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Carla is a Director at Monitor Deloitte and has a breadth of experience across industries including financial services/fintech, government, and the start-up sector. Carla has a background in innovation and technology, formerly the CEO and co-founder of a superannuation-focused fintech and a Director on the board of FinTech Australia from 2018-2021. Carla started her career in science before transitioning to the federal government, where she established the Workplace Gender Equality Agency’s Data and Analytics team. Carla holds a PhD in Environmental Science, MBA, and a BSc in Environmental Biology (Hons 1).
One of the reasons IWD is important is because globally women are still a long way from being equally represented, whether that’s their representation and remuneration in the workforce, financial security, safety, or ‘simply’ having an equal voice in society.
Where there’s oxygen there’s opportunity and IWD brings the opportunity to reflect on how far we have actually come, and the barriers that remain.
I have changed careers several times already, working across male-dominated industries such as science and fintech and female-dominated industries (WGEA), so my experience has been a mixed bag.
In my past few roles, one of the challenges I’ve observed is just the absence of women in general – whether that’s been in a male-dominated industry or in a senior leadership position where there are notoriously few women at the top. The challenge is something I cannot solve alone.
It is more a reflection of what still needs to shift in our society and culture to understand and remove some of the barriers women face for certain jobs and industries.
Positively, I think there have been a number of changes in the corporate world over the past 5-10 years, particularly around how work is done, and by whom. For example, increasingly more companies allow all roles to be done flexibly and they are also encouraging men to take time off for parental leave caring responsibilities. More and more companies are starting to pay superannuation on parental leave – a huge and positive change to improve long-term financial outcomes for women!
Dr. Kirstin Ferguson. I met her during my time as an entrepreneur while participating in the SheStarts accelerator. She’s had such an impressive and diverse career and watching the positive impact she’s had for women (for instance the #celebratingwomen initiative) has been awesome to see evolve over recent years. I‘ve loved watching her many amazing career achievements while also throwing out the net to as many women as possible at the same time.
The deep-seated gender roles and stereotypes that exist in our society are a big one I’d love to smash.
Our culture is still so ingrained around factors such as who pulls back from work for caring responsibilities, and the types of occupations that men and women occupy. These stereotypes start from birth (pink for girls anyone?) but ultimately have huge impacts on the rest of our lives.
I’d love to see that change a lot more in my lifetime.
Director, Monitor Deloitte
