Keynote Speakers
Phil Ruthven is chairman of IBISWorld corporation and widely considered Australia’s most respected strategist and futurist on business, social and economic matters. Phil’s presentation covered the changing nature of Australian society, workforce composition and worker expectations.
Pru Goward is the federal Sex Discrimination Commissioner, and the Commissioner Responsible for Age Discrimination. She is well known for her efforts to promote a national scheme of paid maternity leave and a better balance of work and family. Pru discussed work-life balance in Australia, including what is happening, what is not happening and what needs to occur to change legislation, policies, beliefs and attitudes.
Karl O'Callaghan is the Western Australian Commissioner of Police. The Western Australia Police is responsible for policing the largest single police jurisdiction in the world. Karl talked about the challenges of work-life balance in a 24/7 operation and discuss current initiatives within the Western Australia Police to attract and retain staff.
Louise Rolland is CEO of Business Work and Ageing (BWA) and Professor of Ageing and Work at Swinburne University of Technology. She is recognised as a leader in understanding and promoting strategic responses to the impacts of demographic change including population ageing on business, both nationally and internationally. Louise discussed the imperative and options for extending working life through the application of flexible work options for people in their later working life.
Dr Penny Flett is the CEO of Brightwater Care Group, a not-for-profit organisation that provides innovative and flexible care services to the community. Penny is currently the Chair of the WA Aged Care Advisory Council, and Director, National Seniors Association and was the 1998 Telstra Business Woman of the Year. Penny discussed Brightwater’s innovative approach to work-life balance and flexibility within its workforce. Brightwater has over 1100 staff in a range of health care and supporting occupations who provide aged and health care services on a 24/7 basis.
Karen Schmidt is a professional speaker, workshop leader and author who is on a mission to create fresh workplace attitudes that help people and organisations grow! Karen discussed the differences between generations and the approaches and strategies needed for attracting new generation workers and retaining the baby boomers in the workplace.
International keynote speakers
Andrew Fung is the Deputy Director of the Quality Workplaces Department at the Ministry of Manpower (MOM) in Singapore, promoting quality workplaces family-friendly work practices and work-life harmony to employers. Andrew shared Singapore's experience and tripartite approach to promoting work-life harmony and why Singapore has taken this on.
Trudie McNaughton works as a strategic adviser in employment, work-life and diversity issues and was the CEO of the EEO trust in 1992-2003. Trudie pioneered work to identify the business and social benefits of work-life balance in New Zealand, initiated and led a diverse range of projects, and is on many advisory groups.
Heather McDonald is a Workplace Policy Manager in the Department of Labour, New Zealand. She is responsible for the New Zealand Government's work-life balance program and has been advising on Government policy and research on work life issues for over 15 years. Heather has managed various initiatives to encourage businesses to implement family friendly working arrangements.
Trudie and Heather gave a joint presentation on New Zealand Government Policy and public and private sector initiatives to improve work-life balance. This includes recent research that shows work-life balance contributes to business success; the three critical barriers to work-life balance; and recent developments in paid parental leave, flexible work, income support, child care subsidies and leadership
Dr Linda Duxbury is a Professor at Carleton University in Canada. She has completed major studies on balancing work and family in the public, private and not-for-profit sectors and has recently completed a major work-life balance study featuring 32,800 Canadian employees. Linda discussed work-life balance initiatives in Canada, including her recent research on work-family issues for small business, the organisational and individual impacts of e-mail, telework, flexible work arrangements, regular part-time work and on-site childcare and why management support of work-life balance really matters.