Appointments

The thought of starting a new business to find flexibility as a single mother is enough to make even the boldest woman sweat.

The ASX 200 will soon have one less female CEO, after Dreamworld’s parent company Ardent Leisure Group announced major leadership changes this morning, including the replacement of Deborah Thomas as CEO.

Former Prime Minister Julia Gillard appointed chair of BeyondBlue to succeed Jeff Kennett from the 1st of July 2017. She is “delighted”.

June Oscar has this week been named Australia’s new Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner, becoming the first Indigenous woman appointed to the Australian Human Rights Commission.

Three women made headlines yesterday; each of them trailblazers, each in the spotlight talking openly about the shackles that could have stifled them.

Frances Adamson was yesterday named by Malcolm Turnbull as our first female secretary of the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade.

If you need further proof that tenacity gets you to the top, consider this: Karen Lawson’s just been appointed CEO of Slingshot, a role that didn’t exist until she picked up the phone to the incubator’s two co-founders and said she wanted to run the business.

Google’s head of Performance Susan Wheeldon-Steele has been appointed to the board of Centuria Capital (CNI), becoming the first female director to sit on the board of the ASX-listed specialist investment manager board.

Australia will soon see another woman chairing one of our largest organisations, with the Commonwealth Bank of Australia today announcing Catherine Livingstone as its new chairman from early 2017.

Nicola Wakefield Evans has been appointed to the national board of the Australian Institute of Company Directors, which will see the 12-person board go 50% female for the first time.

Justice Susan Kiefel is to be the next Chief Justice of the High Court, the first woman to occupy the position in Australia.

It’s been a LONG time coming, writes Kcasey McLoughlin from the University of Newcastle, but for the first time a woman will preside as chief justice of Australia’s High Court.