STEM, startup and tech sector business mentors in 100's of global and local companies to connect them with 30,000+ young female students to upskill them for the industries and jobs of tomorrow.
Mads is also the Co-Founder of smart career education and employability skills SaaS platform Future Amp, backed by Amazon Web Services, global and local companies and Future Minds chaired by David Gonski AC. She is also an award-winning Australian entrepreneur, startup mentor and angel investor.
Sarah and Laura have both been working tirelessly for many years to elevate the voices of Aboriginal people and share their stories.
Their shared passion for creating real change in the community saw them come together to form the Victorian Aboriginal owned and led social enterprise ‘Clothing the Gaps’ which now works to unite people through fashion and causes, one of which is to help close the gap in life expectancy between Aboriginal and non- indigenous Australians.
In 2020-2021 financial year they created over 9000 hours of employment for indigenous people and were recognised for excellence at the 2020 Dreamtime Awards and awarded 'Business of the year'.
Lucy Liu is a co-founder and president of cross-border payments start-up Airwallex. In March last year, Airwallex became the quickest company in Australian history to achieve so-called unicorn status with a $US1 billion valuation and she was the youngest female founder to do so!
“I was 25 when Airwallex was founded. Some people were surprised to see a young female co-founder of a startup in an industry traditionally dominated by men,” Lucy Liu told The CEO Magazine. “In the early days, I recall a few double-takes when people saw my business card.”
Erika is a Senior Behaviour and Skill Development Specialist in Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) and cognitive deficit; and is widely recognised as Australia’s leading expert in Wandering and Drowning prevention for those with ASD/cognitive deficit.
Autism Swim is an international, social enterprise of experts specialising in wandering and drowning prevention for those with ASD and other abilities.
GG's Flowers (the G's standing for Gayana and Geetha) is a socially sustainable business that aims to provide people with disabilities with meaningful employment opportunities starting by Nipuni (Nip).
The team work together to make you a beautiful arrangement for any occasion. Then Gayana, delivers the flowers to your door, with a big smile and even bigger ulteria motive- she really wants to meet your dog. Watch the video, we promise it's worth it.
Clothe Creative and Ela were such a key part to ensuring the fit and quality of our locally made sweaters was second to none.
We were privileged to sit down with Ela to discuss how her business has been affected in the past two years and to learn more about the staying competitive in the fashion industry…
Phil and Vicky from CGT Manufacturing were instrumental in bringing our 100% Australian-made cotton sweatshirts to life, generously opening their contact list and hearts to Kate and the She Lion team.
We sat down with Phil to chat about the pandemic's impact on their business and how the Australian fashion industry has changed in his decades of experience…
Support Local: Meet Kate Johansson – Founder of KOJA.
We’re busy enough without having to spend hours trying to make decisions about what we should eat when we're craving a snack!
Lucky for us, KOJA (and Kate J) has done the hard work for us and designed a range of nutritious, satisfying and oh so delicious healthy snack bars.
Learn more about Kate's business journey, experience through the pandemic to date, and how she support's local.
