Insight Into Impact

Part 2 of 2 - Dr. Marcus Curcija continues the discussion with Jane Vadiveloo, Founding CEO and William Tilmouth, Founding Chair of Children’s Ground. Jane and William have worked together for over 15 years, culminating in the foundation and direction of Children’s Ground. Children’s Ground is an organisation led by Aboriginal communities, creating a new future for children filled with promise, justice, hope and empowerment. Children’s Ground works with children, families and communities that face the greatest exclusion and live with injustice and disadvantage every single day.  We unpack how Stakeholder Engagement and Corporate Social Responsibility can empower First Nations people and ensure that the economic, cultural, and social justice first nations people is upheld and promoted.

William Tilmouth was born in Mparntwe (Alice Springs) and is an Arrernte man. A member of the stolen generations, William was taken to Croker Island where he lived and attended school with many other children sent there as a result of Government policy of that era.

Insight Into Impact connected with Children’s Ground after watching In My Blood it Runs. A documentary which arose from the work and families who lead Children’s Ground. The documentary follows the story of ten-year-old Dujuan, a child-healer, a good hunter and speaker of three languages. As Dujuan shares his wisdom of history and the complex world around him, the audience witness his spark and intelligence. Yet Dujuan is ‘failing’ in school and facing increasing scrutiny from welfare and the police. As he travels perilously close to incarceration, his family fights to give him a strong Arrernte education alongside his western education lest he becomes another statistic. His grandmothers lead Children’s Ground and key advisors to the film include the Chair, CEO and cultural leaders of Children’s Ground.

We encourage you to follow the link below and watch the documentary. We also encourage you to follow the work on Children’s Ground and learn how you can support both these organisations.

Cameron Price connects, informs, and inspires social entrepreneurs as the convenor of the Social Enterprise Community. Based in Melbourne, Australia, the Social Enterprise Community is a tribe of people who are passionate about using for-purpose businesses to drive social impact. It is made up of members from across the world who are change-makers and social entrepreneurs seeking to evaluate and increase the positive environmental and social impact of programs. The Community also supports members by teaching them how to establish or scale-up their social impact venture.

The Social Enterprise Community regularly offers a Masterclass – where leading social enterprise experts discuss their work and how they are assisting other social enterprises to be more innovative and market ready. The Community also features a Roundtable that invites all members receive mutual support, discuss shared experiences, and the exchange advice. In summary, members band together to learn from each other’s' mistakes, collectively troubleshoot challenges, and explore opportunities to collaborate.

At our core, the Insight into Impact Podcast is about preparing business owners and managers with the knowledge they need to implement principles and practices that will enable their organisations to be more sustainable and achieve greater social or environmental impact. Therefore, every week, we feature a new guest that can provide in-depth, specialised input on a topic that can be integrated into strategy and operations.

For this episode, we have invited Indi Tansey, who has owned and operated her own tech business, which supported the development of innovative sustainability tech solutions. Over the past few years, Indi has become a huge advocate for the Sustainable Development GOALS (SDGs) and now actively encourages every business to do what they can to make a difference and generate a social & environmental impact. Her involvement with the SDGs has also seen her become involved with young professionals and artists that are using art to communicate and promote the future they want. This art exhibition is not to be missed and will resonate with all members of the audience.

Indi is also the Director at Women in Technology which is an informative and supportive environment for women and young ladies looking to make their mark/ get involved in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics – fields that have historically been dominated by men.

Overall, this Insight into Impact episode explores Indi’s journey from initially trying to make her mark in tech to now being being a leading voice in sustainable development and the adoption/ integration of the SDGs into everyone’s life / best business practice.

Here are some links that Indi references throughout her interview:

The purpose of the Insight into Impact Podcast is to inform individuals about how they can improve their business by adopting more sustainable principles and practices. Every episode we talk about steps and insights that will improve business acumen and result in increased economic prosperity. For our fifth episode, we brought in Rosemary Addis to talk about the Sustainable Development GOALS, impact measurement and management, impact investing, and impact-washing.

Although these topics have all been previously mentioned, eluded to, and discussed on the Podcast, Rosemary brings in a higher view to tie everything together and explain what these topics mean to the business world, no matter of size or capacity. She also goes into detail about what everyone can do to implement sustainable principles and practices and make a difference.

Rosemary’s work has been influential. Her insights have helped guide enterprise, bond, and investment decision-making across the world. For those seeking to better understand sustainability and what it means to them and for those who have struggled to understand the ‘bigger picture’, this episode is not to be missed.

Stakeholder engagement and management is an essential aspect of doing business. As such, this episode features Andres Recalde, Director at Kuya Silver. Andres is an in-demand stakeholder engagement and management specialist for the mining and extractive industries across Latin America.

Within this episode, Andres will discuss the importance of ‘social license’ and why it is essential for companies to be a ‘good neighbour’. Andres also discusses how companies must be prepared to use their resources to build trust and ensure they back-up their promises. Understanding common goals between companies and the community is the first step in ensuring dialogue and a productive relationship between the two entities.

He also details his work resettling entire villages and the importance of understanding the perspectives of all community members and ensuring that everyone is heard.

More and more, the ‘circular economy’ is being discussed as a solution to climate change, resource management, and economic disparity. Many businesses are implementing circular economy strategies into their operations and there is a good chance that your local council or community organisation is talking about how to integrate circular economy practices into your local recycling, waste management, or other resources-based process. However, one of the main problems around ‘circular economy’ is the amount of confusion that surrounds it. So, Insight into Impact has invited a circular economy advocate, spokesperson and educator onto the show to clear any misunderstandings.

As the Founder of Circular Economy Pioneers Australia, Chelsea Mclean brings enthusiasm for all things circular economy. Throughout the episode, she discusses what the circular economy is, what the benefits are, where it originated, and what frameworks are most pertinent to certain markets. Chelsea also gives details about how ‘circular’ Australian and circular economies are at the moment

Various circular business models are explored, along with each’s pros and cons. Chelsea provides real-world examples for each and discusses some of the issues/ challenges that impact their ability to be integrated at scale.

The journey of this Podcast series is to uncover how stakeholders can achieve more sustainable results. To this end, for the second episode, it was appropriate to explore ‘resilience’ because as a society we are currently looking to emerge from this pandemic with a new, more profound appreciation for leadership and recovery practices.

Many communities across Australia and in Asia have called upon Leigh Bennet, Executive Director, Leadership Solutions Consultant and Facilitator for The Institute for Tourism Leadership Australia, to design and deliver their resilient leadership and mentoring capacity building programs. Through his guidance, these communities are emerging stronger than prior to the pandemic because now they have the tools to overcome adversity and recover personally, organisationally, and as a community.

In this episode, Leigh discusses how in order to achieve the sustainable outcomes that we desire as a society, as an organisation, or even personally, we need to be able to recover – to “bounce back” from issues and challenges in a productive, meaningful way so that those around us are inspired to focus on positive impact solutions. Leigh also explores his integrated approach to understand, assess, and build personal resilience, which includes the ability to recover and respond with commitment and optimism..

In addition to being a highly sought after Resilience mentor, Leigh was asked to be come onto the Podcast because of his keen ability to speak very thoroughly and knowledgeable about a subject. Listening to this show, it will become evident as to why Leigh has made a career out of facilitating outcomes for councils, organisations, and stakeholder groups.

For our first episode, we unpack risk. Risk was identified as a topic our listeners should be familiar with as we progress through this podcast series. Understanding the need to gather perspectives and identify issues and challenges is integral to risk management, sustainability evaluation, and impact measurement practices. Therefore, by better understanding risk and how to manage risk, a logical conclusion can be drawn that outcomes can become more sustainable and impactful for intended beneficiaries.

As Head of Risk, Bupa Asia, Rodney Gollo joins to the podcast not in an official capacity, but as a risk practitioner who has experience managing risk for companies. Rodney reviews different ways of managing risk and dives into how organisations can mitigate risk by having systems in place to better understand perspectives. Being prepared and responsive is a form of risk management that helps organisations simplify the complexity of the world we are living in today.

At the end of the podcast, Rodney presents a checklist for both companies and investors to better appreciate and manage potential risks associated with ESG, or environmental, social, and governance, factors.