August 11, 2024 • 42 mins
Lorie Argus has unknowingly been a champion for females in senior leadership roles her whole life. From her early career at Virgin as one of the first female senior leaders, to now being only 1 of 2 female CEO’s of Australian airports she continues to prove that being authentically yourself, being aware and honest of your shortcomings and never believing your better than anyone else are all powerful ingredients for any leader. She’s funny, humble and incredibly real about the challenges that come with leading at the top, whilst being a wife, a mother and continuing to push yourself to be better everyday. One of my favourite conversations with one of my early inspirations!
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Speaker 1 (00:05):
Apoche Production. Welcome to another episode of Brave Always the
CEO series. This series we launched into the new world
of brave leadership.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
Happy people create happy businesses, true.
Speaker 1 (00:21):
Emotionally intelligent leadership. I've picked up Vombit once on our
about our four flight and everybody thought, well it was
good enough for him. I can do it now. We
will be joined by culture and leadership experts and some
superstar CEOs who will courageously tell us the truth behind
their brave leadership journeys. Today I'm joined by one of
my absolute saves, Laurie Argus. Laurie Agus is the CEO
(00:43):
of Melbourne Airport and took up this role in twenty
twenty two after seven years as Chief of Aviation and
Chief of Ground Transport. Laurie started her career in Canada
before relocating to Australia and joining Virgin Australia. In her
teen years at the airline, she was appointed Manager of
International Airport Operations and General Manager of Ground Operations in
(01:03):
twenty seventeen. Lauri Greg wed with an Executive NBA from
Bond University. Laurie is an active member of Chief Executive
Women and of the Australian Institute of Directors and became
a graduate of AICD in twenty nineteen. Laurie is also
a non executive director of the Australian Airport Association Airport
Council International World Governing Board. She's also a wife, a
(01:24):
mom to two beautiful kids, and just one of those
people who lights up the room when you walk in. Welcome, Laurie,
is so great to have you here today.
Speaker 2 (01:31):
Oh thanks, Emma, thanks for such a nice intro.
Speaker 1 (01:33):
Look. I can't start this without noting that Laurie and
I met back in Virgin Blue days, well over sixteen
plus years ago, and Laurie, you were one of the
first female influencers for me in a senior leadership role
that I looked up to. I'm sure I've told you
that that is the truth. You have me there. It
was true even back then. I think you had this
presence about you, like you were championing the flag for
(01:54):
women in leadership. Was that always like a goal of
yours or did you not even know you were doing that?
Speaker 2 (01:59):
I one hundred percent didn't know I was doing that.
And I'll tell you why I know that.
Speaker 3 (02:02):
I mean, I.
Speaker 2 (02:03):
Remember being alone, I remember being the only female in
the management ranks at Virgin my boss at the time
when I was a middle manager, there was ten of
us and I was the only female. And I remember
going up against all the other men in the GM job,
and I had a great executive HR at the time
who was advocating for diversity, and I'm not sure if
(02:24):
he wasn't around that I would have got that job,
because he was pretty passionate about it and he really
supported me through that recruitment process. But talking about women,
it was years later when I had somebody tell me
I was a feminist and I said to him, I said, oh,
I don't know if I'm a feminist, Like genuinely, I
answered the question honestly. I said, I don't know if
I do properly advocate for women or if I'm a feminist.
(02:48):
And she said, well, do you believe in equal pay
for women? And I said, well, yeah, obviously. And she
said do you believe in equal opportunities for women? And
I said yes, of course, and then she said, well, congratulations,
you're a feminist. So it wasn't until I kind of
had that conversation with her that I really started digging
into what it meant to really lift women up and
advocate for women, and so I'm far better at it nowadays.
(03:10):
Maybe it was informal.
Speaker 1 (03:12):
Formal Yeah, okay, So I ask you where about that?
So where your family decided to leave Canada and migrate
to Australia. There must have been a guess, a huge
decision for the family and quite a change. How did
you cope with that? So? How old were you when
you did move here? Well?
Speaker 2 (03:24):
I came by myself, so, which is a funny story
in itself, because I was sitting in Edmonton, Alberta. I
was working at night shift in network operations seven pm
to seven am. It was minus forty nine in the
middle of winter, and a.
Speaker 3 (03:40):
Job ad for Brisbane, Australia came across the fax machine.
I'm like, across the fax machine, I just went, I've
got to get out of here. I can't live in
this weather anymore. So I just applied and everyone told me.
Speaker 2 (03:53):
You know, I was twenty six, so everyone was like,
You're never going to get an airport manager job at
twenty six across the world. It was one of our
key stations we were launching Australia, and I'm like, well,
you know what, I'm just going to try ironically. You know,
of course women shouldn't always say it was luck that
they got an opportunity, but I do think in that
experience it was a little bit of luck and a
little bit of talent because I was easily movable, and
(04:15):
I was up against a lot of other really high
caliber candidates, but they had families and their kids needed schools,
and they needed visas, and there was all these complications.
So I think when I said, hey, I can be
in Australia in four weeks and just stick me in
a hotel and let's get started, I think that was
quite attractive to the management. And so I moved and
I packed up and left my family in Canada. I
(04:37):
lived at the Seeble in Brisbane for about six months,
and then I helped start the airline in Australia. So
one of the scariest times of my life. I never
went out for months. I didn't have any friends. I
wasn't brave enough back then to go out to dinner
by myself or to a movie by myself. I certainly
do that all the time now, but back then it was,
(04:58):
you know, I just stayed in my hotel room and worked.
Speaker 1 (05:01):
How did you get through that? Like, I mean, it's
a big thing to jump at a plan and come
hit me. You didn't even know what it was like
working in Australia. Was it was it a different way
of working? What was it going to be?
Speaker 2 (05:09):
Like?
Speaker 1 (05:10):
Where did you get that confidence from?
Speaker 2 (05:12):
I don't know where it comes from deep within me,
but I just have this drive to just never give up,
and I have this kind of resilience and or grit.
I think I've been working through trying to work out
what it is. But I think I had kind of
a pretty bumpy use and I just think it's taught
me just to push hard. And of course I was terrified.
(05:34):
I mean I got on the plane. It was the
middle of winter there, it was the middle of summer here.
I remember being so hot, and ironically it was only
April in prison, so it wasn't that bad. And I
had this moment in the hotel where I went you
know what. Because the airline hadn't set up yet, I
was doing all the work remotely, so I was negotiating
with quantas to do our ground handling remotely. I wasn't
yet positioned at the airport because we didn't have aircraft here.
(05:57):
And it was about one or two weeks in that
I had this moment where I went, you know what,
I'm completely alone, and even if something happened to me,
like you know what, my parents probably wouldn't work it
out until they didn't get an email for me a
week later. But I must say I had this beautiful
concierge at the hotel who every day when I'd work,
he'd come up and he'd be like, what are you
going to do this weekend, Laurie, And I'm like, well,
I'm working. And he was the one that pushed me
(06:19):
literally on my first bus down to the pineapple farm.
He convinced me to go on some tours. I met
a few people, like he was quite influential, Like you know,
there was lots of times of loneliness, but he kind
of pushed me around. And then you know, six months in,
once I was starting at the airport, I met lots
of great people and kind of the rest is history.
Speaker 1 (06:40):
Twenty six is pretty young right to go into a
leadership role, and then also added to that, you know,
you ought to be one of the few female leaders there.
Did you experience any doubt from other people like you're
coming in, like, hang on, who is this lady? What's
going on? Can she really do this? Oh? One percent?
Speaker 2 (06:55):
Because at the time it was at Brisbane Airport, all
of the station managers were at least fifty plus years
old old men. I don't think I recall meeting any
women for quite some time. So the station manager job
in airports is pretty senior and pretty special, and people
really aspire to have them because they're great. You get
to move around the world, you get to experience different countries.
(07:18):
But that wasn't my background. I had just worked in
one location my whole kind of career up until that point,
and I considered myself quite junior. So yeah, lots of
self doubt and lots of people, particularly you know, no
offense to Quantus, but particularly Quantus management back then. You know,
they were all very senior, and so when I was
kind of coming into a room to negotiate them working
(07:41):
for me, that was interesting.
Speaker 1 (07:44):
How did you overcome that?
Speaker 2 (07:45):
Well, we were a smaller airline, I mean, we only
had one daily flight, so we weren't that important to
Quantus back then. But I always overcome that by just
being honest and kind and building relationships and connecting with
people on a human level. I think that's the most
important thing to do. Like it's not just about the work.
It's like, who are you and how do I get
(08:06):
to know you? Let's go for a coffee and you know,
and these are relationships. I literally have the lovely Henry.
If he's listening, he was one of the station managers
back then. He's well retired now, but we still keep
in touch, Like we actually bump into each other. We
talk about those days. He was kind of put his
arms around me to say, hey, guys, you know, let
her into this club and into this circle. But Emma,
(08:27):
you will know that that was one of the biggest
mentors for me at that time. Too, was Brett Godfrey
because he was launching Virgin and he was also a
kind of underdog and smaller fish in the pond, you know,
And he was always really nice and kind to me too,
so just kept me pushing.
Speaker 1 (08:43):
Brett was one of the first I interviewed on the
series actually, and I mean, he is an amazing guy
and it goes to show what he did and the
opportunity to give people and just how down to earth
he was about everything. It just allowed us all to
sort of shine. I guess. So he was one of
those early mentors for you yeah, one hundred percent.
Speaker 2 (08:58):
And I don't even know if he remembers this, but
you know, he was the one that said to me,
you know, any time you want to come across at Virgin,
there'll be an opportunity. And I sadly, and this has
been brought up recently seeing what everyone at Bonza and
going through is. You know, I was sadly one of
those people that when our airline went into administration, I
(09:18):
was in Brisbane and that's when I've never felt so alone,
Like I had the administrators lock up the office, take
my company car. All of my personal belongings were locked up,
like accessing getting my own things back and kind of
being here stranded in Australia. And unfortunately it was at
the same time as ANSET, so you know, they canceled
my visa. I didn't know what I was going to do.
(09:40):
I sat on my friend's couch for three months, kind
of going what happens now. Unfortunately I couldn't work in
aviation because you know, there was a lot of people
out of work, a lot of Australians out of work
and rightly so the government at the time was prioritizing them.
But Brett was the one that said, if you ever
work it out, like, if you work out if you're staying,
(10:01):
you know, let me know. And I think it was
like a year and a half it took me to
get my permanent residency, to go through all of that stuff.
And I called Virgin once I had permanent residency and said, hey,
would you still consider me? And then that was the
next ten years. Yeah, So that was amazing to end
up there where I did after such kind of hardship
that was pretty specise.
Speaker 1 (10:21):
And does it help you realize now that that impact
that someone could happen? You're like, you have that for
people in Albany, import now when you give them a chance?
Speaker 2 (10:28):
Oh one hundred percent. I mean, the thing I worry
about all the time is my wake. So what is
the wake that every single thing that I say leaves
on somebody? Because there's nothing well, I feel like there's
nothing worse. There's nothing worse than having an interaction with
somebody that you think is so profound and then you
meet them five years later or ten years later and
(10:49):
you talk about it and they're like what are you
talking about?
Speaker 1 (10:51):
I have no idea what you're talking about.
Speaker 2 (10:53):
And I find that fascinating that people can have such
an impact on somebody's life with one conversation, and it
can kind of guide your career or guide your decisions,
and then they cannot remember it. So I always think
about that every single thing that I say as a
CEO is it's important to leave people intact, and I
(11:14):
just think about the wake of the ripple of what
I say and the impact that that might have on
somebody down the track. I think about that a lot.
Speaker 1 (11:21):
Yeah, I love that, and I mean there's something to
be said for having done those roles at a more
junior level and moved your way up. There seems to
be a big consistency, right being in a role. You
get it, You've been there, you've done it, you know
what it feels.
Speaker 2 (11:32):
Like, correct. I think that's what has been game changing
for my career. And I had somebody say to me
recently and I hadn't really thought about it, is I
will talk to my electricians on the airfield exactly the
same way that I will talk to my board of
directors in the boardroom. I just try to look at well,
what's important to the person I'm talking to, and how
(11:54):
do I tailor my conversations that it's interesting to them
and that it means something to them. So I think
just having those experiences, you know, I still go out
in the operation. I still go jump in the safety cars,
drive around the airfield, I still walk through the terminals.
I still help travelers, like you have to just stay
connected to your operation most importantly. But I think working
(12:15):
from the ground up, there's a lot to be said
for that. I mean, you read a lot of success
stories of CEOs that started in the mail room or
you know, worked their way through, and I think that
means something to people because you just didn't get handed everything.
Speaker 1 (12:28):
Absolutely. I think ego, I mean, you have to have
some of it right in order to get anywhere, especially
at your level. But how do you temper that? Sometimes?
Does it sometimes overwhelm you? Like, whoa, look, how far
I've gotten, the influence I've got I'm sitting at the
top of the food chain here in the space. I'm meant,
do you ever have to kind of bring yourself back
down and you know or not? Really? Oh?
Speaker 2 (12:47):
Look, so my kids bring me back down every day.
They don't they don't think I'm special. It was funny. Actually,
my daughter did an economics test recently and she didn't
get a very good mark. And I get the automatic
updates from the school when you get marks, and I
text her said, hey, that wasn't a great mark. And
she copied and pasted an article out of the Herald
(13:09):
Sun that related to the airport and she said, well,
you're not doing a great job on this side. And
I was like, oh god, so but now, like I guess,
you do have to have ego. And I often think
about for me, it's really important to stay ground. Yeah,
And I always think about, you know, the two most
important things to me are humanity and humility and caring
(13:30):
about the people I interact with, the people that work
for me. And I just think you need to be
really careful that ego doesn't run away for you, because
it's even being an internal promotion. People will hold back
their true feelings when they're talking to a CEO. So
you've got to create an environment where people are comfortable
enough to tell you the truth, where you've got people
(13:50):
that will tell you you're wrong. I have people tell
me I'm wrong all the time. But I think you know,
there's lots of case studies in the world where if
you have a team that works for you that just
tells you everything that you want to hear and isn't
going to tell you when there's bad news, those cases
can end up pretty dangerous.
Speaker 1 (14:06):
How do you create an environment where people go, you
know what, it's safe to tell Laurie the truth, even
though she's not going to like it.
Speaker 2 (14:12):
I realized really early on when I got promoted and
the kind of walls went up with everyone. I thought
it was going to be different as an internal promotion
because I knew everybody. I'd been there for seven years.
People knew me deeply, I knew them deeply. My first
kind of one or two interactions with people that I
knew really well, more junior people in the organization, I
(14:33):
could see that that nervousness about continuing a conversation with
me in the new capacity, and that's when I really went, Okay, Wow,
this is bigger than I thought it was. So I
just work really hard to make sure people are comfortable,
to make sure that whoever I'm speaking to, it's not
about hierarchy, it's not about me having an opinion. I
read something recently in the boss around. You know, there's
(14:55):
this CEO that says, it's just an idea. It's like,
let's workshop an idea, it's not a direction, and I
kind of take bits and pieces of that too. Example
I can give is the dirty windows. So I did
a live. I did one of your lives. So I
put workplace into the company. I do a workplace live
every second Friday. I talk to all the team. They
can ask questions, and you know, I get feedback that
(15:16):
people love that. I just tell them what's been happening
for the last couple of weeks. But I did one
in the boardroom one day. Somebody said, oh, the windows
are really dirty behind you, and I looked and I
was like, oh, yeah, they are really dirty. And I
came in the next day and the windows were spotless.
And that's when I remembered thinking, I can't even say
the windows are dirty because somebody's gone out of their
way and probably out of their maintenance schedule to clean
(15:39):
those windows because I said they were dirty. So every
time I kind of think about what I'm saying, I
think dirty windows don't say something that somebody's going to
run off because I think CEOs can really create a
lot of work too for people by just launching bright
ideas and or saying they want something done and really
(16:00):
not understanding the impact of what it takes on individuals
to get that.
Speaker 1 (16:03):
Suff I hear that all the time from companies I
work with, is just the fact that yeah, they're really vibrant,
you know, chatty ceo, but they're just they're often just
throwing at ideas and then they walk at that meeting
and we're all left to go reschedule our plans and
work out suits. I think that's a great insight. I
haven't heard another CEO say of the fourign here, so
thank you for that, Laurie. I remember when you fell
(16:23):
pregnant with your signup virgin okay, And I bring this
up because I remember thinking at the time because, as
you said, you were one of the few gms who
were a female actually, and in all honesty, I can't
actually remember another female GM taking Matt leaf, right, And
I remember at the time just thinking to theirself, oh, like,
how do you do that? Like, I mean, now it
(16:45):
doesn't seem like a big deal at all, right, Like
you can take Matt leave, you still get a promotion
when you're a matt leave like you know. But at
the time, I remember it just being vivid in my head, going, oh, like,
how's that going to affect your career? What's going to happen?
What was that process like for you? And did you
feel pressure to sort of come back early or even
own the fact that you'd fallen pregnant and this is
going to happen or.
Speaker 2 (17:06):
This is dangerous territory? Okay, because it didn't work out right,
if I'm honest, I ended up leaving virgin when my
son was three weeks old. But I'll tell you about
pressure because I was a GM and because there was
no example, and I was surprised to have fallen pregnant
because I was forty and so you know, of course,
(17:26):
my husband and I were hopeful, but we were realistic
that mathematically the likelihood of falling pregnant at that age
is less likely, not so much anymore, it seems, though.
So I was terrified when I got pregnant because number one,
I didn't think i'd actually get pregnant, and then number two,
there was no example in the organization on how to
deal with it at all, and the concept of having
(17:48):
somebody so senior step out for Matt Leeve was just
foreign to everyone, and so it took me. If my
old boss ever listens to this, he'll laugh because it
took me five months to tell my boss I was pregnant.
That's how scared I was.
Speaker 1 (18:05):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (18:05):
And every day I'd go in and my husband was like, Okay,
you have to tell him, and I said, yeah, I know.
And so every day I'd come home and he'd go,
did you tell him? And I said, no, my chi
can know. So when I did finally tell him, he
laughed and said, yeah, no kidding, because you could see
that I was pregnant by that point, right, I mean,
Win and Freddie could probably see that I was pregnant
by at that point. We had a great supportive HR
(18:27):
person at the time as well. But I think, you know,
the reality was that it got tricky and it didn't
really work, and there was a lot of pressure, and
there was a lot of pressure in the early weeks
of my son's arrival, and that's ultimately what made my
decision to leave. The thing I reflected on the most, really,
if I'm honest, is when I had that first few
(18:49):
weeks with him. I also had the luxury of seeing
my daughter at school, like there was quite a gap
between them, so she was in prep or grade one maybe,
you know, I realized that I never got to go
to her school. I didn't know her teachers, I missed
her start completely. So when that happened, I just thought,
you know what, I'm not going to miss his start
and I quit. And he was three weeks old when
(19:13):
I quit. And that was my eleven year work anniversary
as well, So that was intense. And yeah, I had
a bit of a mid well, it can't be a
midlife crisis at forty but forty one, but it was
a bit of a mid career crisis for sure because
it was a long time. It was a long period
of time there. And that is something that I worked
quite hard on at APAC, is policy around flexible parenting.
(19:36):
Like I meet so many dads that would love to
stay home, but the reality is people take the highest
paid person to stay at work and the lowest paid
person stays at home. So for me, pay equity for
women is number one. Fix that, and then the female
might stay at work and the man can stay home.
And then I mean go more broadly, it doesn't have
to be a female and a man. It could be
(19:57):
a single person. It could be IVF, it could be adoption,
it could be grandparents, it could be fluid parenting. It
doesn't really matter to me. It's how do we make
sure that the person that wants to stay home gets
to stay home.
Speaker 1 (20:08):
Yeah, thank you for showing that it was a defining
moment in your life. I'm sure in terms of even
the balance of being a parent and working and having
a successful career. But it was defining for a lot
of us to work there because we all even though
we didn't know that and the details of it, it
was really something I always remember and it made me
when I bentually got pregnant, going, how does this work?
Because we knew that you left, and no one kind
(20:30):
of necessarily knew what the ins and outs were, but
it seemed, you know, the timing wise was she had
a baby and then she's not here anymore.
Speaker 2 (20:38):
So it did.
Speaker 1 (20:38):
It made a lot of us sit up and go
whereas I think today there's a across the board, a
bit of a better approach towards these things. But yeah,
it goes to show.
Speaker 2 (20:45):
And that's a really good point to you, Emma, because
why don't we communicate things. Why don't we explain when
people leave businesses, Like, of course there's going to be
reasons why you can't explain, for their sake or for ours,
why somebody is departing the business. But I think there's
a way to let people know that somebody has departed
the business. I mean when I started at Melbourne Airport,
I started around the airport and there were checking agents
(21:07):
that were coming up and hugging me and welcoming me
back from Matt leave. And I'm like, no, why don't
work for the company.
Speaker 1 (21:14):
Yeah. I remember sitting with you in Melbourne, probably at
the beginning of twenty twenty two, I think is the
craziness of COVID was lifting, and I distinctly remember you
cruising up on this e scooda super confident and this
like highlighter tracksuit or something, and we're meeting to have
a cocktail because like no one had like socialized in
a while, and I had only just started my business.
(21:36):
And you told me at this point that you were
actually putting your hat in the ring for the role
of CEO, a role which I then found out was
traditionally only held by men. But you know, your accolades,
your experience, your strengths speak for themselves. But did you
ever feel like that opportunity you might not get it
because one you're FEMA, two you're a young C suite
as well in the scheme of things. Did that sort
of ever cross your mind or not? Really?
Speaker 2 (21:58):
Oh no, of course. I mean when I put my
hand up, it was a big process, and so it
should be. It's a big company, and we were all
kind of treated equally and there was a pretty robust,
lengthy process. But the person that believed in me the
most in that process was my daughter, because she was like,
of course you can do this. You've been running the
airport for years already, like in my operational roles. But
(22:19):
it was fascinating how many people, including myself. I mean,
of course I'm going to have self doubt, but everyone
around me had it too. I had a really fascinating experience,
whether it was old peers or friends even go oh look,
you know, put your hand up and give it a go,
but don't be too disappointed. And these were some of
my biggest supporters, So I was like, oh, wow, this
(22:39):
is really we just kind of made me think about, well,
this is a really big deal, and I have to
try really hard and work really hard. But I did
some deep soul searching through that process. So I got
to a really great place at the end of it,
where you know, I presented everything I stood for, everything
I wanted to do with the organization, and at the
end of the day, if our board didn't want that,
I was completely at peace with that because it was
(23:01):
aligned to what was important to me and my values,
my belief So yeah, I mean, good god.
Speaker 1 (23:08):
It was hard, but rewarding the right woman for the job.
What sort of surprised you the most in terms of
things you are like, what did you thinking in your
head that's where it's going to be like and it's not.
And what's made you go, Wow, that's so much better
than I ever thought it could be.
Speaker 2 (23:20):
I mean so many things, Like in one respect, you
get to the top and you think, oh my gosh,
I can actually override you know, if we agree to
disagree as an executive team, or if there's a problem,
I could actually just say no, we're doing this. If
I really want to. Now I don't. My style is
I never want to do that. But realizing that you
kind of have the ability to make any decision is
(23:43):
pretty empowering and overwhelming, but equally back to your question
on ego earlier, I think that is where some missteps
can happen, because if you start just making all the
tea when you're disempowering your team. So really, I just
spent the first year navigating You're in this kind of
aura honeymoon period, I feel like, where you're just so
excited or I was so excited to have gotten the opportunity,
(24:05):
the guns blazing for everything that I wanted to and
then kind of year two sets in where you go, gosh,
this is complex, this is hard, this is constant, this
is twenty four to seven, seven days a week. I've
spent my career as junior in a lot of junior roles,
looking up to people and thinking, well, gee, they get
paid a lot, but what do they really Until you
(24:25):
get to the point where you are solely responsible for
everyone's psychological safety, physical safety, operational safety, the burden that
CEO is carrying I think around their obligations, it's a
pretty big deal, and you have to have some really
good support people around you to navigate that. I think
(24:45):
I maybe underestimated my responsibilities of what I carried once
I got here, and then, like I said before, around
people that knew me, I genuinely underestimated that. I thought
people would just trust that I was still the same person.
But that friction of getting treated differently kind of instantly
was overwhelming. And I think we've navigated through it pretty well.
(25:07):
And I would hope that any of my team listening
to this would one feel that they know they could
walk through my office door any day of the week,
they could come up and have a conversation about anything.
I'm pretty candid about my home life and my work
life and things we all navigate, but don't ever underestimate
the title of the role. I think that's what Brett
taught me in the early days, is that yes, you
(25:29):
can lead a company and be a CEO, but you're
not the most important person in their room, and you
should be the person that speaks last, which is hard
for me.
Speaker 1 (25:40):
You know, you touched on a really couple of minutes
in points there, but one was around this immense responsibility, right.
And the truth is, for a lot of people in
more junior ors, they look at where you're at and
they do put you in this superhuman category, right because
it's every day. It's relentless, like you can't be like
I can't be bothered today. Quite frankly, you can do
that depending on where you're at in the company. Right,
you might go to Tom having a two day break
from it, not going to deal with this anymore, and
(26:00):
it doesn't really happen in your space.
Speaker 2 (26:02):
And it was interesting.
Speaker 1 (26:03):
I was talking to Paul Scara and he said to
me that one of the hardest things about being THEO
is you are so available now, right, Like people's access
points to you are constant, Like it's you know, you
were kind of ring fenced in the older days where
you had to go through this. I mean, you have
an amazing EA, but you know sometimes you have his
eas It just won't let anyone touch you, right, That's
how it used to be, And these days it's like
(26:25):
you're trying to be You're on workplace, right, which makes
you highly accessible via social media. You know, you've got
an open door policy. Like this kind of accessibility can
be exhausting mentally.
Speaker 2 (26:35):
It is exhausting, and I laugh. I mean, my EA
is amazing, but she's like my camp counselor too. She's
the only person or my kids or my husband that
I can say I've had a bad day, like really genuine,
you know, I always talk about that I love Mondays,
I just love my job, I love the airport. I
never have an issue getting in a bed and getting
straight out.
Speaker 1 (26:55):
That amazing.
Speaker 2 (26:56):
But that's not the same for everyone. Problems don't get
to my desk until they're really home, because if they
weren't really hard, then they would have been solved by
the four hundred and fifty talented people working for me.
It's those multifaceted, really complex situations that by the time
they get to my desk you kind of sit back
(27:17):
with a handful of people and go, wow, like this
is hard, Like how are we going to solve this?
And so I think you just spend all of this
time in this process where your top priorities are all
pretty complicated, yeah, and long lasting. And I think that
that's the double edged sword is when you are approachable,
people approach to and I can understand why people get
to where they are around kind of closing that office
(27:40):
door sometimes because you need some headspace, you need some
space to think things through. So it's hard to manage.
But I also would never want to turn down a
conversation with somebody either. So you just got to be
disciplined where you can be.
Speaker 1 (27:53):
How do you manage that constant So, yeah, there's a
constant strains. I mean, you're passionate about aviation and I
know being in aviation too. It's one of those things
that's in your blood. But you will still get to
burn out at some point, So what's your strategy managing that? Yeah?
Speaker 2 (28:06):
And I do worry about that too, because when you
read everything about burnout, people kind of say it just
creeps out overnight, right, it creeps up. My rituals are
things like, you know, I don't want airlines to put
Wi Fi on planes, please, because that's when I do
my deep work on planes. I don't want to be contactable.
So every time I get on a plane and see
a Wi Fi signal, I sigh because I feel this
(28:27):
obligation to be contactable.
Speaker 1 (28:29):
Doesn't Literally I can't remember the last time.
Speaker 2 (28:36):
I have some kind of sacred rituals around my travel.
I do a lot of deep work during my travels.
I have a sacred ritual around well, Saturdays, I mean
Saturdays are for kids sport, but and I do lots
of driving around. But I really use my time effectively.
So if I'm sitting at diving with my son, or
if I'm sitting at volleyball with my daughter, that's when
I'm doing my kind of deep work and deep thinking.
(28:56):
Of course, I'm looking at them and smiling and taking
photos of them.
Speaker 1 (28:59):
Too, But I do love the honesty because we're all
the same. Mom. Did you see that? Yeah?
Speaker 2 (29:09):
Did I see that dive? Yes?
Speaker 1 (29:11):
Yes?
Speaker 2 (29:12):
And then you're thinking, oh god, I missed it. All
the time, I call myself a bit of a hibernation
bear because I don't get a lot of sleep through
the week. But then I have this kind of ritual
and my whole family knows about it, which is like
early to bed on a Friday night and I'll sleep
in on a Saturday. I have this ability to do
one big sleep in a week, which I love and
look forward to, and it's really sweet. My son won't
(29:35):
play the drums during that time, and you know, like
everyone pitches in sleep in, And then every now and then,
if it all gets too much, I just go to
my fabulous EA and say it's time for a spa
afternoon at Crown or Body Freedom and just you know,
block out an afternoon and go do something that's just
for me.
Speaker 1 (29:53):
Yeah, okay, amazing, I love it.
Speaker 2 (29:55):
Do I have the balance? Probably not? I don't know.
I always say to my team, anyone that's got younger children,
like you've done a full day before you show up
to the office, the more like the routines and the
school and the obligations, and you know, that's a full
time job in itself.
Speaker 1 (30:10):
So I appreciate that.
Speaker 2 (30:12):
No one gets it right, and I won't get it
right either.
Speaker 1 (30:14):
I think you can hear still the energy and passion
in your voice, which always indicates to me that you're
doing a good job. I think that leads into this
idea that I know people who work for Apac Whipt,
you know, know that it's a great place to work
and they love working there. So how have you cultivated
that culture? Like, is there things that you'll learned from
virgin days or do you have a particular thing that
you're like me? I know, living with purpose and values
(30:35):
is a big one for you guys, Yeah.
Speaker 2 (30:37):
So really big. So the work we did in my
early start, which we cultivated with everyone. This wasn't just
me sitting in a room thinking out values. We did
it from the bottom up to work out, well, what's
important to everybody and how can everyone have a connection
to what we're doing. And I think that that's really
important because the account's payable team is not going to
(30:58):
have the same experience that the terminal coordinators out in
the field have, and so you have to kind of
just find simple ways to connect people's work to purpose
so that they know what we stand for. So I
think the work that we did around our purpose and
our vision it's more than just a document, and it's
not something that we're just going to plaster on a
wall and a lunch round. Like I think we all
(31:20):
talk about it genuinely are stepping forward program. So the
program that we've all been through ourselves and all of
our contractors around what are our golden rules around how
we support the travelers in our terminal, Like everyone is
all in on that. And I love it because literally,
if I can see a plumber in the terminal with
a lanyard on, he or she has been through our
(31:41):
program and helping customers. I get letters now all the
time about somebody that's navigated this incredibly complex environment that
people have to get through, Like it's not easy to
get through an airport, So I think, you know, those
kind of programs. I think deciding what you really stand
for is important, but I equally recognize that's hard to do.
(32:01):
So if I think about you know, we've created our
Women in Apac Advocacy group, We've created our Pride Advocacy Group.
But that's tricky too, because there's a lot of complex
issues happening in the world, whether they be religious or political,
and it's a fine line about when you take a
stand and when you don't. And we saw that play
(32:21):
out with the Voice, and it's tricky.
Speaker 1 (32:23):
You know.
Speaker 2 (32:24):
I have people in my business that are directly affected
by things that are happening globally in the world and
in their home countries, and so corporately finding the balance
of when you should have an opinion and when you
shouldn't is I think one of the hardest things we
have to do. But I anchor back to inclusivity. So
(32:45):
no matter what your origin, sexual orientation, religious beliefs, political beliefs,
I want you to walk through the threshold of our
door and know that you belong and that you have
a voice.
Speaker 1 (32:57):
Yeah. Love that. I also read that I think you
nominated to do some work at a leadership summit that
was around giving compassionate feedback. I'm fascinated to know, like
what your thoughts are and why giving feedback is sort
of something we still avoid. Is it something that you
really focus on and who do you ask the feedback from.
Speaker 2 (33:15):
I'm obsessed with this. We don't give difficult feedback because,
like we're human, we don't want to hurt somebody's feelings.
And arguably giving difficult feedback when you don't give it,
it's more about your protecting yourself, not the other undercent
So put yourself aside, what's in the best interests of
this other human And I've seen so many people in
my career that were absolute superstars that have you know,
(33:39):
had a tumbling exit. And I've seen people that have
been absolutely pigeonholed as difficult become superstars. And it all
comes down to feedback from okay, because if somebody doesn't
have self awareness, you have to help them, like you
have to make them aware, you have to support them.
So I really am all about feedback all of the time.
(34:01):
And it doesn't have to be hard, like it can
be quick, it can be in the moment, it can't
be weeks later. It can't be twice a year in
a performance review. I mean, oh my god, it's a skill.
We did a session recently with about sixty of our
leaders with this lady. Oh, she was fantastic, and she
does this course, which I highly recommend if anyone needs
guidance around feedback that doesn't suck. If you google that,
(34:23):
she'll come up. But giving feedback in a way that
you're keeping somebody intact, you're not stripping them down, you're
not doing it to hurt them. But that's where I
come back to Compassionate leadership has to come from. You're
giving somebody difficult feedback because you want them to be
better and you want them to do better and to
be more successful. And I just think still we're all
(34:43):
just too polite on so many occasions. So my team
and I work quite hard on that with each other.
If there's tension in a room on a conversation, we
won't leave the room until it's aired out. And I
think that that's healthy. And the more that people see that,
particularly across the ranks, the more people get confident to
speak up, and the more somebody takes the feedback not
as a criticism but as a constructivepportunity to learn the intent.
Speaker 1 (35:06):
But it's important, though, isn't it right? Like you said,
you have an intent to want them to be better?
Whereas I don't know if everyone gets into that headspace
before they deliver feedback, is that really their intention or
is it to prove a point or is it to
be right correct?
Speaker 2 (35:19):
This is probably one of the biggest learnings for me
over my career as well, is people, I mean people
want to be right. Of course, you want to be right,
and particularly technical people like knowledge workers or people that
have a technical skill if that's being kind of disrespected
or challenged. And again it comes back to creating those environments.
But you know, it's like slowing down past a car crash, right,
(35:40):
Are you slowing down because you want to get out
and help somebody that's just been in a motor vehicle accident?
Or are you slowing down because you have this seen
curiosity about wanting to know what happened. If you're giving
feedback that you think you're giving because you want to
say I told you so, or you want to say
you did the wrong thing, then you should just be
quiet really because and I'm not perfect, I'm laughing now
(36:03):
because one of my team will be going right. So
you know, you said I told you so this week,
and there was something that I went, oh geez. I
got some really great advice from a great CEO when
I started, which is my job is to only intervene
if something's going to go really wrong. Otherwise empower people,
(36:25):
let them go, let them make mistakes. If it's going
to be kind of you know, a serious impact to
the business, then of course you have to intervene and
share your opinion and maybe give different direction. But if
you're giving regular feedback all the time, if you're having
those robust conversations and you're doing it in a way
that's compassionate and kind, then it becomes the norm. But
I think that too often feedback is maybe a leader's
(36:47):
opinion and not a constructive learning, or it's personally driven.
If what you're about to deliver isn't going to serve
that person, then I think you need to take that
moment to pause as a leader and go, how is
this going to make this person better? And if it's
really just going to make them go home and feel worse,
then you haven't done your job.
Speaker 1 (37:05):
Yeah, when you talk about compassion. That for me is
the ear of brave, which is empathy, right, And you
know you've got to have that part where you're able
to hold that space or person for an individual like
yourself who is just self confess go get her and
get it done. How hard do you find sitting in
that space of holding space to something like do you
want to fix it? Or you fix that? Is that
something you could say? Of course? Is it a space
(37:25):
for you that you want to grow in? For you
to think of which area of leadership for you is like,
that's the one I struggle the most with. Which one
would that be? For me?
Speaker 2 (37:32):
For sure? It's self mastery, It's when to stop talking,
when to leave the problems to my team. I'm just
by nature a person that wants to help people, and
I do it at home all the time. And my
kids tell me that they're like, you can't fix this
problem for me. I just need you to mand me
and I'm like, yeah, got it.
Speaker 1 (37:49):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (37:50):
Particularly having a background of operational pedigree, like you kind
of trained to fix the true and so you have
to untrain yourself to not fix everything for everyone, or
set an environment up where they come to you because
they expect you to fix a problem. So the self
mastery around that, the self mastery around not taking direct
(38:10):
action is one that I work on every day.
Speaker 1 (38:13):
Not the worst problem to have, now, Laurie, I could
literally talk to you for another hour and stuff that
I know I'm not allowed to and we can't, so
I'm gonna have to. I've hactually look down my list
and go, what's two questions I can wrap up his?
So it's just too oftenish on me. One is what sacrifices,
if any, do you if you've had to make in
order to have such a successful career.
Speaker 2 (38:30):
I've made so many sacrifices, Like when I think about
my career, because I was very ambitious quite young, and
that can be good and that can be bad. You know,
I was always job first, location second, So you know,
the sacrifices around living overseas when my dad is still
in Canada, the sacrifices around I live now in Victoria,
(38:53):
which is we love this city and I'm passionate about
the city and the airport that's in it, but we
have no family network here, like the rest of my
family is somewhere else. So I've got a husband that's
moved away from his Like, we've all made deep sacrifices,
I think. So I think lots of different family sacrifices
and family sacrifices around recognizing that I can't be at
(39:15):
everything and I can't be everything i'd want to be
for my children and getting okay with that very hard
to do with mother's guilt. But yeah, I would say
those you know, friends, family, There's been lots of sacrifices
along the way, I think, and that's just working out
that trade off. And like I said, that was kind
of one of the turning points for me with my son,
is making the call to say, I'm not going to
(39:37):
sacrifice this time right now, but you'll never get it perfect.
Speaker 1 (39:40):
I think that's why it's so important to make sure
that you're doing something you're passionate about. You have to
look at kids in the face and then to see
that look what mum's been able to do and give,
and look how happy it makes her.
Speaker 3 (39:49):
Right.
Speaker 1 (39:49):
I think that's a big part of that. So I
get that, all right. Last question for you, Laurie, I
guess aviation is off the table. You're not allowed to
do aviation. You weren't allowed to do it. That's sorry,
it's gone. What other job then would you be doing
if you couldn't do that?
Speaker 2 (40:04):
This is going to sound really leg as an answer, Okay,
but I had somebody tell me once it wouldn't have
to be aviation. It could be widgets and you could
get passionate about it. In my mind, I am very
focused on team culture, developing people, lifting people up, creating
a legacy that matters, creating something that my kids can go, Wow,
(40:27):
that's pretty awesome. I'm pretty proud of that. Like it's
funny as I sit here and talk about family sacrifices.
The irony is I'm fifty two years old and still
just want my parents and my kids to be proud
of me, right Like, at the end of the day,
that's what we all want. I mean, people may laugh
when they hear this. I don't think it has to
be aviation. I think it has to be a company.
It has to be something that has purpose and meaning,
(40:49):
and that could be anything connected to customers. But it's
about the team and the opportunity to deliver. And that
is why I get so passionate about Melbourne and Lonsstin Airport.
Also we own and operate. They are both two airports
that are going through massive transformation, big growth. You know,
we're delivering the biggest airport to the biggest city by
twenty three. And if I can leave that legacy job
(41:11):
done and that I hope is something that everyone at
the airport and in the city can be proud of.
I want to walk away knowing that. You know, Victorians
love this airport. But there's lots of different outsets and
lots of different companies. I'm sure that could be passionate
about that as well, But it does come back to me,
I think to say, what's the opportunity, what do they
stand for? What do they believe in? Would I want
(41:32):
to be a part of that?
Speaker 1 (41:33):
That's where I start, you know, even though in my
head I was thinking, I wonder if she'll say professional
skateboarder or you know, something out there. I actually loved
that because it leaks nicely to something I picked up
when I was looking through your resume. There was one
time you left and you went and did I think
you went for urban utilities for two years, right, so
you got out of aviation to years and I think
the one thing I read when you were talking about
(41:54):
that was that what you recognized during that time was
that what people need is good leadership, right that it
needs to transcend industry. And I think that's what your
aunts is beautifully saying, right that, Yeah, I know you
love aviation, but you just want to be a really
really good leader and have an impact on no matter
where that is. I love watching a journey, Laurie, and
thank you so much for coming on here. It's been
a pleasure. It's been great to see you again.
Speaker 2 (42:15):
Thank you and about you too.
Apoche Production. Welcome to another episode of Brave Always the
CEO series. This series we launched into the new world
of brave leadership.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
Happy people create happy businesses, true.
Speaker 1 (00:21):
Emotionally intelligent leadership. I've picked up Vombit once on our
about our four flight and everybody thought, well it was
good enough for him. I can do it now. We
will be joined by culture and leadership experts and some
superstar CEOs who will courageously tell us the truth behind
their brave leadership journeys. Today I'm joined by one of
my absolute saves, Laurie Argus. Laurie Agus is the CEO
(00:43):
of Melbourne Airport and took up this role in twenty
twenty two after seven years as Chief of Aviation and
Chief of Ground Transport. Laurie started her career in Canada
before relocating to Australia and joining Virgin Australia. In her
teen years at the airline, she was appointed Manager of
International Airport Operations and General Manager of Ground Operations in
(01:03):
twenty seventeen. Lauri Greg wed with an Executive NBA from
Bond University. Laurie is an active member of Chief Executive
Women and of the Australian Institute of Directors and became
a graduate of AICD in twenty nineteen. Laurie is also
a non executive director of the Australian Airport Association Airport
Council International World Governing Board. She's also a wife, a
(01:24):
mom to two beautiful kids, and just one of those
people who lights up the room when you walk in. Welcome, Laurie,
is so great to have you here today.
Speaker 2 (01:31):
Oh thanks, Emma, thanks for such a nice intro.
Speaker 1 (01:33):
Look. I can't start this without noting that Laurie and
I met back in Virgin Blue days, well over sixteen
plus years ago, and Laurie, you were one of the
first female influencers for me in a senior leadership role
that I looked up to. I'm sure I've told you
that that is the truth. You have me there. It
was true even back then. I think you had this
presence about you, like you were championing the flag for
(01:54):
women in leadership. Was that always like a goal of
yours or did you not even know you were doing that?
Speaker 2 (01:59):
I one hundred percent didn't know I was doing that.
And I'll tell you why I know that.
Speaker 3 (02:02):
I mean, I.
Speaker 2 (02:03):
Remember being alone, I remember being the only female in
the management ranks at Virgin my boss at the time
when I was a middle manager, there was ten of
us and I was the only female. And I remember
going up against all the other men in the GM job,
and I had a great executive HR at the time
who was advocating for diversity, and I'm not sure if
(02:24):
he wasn't around that I would have got that job,
because he was pretty passionate about it and he really
supported me through that recruitment process. But talking about women,
it was years later when I had somebody tell me
I was a feminist and I said to him, I said, oh,
I don't know if I'm a feminist, Like genuinely, I
answered the question honestly. I said, I don't know if
I do properly advocate for women or if I'm a feminist.
(02:48):
And she said, well, do you believe in equal pay
for women? And I said, well, yeah, obviously. And she
said do you believe in equal opportunities for women? And
I said yes, of course, and then she said, well, congratulations,
you're a feminist. So it wasn't until I kind of
had that conversation with her that I really started digging
into what it meant to really lift women up and
advocate for women, and so I'm far better at it nowadays.
(03:10):
Maybe it was informal.
Speaker 1 (03:12):
Formal Yeah, okay, So I ask you where about that?
So where your family decided to leave Canada and migrate
to Australia. There must have been a guess, a huge
decision for the family and quite a change. How did
you cope with that? So? How old were you when
you did move here? Well?
Speaker 2 (03:24):
I came by myself, so, which is a funny story
in itself, because I was sitting in Edmonton, Alberta. I
was working at night shift in network operations seven pm
to seven am. It was minus forty nine in the
middle of winter, and a.
Speaker 3 (03:40):
Job ad for Brisbane, Australia came across the fax machine.
I'm like, across the fax machine, I just went, I've
got to get out of here. I can't live in
this weather anymore. So I just applied and everyone told me.
Speaker 2 (03:53):
You know, I was twenty six, so everyone was like,
You're never going to get an airport manager job at
twenty six across the world. It was one of our
key stations we were launching Australia, and I'm like, well,
you know what, I'm just going to try ironically. You know,
of course women shouldn't always say it was luck that
they got an opportunity, but I do think in that
experience it was a little bit of luck and a
little bit of talent because I was easily movable, and
(04:15):
I was up against a lot of other really high
caliber candidates, but they had families and their kids needed schools,
and they needed visas, and there was all these complications.
So I think when I said, hey, I can be
in Australia in four weeks and just stick me in
a hotel and let's get started, I think that was
quite attractive to the management. And so I moved and
I packed up and left my family in Canada. I
(04:37):
lived at the Seeble in Brisbane for about six months,
and then I helped start the airline in Australia. So
one of the scariest times of my life. I never
went out for months. I didn't have any friends. I
wasn't brave enough back then to go out to dinner
by myself or to a movie by myself. I certainly
do that all the time now, but back then it was,
(04:58):
you know, I just stayed in my hotel room and worked.
Speaker 1 (05:01):
How did you get through that? Like, I mean, it's
a big thing to jump at a plan and come
hit me. You didn't even know what it was like
working in Australia. Was it was it a different way
of working? What was it going to be?
Speaker 2 (05:09):
Like?
Speaker 1 (05:10):
Where did you get that confidence from?
Speaker 2 (05:12):
I don't know where it comes from deep within me,
but I just have this drive to just never give up,
and I have this kind of resilience and or grit.
I think I've been working through trying to work out
what it is. But I think I had kind of
a pretty bumpy use and I just think it's taught
me just to push hard. And of course I was terrified.
(05:34):
I mean I got on the plane. It was the
middle of winter there, it was the middle of summer here.
I remember being so hot, and ironically it was only
April in prison, so it wasn't that bad. And I
had this moment in the hotel where I went you
know what. Because the airline hadn't set up yet, I
was doing all the work remotely, so I was negotiating
with quantas to do our ground handling remotely. I wasn't
yet positioned at the airport because we didn't have aircraft here.
(05:57):
And it was about one or two weeks in that
I had this moment where I went, you know what,
I'm completely alone, and even if something happened to me,
like you know what, my parents probably wouldn't work it
out until they didn't get an email for me a
week later. But I must say I had this beautiful
concierge at the hotel who every day when I'd work,
he'd come up and he'd be like, what are you
going to do this weekend, Laurie, And I'm like, well,
I'm working. And he was the one that pushed me
(06:19):
literally on my first bus down to the pineapple farm.
He convinced me to go on some tours. I met
a few people, like he was quite influential, Like you know,
there was lots of times of loneliness, but he kind
of pushed me around. And then you know, six months in,
once I was starting at the airport, I met lots
of great people and kind of the rest is history.
Speaker 1 (06:40):
Twenty six is pretty young right to go into a
leadership role, and then also added to that, you know,
you ought to be one of the few female leaders there.
Did you experience any doubt from other people like you're
coming in, like, hang on, who is this lady? What's
going on? Can she really do this? Oh? One percent?
Speaker 2 (06:55):
Because at the time it was at Brisbane Airport, all
of the station managers were at least fifty plus years
old old men. I don't think I recall meeting any
women for quite some time. So the station manager job
in airports is pretty senior and pretty special, and people
really aspire to have them because they're great. You get
to move around the world, you get to experience different countries.
(07:18):
But that wasn't my background. I had just worked in
one location my whole kind of career up until that point,
and I considered myself quite junior. So yeah, lots of
self doubt and lots of people, particularly you know, no
offense to Quantus, but particularly Quantus management back then. You know,
they were all very senior, and so when I was
kind of coming into a room to negotiate them working
(07:41):
for me, that was interesting.
Speaker 1 (07:44):
How did you overcome that?
Speaker 2 (07:45):
Well, we were a smaller airline, I mean, we only
had one daily flight, so we weren't that important to
Quantus back then. But I always overcome that by just
being honest and kind and building relationships and connecting with
people on a human level. I think that's the most
important thing to do. Like it's not just about the work.
It's like, who are you and how do I get
(08:06):
to know you? Let's go for a coffee and you know,
and these are relationships. I literally have the lovely Henry.
If he's listening, he was one of the station managers
back then. He's well retired now, but we still keep
in touch, Like we actually bump into each other. We
talk about those days. He was kind of put his
arms around me to say, hey, guys, you know, let
her into this club and into this circle. But Emma,
(08:27):
you will know that that was one of the biggest
mentors for me at that time. Too, was Brett Godfrey
because he was launching Virgin and he was also a
kind of underdog and smaller fish in the pond, you know,
And he was always really nice and kind to me too,
so just kept me pushing.
Speaker 1 (08:43):
Brett was one of the first I interviewed on the
series actually, and I mean, he is an amazing guy
and it goes to show what he did and the
opportunity to give people and just how down to earth
he was about everything. It just allowed us all to
sort of shine. I guess. So he was one of
those early mentors for you yeah, one hundred percent.
Speaker 2 (08:58):
And I don't even know if he remembers this, but
you know, he was the one that said to me,
you know, any time you want to come across at Virgin,
there'll be an opportunity. And I sadly, and this has
been brought up recently seeing what everyone at Bonza and
going through is. You know, I was sadly one of
those people that when our airline went into administration, I
(09:18):
was in Brisbane and that's when I've never felt so alone,
Like I had the administrators lock up the office, take
my company car. All of my personal belongings were locked up,
like accessing getting my own things back and kind of
being here stranded in Australia. And unfortunately it was at
the same time as ANSET, so you know, they canceled
my visa. I didn't know what I was going to do.
(09:40):
I sat on my friend's couch for three months, kind
of going what happens now. Unfortunately I couldn't work in
aviation because you know, there was a lot of people
out of work, a lot of Australians out of work
and rightly so the government at the time was prioritizing them.
But Brett was the one that said, if you ever
work it out, like, if you work out if you're staying,
(10:01):
you know, let me know. And I think it was
like a year and a half it took me to
get my permanent residency, to go through all of that stuff.
And I called Virgin once I had permanent residency and said, hey,
would you still consider me? And then that was the
next ten years. Yeah, So that was amazing to end
up there where I did after such kind of hardship
that was pretty specise.
Speaker 1 (10:21):
And does it help you realize now that that impact
that someone could happen? You're like, you have that for
people in Albany, import now when you give them a chance?
Speaker 2 (10:28):
Oh one hundred percent. I mean, the thing I worry
about all the time is my wake. So what is
the wake that every single thing that I say leaves
on somebody? Because there's nothing well, I feel like there's
nothing worse. There's nothing worse than having an interaction with
somebody that you think is so profound and then you
meet them five years later or ten years later and
(10:49):
you talk about it and they're like what are you
talking about?
Speaker 1 (10:51):
I have no idea what you're talking about.
Speaker 2 (10:53):
And I find that fascinating that people can have such
an impact on somebody's life with one conversation, and it
can kind of guide your career or guide your decisions,
and then they cannot remember it. So I always think
about that every single thing that I say as a
CEO is it's important to leave people intact, and I
(11:14):
just think about the wake of the ripple of what
I say and the impact that that might have on
somebody down the track. I think about that a lot.
Speaker 1 (11:21):
Yeah, I love that, and I mean there's something to
be said for having done those roles at a more
junior level and moved your way up. There seems to
be a big consistency, right being in a role. You
get it, You've been there, you've done it, you know
what it feels.
Speaker 2 (11:32):
Like, correct. I think that's what has been game changing
for my career. And I had somebody say to me
recently and I hadn't really thought about it, is I
will talk to my electricians on the airfield exactly the
same way that I will talk to my board of
directors in the boardroom. I just try to look at well,
what's important to the person I'm talking to, and how
(11:54):
do I tailor my conversations that it's interesting to them
and that it means something to them. So I think
just having those experiences, you know, I still go out
in the operation. I still go jump in the safety cars,
drive around the airfield, I still walk through the terminals.
I still help travelers, like you have to just stay
connected to your operation most importantly. But I think working
(12:15):
from the ground up, there's a lot to be said
for that. I mean, you read a lot of success
stories of CEOs that started in the mail room or
you know, worked their way through, and I think that
means something to people because you just didn't get handed everything.
Speaker 1 (12:28):
Absolutely. I think ego, I mean, you have to have
some of it right in order to get anywhere, especially
at your level. But how do you temper that? Sometimes?
Does it sometimes overwhelm you? Like, whoa, look, how far
I've gotten, the influence I've got I'm sitting at the
top of the food chain here in the space. I'm meant,
do you ever have to kind of bring yourself back
down and you know or not? Really? Oh?
Speaker 2 (12:47):
Look, so my kids bring me back down every day.
They don't they don't think I'm special. It was funny. Actually,
my daughter did an economics test recently and she didn't
get a very good mark. And I get the automatic
updates from the school when you get marks, and I
text her said, hey, that wasn't a great mark. And
she copied and pasted an article out of the Herald
(13:09):
Sun that related to the airport and she said, well,
you're not doing a great job on this side. And
I was like, oh god, so but now, like I guess,
you do have to have ego. And I often think
about for me, it's really important to stay ground. Yeah,
And I always think about, you know, the two most
important things to me are humanity and humility and caring
(13:30):
about the people I interact with, the people that work
for me. And I just think you need to be
really careful that ego doesn't run away for you, because
it's even being an internal promotion. People will hold back
their true feelings when they're talking to a CEO. So
you've got to create an environment where people are comfortable
enough to tell you the truth, where you've got people
(13:50):
that will tell you you're wrong. I have people tell
me I'm wrong all the time. But I think you know,
there's lots of case studies in the world where if
you have a team that works for you that just
tells you everything that you want to hear and isn't
going to tell you when there's bad news, those cases
can end up pretty dangerous.
Speaker 1 (14:06):
How do you create an environment where people go, you
know what, it's safe to tell Laurie the truth, even
though she's not going to like it.
Speaker 2 (14:12):
I realized really early on when I got promoted and
the kind of walls went up with everyone. I thought
it was going to be different as an internal promotion
because I knew everybody. I'd been there for seven years.
People knew me deeply, I knew them deeply. My first
kind of one or two interactions with people that I
knew really well, more junior people in the organization, I
(14:33):
could see that that nervousness about continuing a conversation with
me in the new capacity, and that's when I really went, Okay, Wow,
this is bigger than I thought it was. So I
just work really hard to make sure people are comfortable,
to make sure that whoever I'm speaking to, it's not
about hierarchy, it's not about me having an opinion. I
read something recently in the boss around. You know, there's
(14:55):
this CEO that says, it's just an idea. It's like,
let's workshop an idea, it's not a direction, and I
kind of take bits and pieces of that too. Example
I can give is the dirty windows. So I did
a live. I did one of your lives. So I
put workplace into the company. I do a workplace live
every second Friday. I talk to all the team. They
can ask questions, and you know, I get feedback that
(15:16):
people love that. I just tell them what's been happening
for the last couple of weeks. But I did one
in the boardroom one day. Somebody said, oh, the windows
are really dirty behind you, and I looked and I
was like, oh, yeah, they are really dirty. And I
came in the next day and the windows were spotless.
And that's when I remembered thinking, I can't even say
the windows are dirty because somebody's gone out of their
way and probably out of their maintenance schedule to clean
(15:39):
those windows because I said they were dirty. So every
time I kind of think about what I'm saying, I
think dirty windows don't say something that somebody's going to
run off because I think CEOs can really create a
lot of work too for people by just launching bright
ideas and or saying they want something done and really
(16:00):
not understanding the impact of what it takes on individuals
to get that.
Speaker 1 (16:03):
Suff I hear that all the time from companies I
work with, is just the fact that yeah, they're really vibrant,
you know, chatty ceo, but they're just they're often just
throwing at ideas and then they walk at that meeting
and we're all left to go reschedule our plans and
work out suits. I think that's a great insight. I
haven't heard another CEO say of the fourign here, so
thank you for that, Laurie. I remember when you fell
(16:23):
pregnant with your signup virgin okay, And I bring this
up because I remember thinking at the time because, as
you said, you were one of the few gms who
were a female actually, and in all honesty, I can't
actually remember another female GM taking Matt leaf, right, And
I remember at the time just thinking to theirself, oh, like,
how do you do that? Like, I mean, now it
(16:45):
doesn't seem like a big deal at all, right, Like
you can take Matt leave, you still get a promotion
when you're a matt leave like you know. But at
the time, I remember it just being vivid in my head, going, oh, like,
how's that going to affect your career? What's going to happen?
What was that process like for you? And did you
feel pressure to sort of come back early or even
own the fact that you'd fallen pregnant and this is
going to happen or.
Speaker 2 (17:06):
This is dangerous territory? Okay, because it didn't work out right,
if I'm honest, I ended up leaving virgin when my
son was three weeks old. But I'll tell you about
pressure because I was a GM and because there was
no example, and I was surprised to have fallen pregnant
because I was forty and so you know, of course,
(17:26):
my husband and I were hopeful, but we were realistic
that mathematically the likelihood of falling pregnant at that age
is less likely, not so much anymore, it seems, though.
So I was terrified when I got pregnant because number one,
I didn't think i'd actually get pregnant, and then number two,
there was no example in the organization on how to
deal with it at all, and the concept of having
(17:48):
somebody so senior step out for Matt Leeve was just
foreign to everyone, and so it took me. If my
old boss ever listens to this, he'll laugh because it
took me five months to tell my boss I was pregnant.
That's how scared I was.
Speaker 1 (18:05):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (18:05):
And every day I'd go in and my husband was like, Okay,
you have to tell him, and I said, yeah, I know.
And so every day I'd come home and he'd go,
did you tell him? And I said, no, my chi
can know. So when I did finally tell him, he
laughed and said, yeah, no kidding, because you could see
that I was pregnant by that point, right, I mean,
Win and Freddie could probably see that I was pregnant
by at that point. We had a great supportive HR
(18:27):
person at the time as well. But I think, you know,
the reality was that it got tricky and it didn't
really work, and there was a lot of pressure, and
there was a lot of pressure in the early weeks
of my son's arrival, and that's ultimately what made my
decision to leave. The thing I reflected on the most, really,
if I'm honest, is when I had that first few
(18:49):
weeks with him. I also had the luxury of seeing
my daughter at school, like there was quite a gap
between them, so she was in prep or grade one maybe,
you know, I realized that I never got to go
to her school. I didn't know her teachers, I missed
her start completely. So when that happened, I just thought,
you know what, I'm not going to miss his start
and I quit. And he was three weeks old when
(19:13):
I quit. And that was my eleven year work anniversary
as well, So that was intense. And yeah, I had
a bit of a mid well, it can't be a
midlife crisis at forty but forty one, but it was
a bit of a mid career crisis for sure because
it was a long time. It was a long period
of time there. And that is something that I worked
quite hard on at APAC, is policy around flexible parenting.
(19:36):
Like I meet so many dads that would love to
stay home, but the reality is people take the highest
paid person to stay at work and the lowest paid
person stays at home. So for me, pay equity for
women is number one. Fix that, and then the female
might stay at work and the man can stay home.
And then I mean go more broadly, it doesn't have
to be a female and a man. It could be
(19:57):
a single person. It could be IVF, it could be adoption,
it could be grandparents, it could be fluid parenting. It
doesn't really matter to me. It's how do we make
sure that the person that wants to stay home gets
to stay home.
Speaker 1 (20:08):
Yeah, thank you for showing that it was a defining
moment in your life. I'm sure in terms of even
the balance of being a parent and working and having
a successful career. But it was defining for a lot
of us to work there because we all even though
we didn't know that and the details of it, it
was really something I always remember and it made me
when I bentually got pregnant, going, how does this work?
Because we knew that you left, and no one kind
(20:30):
of necessarily knew what the ins and outs were, but
it seemed, you know, the timing wise was she had
a baby and then she's not here anymore.
Speaker 2 (20:38):
So it did.
Speaker 1 (20:38):
It made a lot of us sit up and go
whereas I think today there's a across the board, a
bit of a better approach towards these things. But yeah,
it goes to show.
Speaker 2 (20:45):
And that's a really good point to you, Emma, because
why don't we communicate things. Why don't we explain when
people leave businesses, Like, of course there's going to be
reasons why you can't explain, for their sake or for ours,
why somebody is departing the business. But I think there's
a way to let people know that somebody has departed
the business. I mean when I started at Melbourne Airport,
I started around the airport and there were checking agents
(21:07):
that were coming up and hugging me and welcoming me
back from Matt leave. And I'm like, no, why don't
work for the company.
Speaker 1 (21:14):
Yeah. I remember sitting with you in Melbourne, probably at
the beginning of twenty twenty two, I think is the
craziness of COVID was lifting, and I distinctly remember you
cruising up on this e scooda super confident and this
like highlighter tracksuit or something, and we're meeting to have
a cocktail because like no one had like socialized in
a while, and I had only just started my business.
(21:36):
And you told me at this point that you were
actually putting your hat in the ring for the role
of CEO, a role which I then found out was
traditionally only held by men. But you know, your accolades,
your experience, your strengths speak for themselves. But did you
ever feel like that opportunity you might not get it
because one you're FEMA, two you're a young C suite
as well in the scheme of things. Did that sort
of ever cross your mind or not? Really?
Speaker 2 (21:58):
Oh no, of course. I mean when I put my
hand up, it was a big process, and so it
should be. It's a big company, and we were all
kind of treated equally and there was a pretty robust,
lengthy process. But the person that believed in me the
most in that process was my daughter, because she was like,
of course you can do this. You've been running the
airport for years already, like in my operational roles. But
(22:19):
it was fascinating how many people, including myself. I mean,
of course I'm going to have self doubt, but everyone
around me had it too. I had a really fascinating experience,
whether it was old peers or friends even go oh look,
you know, put your hand up and give it a go,
but don't be too disappointed. And these were some of
my biggest supporters, So I was like, oh, wow, this
(22:39):
is really we just kind of made me think about, well,
this is a really big deal, and I have to
try really hard and work really hard. But I did
some deep soul searching through that process. So I got
to a really great place at the end of it,
where you know, I presented everything I stood for, everything
I wanted to do with the organization, and at the
end of the day, if our board didn't want that,
I was completely at peace with that because it was
(23:01):
aligned to what was important to me and my values,
my belief So yeah, I mean, good god.
Speaker 1 (23:08):
It was hard, but rewarding the right woman for the job.
What sort of surprised you the most in terms of
things you are like, what did you thinking in your
head that's where it's going to be like and it's not.
And what's made you go, Wow, that's so much better
than I ever thought it could be.
Speaker 2 (23:20):
I mean so many things, Like in one respect, you
get to the top and you think, oh my gosh,
I can actually override you know, if we agree to
disagree as an executive team, or if there's a problem,
I could actually just say no, we're doing this. If
I really want to. Now I don't. My style is
I never want to do that. But realizing that you
kind of have the ability to make any decision is
(23:43):
pretty empowering and overwhelming, but equally back to your question
on ego earlier, I think that is where some missteps
can happen, because if you start just making all the
tea when you're disempowering your team. So really, I just
spent the first year navigating You're in this kind of
aura honeymoon period, I feel like, where you're just so
excited or I was so excited to have gotten the opportunity,
(24:05):
the guns blazing for everything that I wanted to and
then kind of year two sets in where you go, gosh,
this is complex, this is hard, this is constant, this
is twenty four to seven, seven days a week. I've
spent my career as junior in a lot of junior roles,
looking up to people and thinking, well, gee, they get
paid a lot, but what do they really Until you
(24:25):
get to the point where you are solely responsible for
everyone's psychological safety, physical safety, operational safety, the burden that
CEO is carrying I think around their obligations, it's a
pretty big deal, and you have to have some really
good support people around you to navigate that. I think
(24:45):
I maybe underestimated my responsibilities of what I carried once
I got here, and then, like I said before, around
people that knew me, I genuinely underestimated that. I thought
people would just trust that I was still the same person.
But that friction of getting treated differently kind of instantly
was overwhelming. And I think we've navigated through it pretty well.
(25:07):
And I would hope that any of my team listening
to this would one feel that they know they could
walk through my office door any day of the week,
they could come up and have a conversation about anything.
I'm pretty candid about my home life and my work
life and things we all navigate, but don't ever underestimate
the title of the role. I think that's what Brett
taught me in the early days, is that yes, you
(25:29):
can lead a company and be a CEO, but you're
not the most important person in their room, and you
should be the person that speaks last, which is hard
for me.
Speaker 1 (25:40):
You know, you touched on a really couple of minutes
in points there, but one was around this immense responsibility, right.
And the truth is, for a lot of people in
more junior ors, they look at where you're at and
they do put you in this superhuman category, right because
it's every day. It's relentless, like you can't be like
I can't be bothered today. Quite frankly, you can do
that depending on where you're at in the company. Right,
you might go to Tom having a two day break
from it, not going to deal with this anymore, and
(26:00):
it doesn't really happen in your space.
Speaker 2 (26:02):
And it was interesting.
Speaker 1 (26:03):
I was talking to Paul Scara and he said to
me that one of the hardest things about being THEO
is you are so available now, right, Like people's access
points to you are constant, Like it's you know, you
were kind of ring fenced in the older days where
you had to go through this. I mean, you have
an amazing EA, but you know sometimes you have his
eas It just won't let anyone touch you, right, That's
how it used to be, And these days it's like
(26:25):
you're trying to be You're on workplace, right, which makes
you highly accessible via social media. You know, you've got
an open door policy. Like this kind of accessibility can
be exhausting mentally.
Speaker 2 (26:35):
It is exhausting, and I laugh. I mean, my EA
is amazing, but she's like my camp counselor too. She's
the only person or my kids or my husband that
I can say I've had a bad day, like really genuine,
you know, I always talk about that I love Mondays,
I just love my job, I love the airport. I
never have an issue getting in a bed and getting
straight out.
Speaker 1 (26:55):
That amazing.
Speaker 2 (26:56):
But that's not the same for everyone. Problems don't get
to my desk until they're really home, because if they
weren't really hard, then they would have been solved by
the four hundred and fifty talented people working for me.
It's those multifaceted, really complex situations that by the time
they get to my desk you kind of sit back
(27:17):
with a handful of people and go, wow, like this
is hard, Like how are we going to solve this?
And so I think you just spend all of this
time in this process where your top priorities are all
pretty complicated, yeah, and long lasting. And I think that
that's the double edged sword is when you are approachable,
people approach to and I can understand why people get
to where they are around kind of closing that office
(27:40):
door sometimes because you need some headspace, you need some
space to think things through. So it's hard to manage.
But I also would never want to turn down a
conversation with somebody either. So you just got to be
disciplined where you can be.
Speaker 1 (27:53):
How do you manage that constant So, yeah, there's a
constant strains. I mean, you're passionate about aviation and I
know being in aviation too. It's one of those things
that's in your blood. But you will still get to
burn out at some point, So what's your strategy managing that? Yeah?
Speaker 2 (28:06):
And I do worry about that too, because when you
read everything about burnout, people kind of say it just
creeps out overnight, right, it creeps up. My rituals are
things like, you know, I don't want airlines to put
Wi Fi on planes, please, because that's when I do
my deep work on planes. I don't want to be contactable.
So every time I get on a plane and see
a Wi Fi signal, I sigh because I feel this
(28:27):
obligation to be contactable.
Speaker 1 (28:29):
Doesn't Literally I can't remember the last time.
Speaker 2 (28:36):
I have some kind of sacred rituals around my travel.
I do a lot of deep work during my travels.
I have a sacred ritual around well, Saturdays, I mean
Saturdays are for kids sport, but and I do lots
of driving around. But I really use my time effectively.
So if I'm sitting at diving with my son, or
if I'm sitting at volleyball with my daughter, that's when
I'm doing my kind of deep work and deep thinking.
(28:56):
Of course, I'm looking at them and smiling and taking
photos of them.
Speaker 1 (28:59):
Too, But I do love the honesty because we're all
the same. Mom. Did you see that? Yeah?
Speaker 2 (29:09):
Did I see that dive? Yes?
Speaker 1 (29:11):
Yes?
Speaker 2 (29:12):
And then you're thinking, oh god, I missed it. All
the time, I call myself a bit of a hibernation
bear because I don't get a lot of sleep through
the week. But then I have this kind of ritual
and my whole family knows about it, which is like
early to bed on a Friday night and I'll sleep
in on a Saturday. I have this ability to do
one big sleep in a week, which I love and
look forward to, and it's really sweet. My son won't
(29:35):
play the drums during that time, and you know, like
everyone pitches in sleep in, And then every now and then,
if it all gets too much, I just go to
my fabulous EA and say it's time for a spa
afternoon at Crown or Body Freedom and just you know,
block out an afternoon and go do something that's just
for me.
Speaker 1 (29:53):
Yeah, okay, amazing, I love it.
Speaker 2 (29:55):
Do I have the balance? Probably not? I don't know.
I always say to my team, anyone that's got younger children,
like you've done a full day before you show up
to the office, the more like the routines and the
school and the obligations, and you know, that's a full
time job in itself.
Speaker 1 (30:10):
So I appreciate that.
Speaker 2 (30:12):
No one gets it right, and I won't get it
right either.
Speaker 1 (30:14):
I think you can hear still the energy and passion
in your voice, which always indicates to me that you're
doing a good job. I think that leads into this
idea that I know people who work for Apac Whipt,
you know, know that it's a great place to work
and they love working there. So how have you cultivated
that culture? Like, is there things that you'll learned from
virgin days or do you have a particular thing that
you're like me? I know, living with purpose and values
(30:35):
is a big one for you guys, Yeah.
Speaker 2 (30:37):
So really big. So the work we did in my
early start, which we cultivated with everyone. This wasn't just
me sitting in a room thinking out values. We did
it from the bottom up to work out, well, what's
important to everybody and how can everyone have a connection
to what we're doing. And I think that that's really
important because the account's payable team is not going to
(30:58):
have the same experience that the terminal coordinators out in
the field have, and so you have to kind of
just find simple ways to connect people's work to purpose
so that they know what we stand for. So I
think the work that we did around our purpose and
our vision it's more than just a document, and it's
not something that we're just going to plaster on a
wall and a lunch round. Like I think we all
(31:20):
talk about it genuinely are stepping forward program. So the
program that we've all been through ourselves and all of
our contractors around what are our golden rules around how
we support the travelers in our terminal, Like everyone is
all in on that. And I love it because literally,
if I can see a plumber in the terminal with
a lanyard on, he or she has been through our
(31:41):
program and helping customers. I get letters now all the
time about somebody that's navigated this incredibly complex environment that
people have to get through, Like it's not easy to
get through an airport, So I think, you know, those
kind of programs. I think deciding what you really stand
for is important, but I equally recognize that's hard to do.
(32:01):
So if I think about you know, we've created our
Women in Apac Advocacy group, We've created our Pride Advocacy Group.
But that's tricky too, because there's a lot of complex
issues happening in the world, whether they be religious or political,
and it's a fine line about when you take a
stand and when you don't. And we saw that play
(32:21):
out with the Voice, and it's tricky.
Speaker 1 (32:23):
You know.
Speaker 2 (32:24):
I have people in my business that are directly affected
by things that are happening globally in the world and
in their home countries, and so corporately finding the balance
of when you should have an opinion and when you
shouldn't is I think one of the hardest things we
have to do. But I anchor back to inclusivity. So
(32:45):
no matter what your origin, sexual orientation, religious beliefs, political beliefs,
I want you to walk through the threshold of our
door and know that you belong and that you have
a voice.
Speaker 1 (32:57):
Yeah. Love that. I also read that I think you
nominated to do some work at a leadership summit that
was around giving compassionate feedback. I'm fascinated to know, like
what your thoughts are and why giving feedback is sort
of something we still avoid. Is it something that you
really focus on and who do you ask the feedback from.
Speaker 2 (33:15):
I'm obsessed with this. We don't give difficult feedback because,
like we're human, we don't want to hurt somebody's feelings.
And arguably giving difficult feedback when you don't give it,
it's more about your protecting yourself, not the other undercent
So put yourself aside, what's in the best interests of
this other human And I've seen so many people in
my career that were absolute superstars that have you know,
(33:39):
had a tumbling exit. And I've seen people that have
been absolutely pigeonholed as difficult become superstars. And it all
comes down to feedback from okay, because if somebody doesn't
have self awareness, you have to help them, like you
have to make them aware, you have to support them.
So I really am all about feedback all of the time.
(34:01):
And it doesn't have to be hard, like it can
be quick, it can be in the moment, it can't
be weeks later. It can't be twice a year in
a performance review. I mean, oh my god, it's a skill.
We did a session recently with about sixty of our
leaders with this lady. Oh, she was fantastic, and she
does this course, which I highly recommend if anyone needs
guidance around feedback that doesn't suck. If you google that,
(34:23):
she'll come up. But giving feedback in a way that
you're keeping somebody intact, you're not stripping them down, you're
not doing it to hurt them. But that's where I
come back to Compassionate leadership has to come from. You're
giving somebody difficult feedback because you want them to be
better and you want them to do better and to
be more successful. And I just think still we're all
(34:43):
just too polite on so many occasions. So my team
and I work quite hard on that with each other.
If there's tension in a room on a conversation, we
won't leave the room until it's aired out. And I
think that that's healthy. And the more that people see that,
particularly across the ranks, the more people get confident to
speak up, and the more somebody takes the feedback not
as a criticism but as a constructivepportunity to learn the intent.
Speaker 1 (35:06):
But it's important, though, isn't it right? Like you said,
you have an intent to want them to be better?
Whereas I don't know if everyone gets into that headspace
before they deliver feedback, is that really their intention or
is it to prove a point or is it to
be right correct?
Speaker 2 (35:19):
This is probably one of the biggest learnings for me
over my career as well, is people, I mean people
want to be right. Of course, you want to be right,
and particularly technical people like knowledge workers or people that
have a technical skill if that's being kind of disrespected
or challenged. And again it comes back to creating those environments.
But you know, it's like slowing down past a car crash, right,
(35:40):
Are you slowing down because you want to get out
and help somebody that's just been in a motor vehicle accident?
Or are you slowing down because you have this seen
curiosity about wanting to know what happened. If you're giving
feedback that you think you're giving because you want to
say I told you so, or you want to say
you did the wrong thing, then you should just be
quiet really because and I'm not perfect, I'm laughing now
(36:03):
because one of my team will be going right. So
you know, you said I told you so this week,
and there was something that I went, oh geez. I
got some really great advice from a great CEO when
I started, which is my job is to only intervene
if something's going to go really wrong. Otherwise empower people,
(36:25):
let them go, let them make mistakes. If it's going
to be kind of you know, a serious impact to
the business, then of course you have to intervene and
share your opinion and maybe give different direction. But if
you're giving regular feedback all the time, if you're having
those robust conversations and you're doing it in a way
that's compassionate and kind, then it becomes the norm. But
I think that too often feedback is maybe a leader's
(36:47):
opinion and not a constructive learning, or it's personally driven.
If what you're about to deliver isn't going to serve
that person, then I think you need to take that
moment to pause as a leader and go, how is
this going to make this person better? And if it's
really just going to make them go home and feel worse,
then you haven't done your job.
Speaker 1 (37:05):
Yeah, when you talk about compassion. That for me is
the ear of brave, which is empathy, right, And you
know you've got to have that part where you're able
to hold that space or person for an individual like
yourself who is just self confess go get her and
get it done. How hard do you find sitting in
that space of holding space to something like do you
want to fix it? Or you fix that? Is that
something you could say? Of course? Is it a space
(37:25):
for you that you want to grow in? For you
to think of which area of leadership for you is like,
that's the one I struggle the most with. Which one
would that be? For me?
Speaker 2 (37:32):
For sure? It's self mastery, It's when to stop talking,
when to leave the problems to my team. I'm just
by nature a person that wants to help people, and
I do it at home all the time. And my
kids tell me that they're like, you can't fix this
problem for me. I just need you to mand me
and I'm like, yeah, got it.
Speaker 1 (37:49):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (37:50):
Particularly having a background of operational pedigree, like you kind
of trained to fix the true and so you have
to untrain yourself to not fix everything for everyone, or
set an environment up where they come to you because
they expect you to fix a problem. So the self
mastery around that, the self mastery around not taking direct
(38:10):
action is one that I work on every day.
Speaker 1 (38:13):
Not the worst problem to have, now, Laurie, I could
literally talk to you for another hour and stuff that
I know I'm not allowed to and we can't, so
I'm gonna have to. I've hactually look down my list
and go, what's two questions I can wrap up his?
So it's just too oftenish on me. One is what sacrifices,
if any, do you if you've had to make in
order to have such a successful career.
Speaker 2 (38:30):
I've made so many sacrifices, Like when I think about
my career, because I was very ambitious quite young, and
that can be good and that can be bad. You know,
I was always job first, location second, So you know,
the sacrifices around living overseas when my dad is still
in Canada, the sacrifices around I live now in Victoria,
(38:53):
which is we love this city and I'm passionate about
the city and the airport that's in it, but we
have no family network here, like the rest of my
family is somewhere else. So I've got a husband that's
moved away from his Like, we've all made deep sacrifices,
I think. So I think lots of different family sacrifices
and family sacrifices around recognizing that I can't be at
(39:15):
everything and I can't be everything i'd want to be
for my children and getting okay with that very hard
to do with mother's guilt. But yeah, I would say
those you know, friends, family, There's been lots of sacrifices
along the way, I think, and that's just working out
that trade off. And like I said, that was kind
of one of the turning points for me with my son,
is making the call to say, I'm not going to
(39:37):
sacrifice this time right now, but you'll never get it perfect.
Speaker 1 (39:40):
I think that's why it's so important to make sure
that you're doing something you're passionate about. You have to
look at kids in the face and then to see
that look what mum's been able to do and give,
and look how happy it makes her.
Speaker 3 (39:49):
Right.
Speaker 1 (39:49):
I think that's a big part of that. So I
get that, all right. Last question for you, Laurie, I
guess aviation is off the table. You're not allowed to
do aviation. You weren't allowed to do it. That's sorry,
it's gone. What other job then would you be doing
if you couldn't do that?
Speaker 2 (40:04):
This is going to sound really leg as an answer, Okay,
but I had somebody tell me once it wouldn't have
to be aviation. It could be widgets and you could
get passionate about it. In my mind, I am very
focused on team culture, developing people, lifting people up, creating
a legacy that matters, creating something that my kids can go, Wow,
(40:27):
that's pretty awesome. I'm pretty proud of that. Like it's
funny as I sit here and talk about family sacrifices.
The irony is I'm fifty two years old and still
just want my parents and my kids to be proud
of me, right Like, at the end of the day,
that's what we all want. I mean, people may laugh
when they hear this. I don't think it has to
be aviation. I think it has to be a company.
It has to be something that has purpose and meaning,
(40:49):
and that could be anything connected to customers. But it's
about the team and the opportunity to deliver. And that
is why I get so passionate about Melbourne and Lonsstin Airport.
Also we own and operate. They are both two airports
that are going through massive transformation, big growth. You know,
we're delivering the biggest airport to the biggest city by
twenty three. And if I can leave that legacy job
(41:11):
done and that I hope is something that everyone at
the airport and in the city can be proud of.
I want to walk away knowing that. You know, Victorians
love this airport. But there's lots of different outsets and
lots of different companies. I'm sure that could be passionate
about that as well, But it does come back to me,
I think to say, what's the opportunity, what do they
stand for? What do they believe in? Would I want
(41:32):
to be a part of that?
Speaker 1 (41:33):
That's where I start, you know, even though in my
head I was thinking, I wonder if she'll say professional
skateboarder or you know, something out there. I actually loved
that because it leaks nicely to something I picked up
when I was looking through your resume. There was one
time you left and you went and did I think
you went for urban utilities for two years, right, so
you got out of aviation to years and I think
the one thing I read when you were talking about
(41:54):
that was that what you recognized during that time was
that what people need is good leadership, right that it
needs to transcend industry. And I think that's what your
aunts is beautifully saying, right that, Yeah, I know you
love aviation, but you just want to be a really
really good leader and have an impact on no matter
where that is. I love watching a journey, Laurie, and
thank you so much for coming on here. It's been
a pleasure. It's been great to see you again.
Speaker 2 (42:15):
Thank you and about you too.
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