Transparent, Inclusive, Authentic, Collaborative – Unlocking Brilliant Career Moves
On Tuesday 3rd March SBS hosted an 'Amplifying Brilliant Career Moves' event to celebrate International Women’s Day, and start a conversation about the brilliant careers and brilliant minds of an impressive panel from the School of Biomedical Sciences.
The event was a fantastic showcase of women in science at diverse stages of their career. Thank you to all our speakers and panellists for generously sharing your career experiences, acknowledging hard work and opportunities, and inspiring the EMCRA audience, and others in attendance to strive for greatness.
Director of Education, Professor Robyn Slattery, opened the morning sharing her own personal journey of successes and challenges. She highlighted the importance of community, “community is what allows women to succeed in our field.”
Robyn also emphasised the importance of taking agency, “I encourage you to seek mentorship and to develop your own insight about how to advance your career.”
Then it was over to our skilled convenor, A/Prof Rosa McCarty, who acknowledged her tradition of singing "Don't be too polite, girls” every International Women’s Day. Rosa seamlessly orchestrated a powerful conversation across the panel drawing on her own experiences.
When it comes to your career, Prof Kanta Subbarao highlighted that you need to be open – open to possibilities, to mistakes, and to change. While working at the World Health Organisation (after leading a research lab), Kanta was astonished by how far her research area had advanced without her, “I realised then, that being in the lab was what made me really happy.”
Prof Alice Pebay grew up knowing who she wanted to be “I want to make a difference in this world. Working for me is more than an activity... its the best job.”
“You can only achieve the best, when you bring the best together with a shared vision and common values” said Alice, “You also need to value diversity, those that are different from you, enrich your perspective”.
“I want my discoveries, the discoveries of my group, to go places,” said Alice, "in order to achieve this we need to think about commercialisation as a progression of our work. Its not a competition, its for the good of society”.
It’s a process, Dr Sidonia Eckles explained, “Address a really great scientific question, publish your findings, speak at conferences, then you start to gain small grants, and when you manage those well, it all forms part of your track record to go for something bigger.”
She encouraged the audience, “Do something authentic, and be engaged, locally and internationally.”
When things don’t go your way, Kanta advises to "always reflect on your research, and ask 'why?’ - why do we care?.”
Collaboration with DAP was important for Dr Lou Fourriere-Chea (DBP) when she was establishing herself in Melbourne, “My earliest collaborator here in Melbourne, I still discuss my findings with today. There are so many ways to collaborate in the precinct.”
Lou spoke about relocating from France for science, the challenges of building new relationships, and the knowledge we take for granted such as understanding the various systems, grant schemes and how they all work together. She highlighted how lucky we are in Australia, “Science is in English – you can work anywhere in the world.”
When discussing leadership, running research and being an enabler for high functioning teams, Alice says being a good scientist doesn’t cut it, “You need to be a good human - transparent, inclusive, work with integrity and ethics.” Alice also highlighted the importance of investing in your relationships, “If people are seen and valued, they will fight.”
When it comes to how far society has progressed with relation to representation of women, Kanta highlighted how much has been gained “from the battles of previous generations of women in science and society.”
The panel all acknowledged the importance of International Women’s Day, as an opportunity to shine a light on women and their importance in every aspect of society.
Lou looks forward to the day we don’t need to host a Women’s Day anymore.
Sadly, there is still more work to be done and as Alice so perfectly phrased it...“It’s so important when we go up, when we succeed, we must lift others up with us.”
The event was a brilliant opportunity to promote opportunities for discussion and networking across our departments.
A special mention to men in the room who showed up to listen to an inspiring group of brilliant women.
This event was coordinated in conjunction with Jessica Neil and Isabelle Foo from the SBS EMCRA Committee.