Culturally Diverse Women

Leadership & Influence

Culturally Diverse Women

A masterclass in career navigation – Move your understanding to action

While efforts continue to address the issues of inequity for women at work, it is not progressing at the same rate for all.

This program is designed to support women who identify as culturally and linguistically diverse (CaLD) women and, or Women of Colour [WoC] in navigating barriers and biases in their career growth. Specifically, the program applies to those from Non-Anglo-European backgrounds, inclusive of those from migrant, refugee and asylum seeker families. This is in line with the recent Australian census, seeing growth in migrant professionals from Nepal, India, Pakistan, Iraq, The Philippines, etc. who make up a significant proportion of Australia’s 51.5% of 1st and 2nd generation migrants.

This program has been delivered for two years with wonderful participant growth and improved allyship and advocacy from Anglo-Saxon leaders. We create a safe and supportive online environment in a peer-to-peer learning and coaching style [sessions 1-4]; we invite strategically selected allies and advocates to a closed session and then we bring everyone back for the last session [session 5], which creates the impetus for change in career plans with senior leadership support.

Together with:

MindTribes

What you'll learn

Join the Culturally diverse women – Career navigation program and take the first step in unlocking barriers to your career advancement in the process.

Since 2017, MindTribes have supported over 600 culturally diverse women to advance with the support of their allies and advocates. Over 80% have progressed their leadership careers, stepping up into more senior roles, acquiring board roles, and gaining sponsorship for global executive MBA’s.

The program takes an intersectional and strengths-based approach to tackling gender and racial equality in the workplace and leadership, by empowering CALD, migrant and refugee women to embrace their unique identities, skills and experiences; navigate barriers to career progression and leadership; and advocate for themselves and others.

— Jemi Jeng, a/Director, Optimisation & Project Delivery, Revenue NSW.

How you'll learn

The program is delivered over five Masterclasses, designed to Inspire, Teach, Coach and Make a Commitment to Act. It is 80 per cent interaction and application with 20 per cent learning, a style that mobilises participants to make real change.

Together we form a community of practice. We also match you with an accountability partner within the session, so that you keep moving forward. All the sessions are connected both in content and action, so we are designing for your progress.

Between sessions participants should engage with their accountability partner to move their commitments to act. Manami Ray and Lilian Kikuvi are coaches who are accessible in between sessions for support and questions and sharing of information that the group requires.

Details

For 2023, Culturally Diverse Women will be offered as a custom program, delivered on-demand for individual organisations with a minimum of 15 participants. Please contact buseco-exec-ed@monash.edu to discuss how we can tailor this program to meet your organisation's unique skills needs.

Who should attend

Female professionals who identify as being:

  • culturally and/or linguistically diverse
  • from migrant, refugee or asylum seeker family backgrounds
  • women of colour
  • biracial women
  • women who strongly identify as non-Anglo Saxon
  • women who strongly identify with their language, faith religion as part of their core identity.

**From an Australian perspective, and the last census, 51.5% of the population, are 1st and 2nd generation migrants, with the census noting: “Australia continues to be a culturally and linguistically diverse country with the growth of communities from Nepal, India, Pakistan, Iraq and the Philippines.”, ABS, 2021. MindTribes finds that Australian organisations with 1,000+ employees have on average 15–30% representation of culturally diverse people in the workforce, but this representation does not exist in senior leadership ranks.

Program fee

$2,195

We encourage leaders and organisations to nominate and support CALD women and First Nations women in their workplace to attend.

Digital badging

Upon successful completion of this program, you will be awarded a digital badge to share with your network. Find out more about digital badges.

Facilitators

Div Pillay

Lead Facilitator & Executive Coach, Co-founder of Culturally diverse women masterclass

Div Pillay is an experienced and respected diversity and inclusion practitioner, leader, researcher and advocate, for over 25 years. Her speciality focus is on gender, race and cultural inclusion. Her work is backed by her experience of living under racially segregated apartheid laws in South Africa, before migrating to Australia; and her behavioural psychology background. Div leads award winning management consultancy MindTribes and social enterprise Culturally Diverse Women.

Div’s work on gender intersectionality is published as guidance material by The Commission for Gender Equality in the Public Sector and; she is well regarded by the Victorian Multicultural Commission and CPSU for her research on Women of Colour career mobility and safety. Div is also the Chair of the D&I Committee at the American Chamber of Commerce, Australia; is a Board Director at VicHealth and is named as one of the 100 Women of Influence, by the Australian Financial Review. She has contributed her voice for others in the media, appearing on SBS, ABC News, Sydney Morning Herald, Herald Sun and Women’s Agenda. Further amplifying voices often missing, she co-hosts the popular podcast, Business in Colour.

Manami Ray is a Director at MindTribes working with clients to advance equity and inclusion. She brings 18+ years of her people, business and innovation experience to creating sustainable systems that includes all voices.

She knows what it feels like to be the only woman in the room and often the only culturally diverse woman in the room; throughout her corporate sector experience -  from global consulting firms to large financial institutions to not-for-profit and start-ups.

Manami is an Alumni of the 2018 Culturally Diverse Women’s Masterclass – she used the learning to successfully transform her career from Mercer to a career in social impact before joining MindTribes. She has designed and delivered hundreds of workshops bringing together social impact start-ups with big business, universities and government agencies. Notable achievements is a Young Women’s Leadership and Financial Literacy Program for the City of Monash and Casey Council; a 9-month Refugee Entrepreneurship Global Project; and partnering with an international pharmaceutical firm, working with people living with a disability.  She has also been a long-term Mentor Volunteer with Fitted for Work working with vulnerable women.

A love for continuous learning, she has completed the Women on Boards’ Next Generation of Corporate Female Leaders Program and holds two Masters; in Design Strategy & Innovation and a Masters in Finance.

Lilian Kikuvi is a diversity and inclusion professional with an extensive corporate leadership experience and a demonstrated capacity to deliver outstanding results for the Public, Private and Not for Profit sectors, which include financial profitability, client satisfaction, operational excellence, and reputation gains.

She has over 22 years’ cross-cultural experience that has served clients like Microsoft, Spotify, eNett International, Fidelity International, Medibank, Linktree, Australia Institute of Company Directors (AICD) and the 3 levels of Australian government.

Lilian is an Advisory Board Member of Culturally Diverse Workforces that supports over 600 women from 25 cultural heritages to close the leadership cultural diversity gap in Australian business.

She holds a postgraduate diploma in psychology and is a qualified counsellor.

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