On May 15th, the IPG Women’s Leadership Network in Sydney collaborated with Spotify to host an event focused on work-life balance featuring women from different industries discussing how they balance their work and personal life while excelling in their careers and personal goals. More than 80 guests from across 21 IPG agencies attended the event, which took place at Spotify’s impressive office overlooking Sydney’s Darling Harbour.
The opening guest speaker, Kate Watson, has a very interesting work history having worked in politics earlier in her career, including working with the Chief of Staff at the Australian Prime Minister’s office. Kate made a career change and began working in partnerships with Bauer and Sky News. Most recently, however, Kate has become an entrepreneur. She, with her co-host Claire, run The Squiz, a weekday podcast and email covering the key news headlines. It is short, informed and engaging.
Inese Kingsmill spent 16 years at Microsoft in various marketing, channel and business leadership positions before moving to Telstra. At Telstra, Inese was responsible for corporate and consumer marketing for over 5 years and was involved in the Telstra re-brand and the shift to customer-centricity. Inese then took on the impressive and sizable role of CMO at Virgin Australia, which included running the airline’s digital and e-commerce business, contact centers and marketing. Inese is passionate about female representation on boards and is currently a non-executive director of two boards and has been involved in others throughout her career. Most recently, Inese established a leadership and strategy consultancy, Breakfast Epiphanies.
Lauren McAlister started as a media assistant and then moved to advertising sales with the Australian Financial Review. She took some time out from the advertising industry and began teaching English to children in Japan. On returning, she decided to change tact and get her master’s degree in Public Health. For the last ten years, Lauren has worked for the Cancer Council in a variety of roles from creating grassroots programs to improve cancer treatment, to raising millions of dollars in fundraising annually. Last year Lauren was awarded Employee of the Year for the Cancer Council. Lauren is also passionate about sports and represents Australia in Women’s Touch Football. Earlier this month her team won gold at the World Championships in Kuala Lumpur. Lauren is also Mum to twin 4-year old girls.
The event concluded with cocktails and networking.