Women are the Business

Over 8 Episodes we'll be digging into women's working lives. We'll be exploring what research tells with leading academics, and hearing from alumni who have gone on to become industry leaders. What we really hope, is that we'll get to the root of these problems, and offer some practical solutions you can use in your every day working life.

In the final episode of Women are the Business, we're stepping beyond the Western workplace. Women in developing nations face many of the same challenges as women in the West, as well as some that are uniquely their own. With the help of two experts, we're addressing the power of research and finding out why it’s important to acknowledge the diverse experience of women around the world. Today's guests are Sarah Boyd, Director of Global Advocacy at Data2X, and Dr Diana Contreras Suarez, Research Fellow at the Melbourne Institute: Applied Economic and Social Research.

In this special episode of Women are the Business, we're bringing you a candid conversation with University of Melbourne alum, and former Prime Minister of Australia, Julia Gillard. We spoke about the roadblocks to true gender equality, how she looks back on her career with the benefit of hindsight, the power of activism and what she’s been up to since she left politics. "We only change big things in our world by talking about them."

The COVID-19 pandemic is shaking up the way we live and work - and in this episode we take a close look at how women and men are affected in different ways. As we’ll hear, the pandemic has exposed the “care crisis” in our homes, and highlighted women’s role at the frontline of the response. It threatens to take gender equity backwards in the workplace. Can we get to the other side of the pandemic without making gender inequity worse? Our guests are Professor Susan Ainsworth and Associate Professor Leah Ruppanner.

Despite huge progress when it comes to equality in the workforce, there is one trend that is proving hard to budge: gender segregation. In this episode, two experts lay out the data on the prevalence of female and male dominated jobs - from education and nursing to computer science and construction. Does it matter that the labour market is so gender-segregated? Today's guests are Libby Lyons, Director of Australia's Workplace Gender Equality Agency (WGEA), and Dr Victor Sojo, Lecturer in Leadership and Research Fellow at the Centre for Workplace Leadership.

Money shapes our personal and professional lives in dramatic ways, but we're often reluctant to talk about it. On episode three of Women are the Business, we're speaking to two experts about their own experiences with money - the good, the bad and the ugly. We're digging into the gender pay gap, the problem with Australia's retirement system and the prevalence of financial abuse. Our guests: Corinne Proske (BCom 1993), General Manager of ethical lending platform, Speckle, and Professor Carsten Murawski, Co-Director of the Brain, Mind & Markets Lab. This episode contains some strong language and discusses domestic violence. 

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Unpaid work underpins our entire economy. We're only able to function because we have clean clothes and packed lunches. But what are the impacts of all this unpaid labour on women's lives? University of Melbourne research reveals that chores also exist in workplaces - think taking notes in meetings, emptying the dishwasher or planning the office Christmas party - and it's largely women who carry the load. On episode two of Women are the Business, we're bringing in experts Dr Leah Ruppanner and Dr Maria Recalde to explore the dynamics of unpaid work both at home and in the office, and to find out what we can do to create a little more balance.

Did you know that Australia was the second last developed country to implement a National Paid Parental Leave (PPL) Policy? In the first episode of Women are the Business, we speak with Jenny Macklin, the longest serving woman in the Australian House of Representatives. She drove the fight for PPL in Australia, finally getting it across the line in 2011. We also hear from Professor Guyonne Kalb, who measured the policy's impact on Australian families. We'll explore how this one piece of policy impacts women's careers - and men's - and why more change might be needed.