Returning home this week after attending the Women Deliver Conference 2026, I've been sitting with a quiet but powerful reflection.
In a room filled with women from across the world, leaders, advocates, changemakers, I kept coming back to one truth. This did not start with me.
There were powerful conversations happening on stage about equity, representation and leadership. Important conversations. Necessary conversations. But as I listened, I found myself thinking about home. About the women who shaped me long before I ever stepped into a space like that.
The matriarchs. The aunties. The mums. The nanas.
The ones who carried culture when it wasn't safe to do so. The ones who held families and communities together through policies designed to break us. The ones who led without titles, without recognition, but with strength, wisdom and a deep responsibility to our people.
They made my journey easier. And they did it without ever asking for acknowledgement.
With Wendy Anders, left, CEO of National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Women's Alliance at the Women Deliver conference. Image: supplied.
As a proud Larrakia woman, my leadership is grounded in them. It's not something I switch on when I enter a boardroom or a conference. It's something I carry with me, shaped by community, culture and the women who came before me. That's something I was reminded of constantly throughout the week.
Because while the world is still catching up to conversations about women in leadership, our women have always been leading. Quietly. Powerfully. Consistently. Not for recognition, but because it needed to be done.
This year's NAIDOC theme, recognising 50 years of deadly, speaks to that strength. But we know it goes much further back than that. Our leadership, our activism, our resistance, it didn't begin fifty years ago. It has always been here. Passed down through generations. Carried by women who may never sit on a board or speak on a global stage, but whose impact is felt in every part of our communities.
That's the leadership I know.
And yet, when we step into formal systems, governance, policy, decision-making, we are still measured against a narrow definition of what leadership looks like. Too often, it's the same voices being called on. The same faces sitting across multiple tables. The same networks being relied upon.
Meanwhile, there are so many others ready. People with deep cultural authority, lived experience and strong community connection, who are still waiting to be given a chance. That's where the gap sits. Not in our people, but tn the system.
Because leadership doesn't always come with a title. Sometimes it looks like an aunty holding community together behind the scenes. Sometimes it looks like a mum carrying everything and still showing up for others. Sometimes it looks like a nana guiding decisions quietly, without needing to be seen.
That is leadership. And if we are serious about change, we need to expand how we see it. We need to make space for it. Not just invite it in, but actually shift how decisions are made and who gets to make them.
There is also a responsibility on those already in positions of influence. To step aside when it's not their time. To create room for others to come through. To understand that holding space also means sharing it.
Coming back from Naarm, I feel more grounded than ever in why I do this work. It's not about being in the room. It's about who you bring with you when you walk in.
I carry my matriarchs with me. In how I speak. In how I lead. In how I challenge systems that were never built for us.
Because this work is not about individual success. It's about legacy. Honouring the women who came before us. And making sure the next generation doesn't have to fight the same battles just to be seen, to be heard and to lead.
This did not start with me. But I will continue it.
