The Canberra Business Podcast
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The Canberra Business Podcast
Empowering Canberra's Girls: Inside Fearless Women
What happens when girls in one of Australia's most educated and affluent communities are quietly suffering the poorest mental health outcomes in the nation? The answer: Fearless Women steps in to transform young lives.
Glenda Stevens, founding CEO of Fearless Women and 2024 ACT Senior Woman of the Year, shares the remarkable journey of building an organization dedicated to empowering vulnerable girls and young women. Drawing from her diverse background as an Air Force air traffic controller and community leader, Glenda explains how Fearless Women developed its multi-layered approach to supporting girls through school programs, counseling, and mentorship.
Despite overwhelming community response with volunteer mentors, Fearless Women struggles to meet demand, with hundreds of girls currently on waitlists for their life-changing programs. Glenda challenges listeners to support not just through donations, but by actively calling out gender bias, having meaningful conversations with young people about media messages, and examining the subtle ways we reinforce stereotypes in everyday settings.
Want to support vulnerable girls or know someone who could benefit from these programs? Visit fearlesswomen.org.au to learn how you can be part of creating a generation of confident, resilient young women ready to face tomorrow's challenges.
This episode is supported by CareSuper.
Hello and welcome to the Canberra Business Podcast. I'm Greg Harford, your host from the Canberra Business Chamber, and today I'm joined by Glenda Stephens, the founding chief executive of Fearless Women. Glenda, welcome to the podcast.
Speaker 2:Thank you, Greg. I'm really pleased to be here talking to you.
Speaker 1:Now you've got a really interesting career career and we'll get into talking about Fearless Women shortly but you're a highly experienced community and business leader. You're a former Air Force air traffic controller and a past chair of ACTACOS. You were the 2024 ACT Senior Woman of the Year, as well as being the founding CEO of Fearless Women. You've had a fascinating career journey. What inspired your transition into the not-for-profit sector?
Speaker 2:All through my life I've had a social bent. Even when I was at school I was always very involved in the community activities and my career in the Air Force. In a way, I saw that as community service, in that I was giving to the wider community. And then that came to an end due to lack of childcare. I had to look around and see what else I could do. I'd always had an interest in finance and numbers, so I retrained as an accountant.
Speaker 2:I started at the local TAFE college and then went to university et cetera, but realised I was a little bit too creative to stay in that field and so trans looked at what did interest me, where my interests, and so I ended up sort of in a very large school in Sydney supporting girls et cetera, and so it was really an unplanned series of fortunate accidents that ended me up in the not-for-profit sector. Having said that, everything I've done has actually contributed to me being here. So the things I learned in the Air Force about teamwork, working with other people, leadership, et cetera, has all been a foundation for what I'm doing now.
Speaker 1:And last year congratulations. A little belatedly you were named ACT Senior Woman of the Year. What drove that and what does that recognition mean for you personally?
Speaker 2:Well, first of all, it was the recognition that I actually was over 60. I was trying to ignore that.
Speaker 1:About 60 is the new 20, right.
Speaker 2:Yes, after my sons told me that I wasn't really the real one I was the older one I then went about changing their mind, as well as mine. What it meant to me personally was actually a recognition of the accumulated knowledge that I have and how I can actually help empower other people with that knowledge. It's not just to sit in my brain and and go along. For me it's there to to be shared. But on a wider scale, for fearless women, it's been absolutely wonderful the recognition and the recognition for the organisation to be able to go and talk to people, particularly women's groups, about what we actually do.
Speaker 1:So tell us a little bit about that. I mean, I think most people will know that Fearless Women is focused on helping girls and young women thrive, but what are you actually doing on a practical level?
Speaker 2:On a practical level, it started in 2018. There was some research done by ANU about the mental health and wellbeing of girls in the ACT and unfortunately, our girls have the poorest mental health of any group in the country. There's a really unique set of factors that feed into that, and so that was sort of the initial catalyst. And at the same time, the lovely Martin Fisk, who was then the CEO of Men's Link, was being asked for programs for girls. People were saying you do this amazing stuff for boys. Where's something equivalent for girls? So those two things came together and some people decided to actually take action and they got some seed funding and then we were able to research and work out what was needed. So we looked at models around the world. We looked very closely at Men's Link and I have to say they were extremely generous. They shared everything, all their information, with us, but to see how we could build programs that actually did empower girls, that actually, on a grassroots level, changed the lives of young girls, and how did we want to change that? What did we want? What did they want? So we did a lot of research on what girls wanted, and they wanted to know who they are. They wanted to know about their world. They wanted to know how they fitted into their world. They wanted to have confidence and have a voice, to be able to speak up, and they wanted that for the rest of their lives. So they wanted resilience. So we looked at that and went well, how do you get that? We looked at where the girls were at that time and we very rarely use the word anxiety and stress, because we actually went a step further. What do you need to not have anxiety and stress? So we did that sort of modelling.
Speaker 2:The programs that we do now deliver are school education. The very first step is to actually recognise about yourself and recognise how you work. So we go and talk with girls Now. Up until recently it was grades five to 10. But due to the demand from the schools, we're now talking with girls from grade three and we talk to them about you know, it's okay not to be okay, it's like you're not alone, where to go for help and how to help someone they think may be struggling.
Speaker 2:So that's sort of one program which was the very first rollout, that's called fearless future. We then have another school program from that girls will actually sometimes go. I need more help and we have a counseling, one-on-one, counseling, small group. Counseling small group focuses on friendship and boundaries and how to sort of relationships and of course then we have a two-year mentoring program where girls are paired with volunteer female mentors. We've been very careful all the way from development we have been evaluating to making sure that it is all adding value to the young person's lives, and so far everything's proven to be working really well.
Speaker 1:Good to hear Now. I guess, though, there's so much in what you've just said. Why do girls in the ACT have such poor mental health outcomes?
Speaker 2:So we have a really wonderful community. We have a highly educated, highly engaged, very wealthy community compared to the whole of our country. But in amongst that we have girls who are here. We have a highly mobile population. So the girls will be at school one day and one comes in and says well, we've been posted to Darwin. She has no choice in this. She's just a month later pulled out of school and moves to somewhere else across the country or the world.
Speaker 2:So this friendship group has to then reform. Three or four years later that young person may come back generally, come with a defence family. She'll come back Again. Friendship groups have to reform. So girls' friendship groups are in constant flux. So the highly mobile population most of us come from elsewhere. So young women don't have extended family to talk to. Aunties are really really important people, but if you don't have a strong relationship with your aunt or an auntie type figure, it means you can't sort of when you're growing up, say so why? Why is mum being so mean to me? You know you don't have that external voice of reason. So that's another one our college system. Unfortunately that transition from high school to college at that age for a lot of girls is traumatic and they start worrying about it a few years earlier, and several other reasons as well, which I can't remember off the top of my head, but there's a whole lot of little things you take each individually.
Speaker 1:Little things that add up. And I guess is that materially different, do you think, for girls compared to boys, because the same issues around mobile population, lack of extended families apply across the community right?
Speaker 2:And the answer's yes. Yeah, it does. It affects girls more than it affects boys.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so you've set up Fearless Women in 2018, so you've been going for seven years now. So well done. That's a big, big achievement. How did you start? Was it just you, um? And how have you grown?
Speaker 2:so we um, we started delivering our programs through just almost three years ago, um, before that there was 12 months of research and um program development. Uh, prior to that was, you know, actually getting the seed funding together so we could, so I could be employed to do the other things, and all that has taken a long time. So 2020, I think, was the initial constitution and then it's been a gradual development to that from that and we brought on initially the one school program and mentoring with two groups. We called our pilot groups and we evaluated them very closely and watched what was happening with them, and they've now graduated. And then we've just been gradually adding programs to the whole empowerment program. We've brought it all under the one umbrella and call it a girls empowerment program, because they actually work very well together. We find that sometimes a young person will come in through one door and then will continue her support through other parts of the program. There's still a few more things we'd like to develop, but at the moment they're sitting on the whiteboard.
Speaker 1:So how big is your team?
Speaker 2:So we have myself and a finance person, then we have two program managers plus two education officers and two counsellors.
Speaker 1:So a team of eight relatively small, big jobs.
Speaker 2:Yes, and nearly all of them are part-time.
Speaker 1:So that must have some challenges in itself, trying to navigate a significant workload with a small group of part-time people.
Speaker 2:It is yes, and I think we recognise that. That one thing everybody in the team has is a great sense of commitment and connection to what they're doing. But making sure that everybody you know puts in their right hours I'm a firm believer that you know if you're working the hours you have to be paid for the hours it's you yourself are not a charity, um, and making sure that everyone gets the business support that they need, you know, whether it's professional development or salary sacrificing programs. Keeping all that running on top of running programs is a big challenge.
Speaker 1:yes, absolutely so. You touched on funding a little earlier, but how are you funded?
Speaker 2:We're funded by the goodness of the people of the ACT. So we received last year a small grant from the ACT government to pilot the counselling part of our program and we're still seeking further government support. We believe that we should be supported by government. They're supporting the Boys' Programme, which is parallel to ours, and everything we're doing is supporting the government's mission of empowerment, their women's programmes, as well as keeping girls out of Canberra hospitals, out of the mental health units. So yeah, we're very much enmeshed in the ecosystem and do you have a fundraising program as well?
Speaker 1:um from the public we do.
Speaker 2:It is, it is small, uh, but yeah, we run some events throughout the year. Plus, we, um, are very keen to have people support us with donations or partnerships. We're very open to to talking to people about how they can be part of it, given that we don't have something that they can come in and do because the privacy of the young women involved we can't invite everybody from Taubman's Paints or whatever in to do something with us. So it's a different model, but we seem to be able to find ways to work with people.
Speaker 1:So if there's any business people listening to this who might want to be doing something, putting something back into the community, you'd love to hear from them.
Speaker 2:Certainly would. Yeah, we all have young women in our lives and if you've got a 14-year-old in your life, you'll know what it's like. And if she's a 14 who's achieving really well, imagine what it'd be like if she wasn't. You know what, if she was unable to meet the challenges of everyday life, if she was unable to get out of bed of a morning, if she couldn't go and join a social group because her anxiety and her fear was so high. So and sometimes it's just working through those barriers, having the extra person help them understand their world. That gets the girls from being a child to being an adult.
Speaker 1:Now there will be people listening to this who might perhaps roll their eyes at that and say well, people just need to harden up and be a bit more resilient. What is different about the current generation, do you think, compared to perhaps those of us who are a bit older?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so when we were growing up, everything we did wasn't out there for public scrutiny. We had, you know we'd do stupid stuff.
Speaker 2:Nobody knew about it you know and future employers didn't know about. You know things that are in social media now that you don't want to be there. The influencers are telling them that you know, if your teeth aren't perfectly white, then you know you're a failure at life. Really, if you don't have a double degree in something, you're a failure at life. So the messages they're getting are not empowering messages and they're constantly receiving these messages from all different angles.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we had. You know we had, and they don't have time to switch off Because it's always there, you know, in schools. Now you know that most schools now phones aren't allowed. That's a great move because they can switch off. It's not sitting there as a tool, but also as a threat. So it's that you know they really connect. Girls are really connected with the world. They worry about what's happening in Ukraine. They worry about messages coming out of the United States. They worry about messages from the boys around them who are listening to the Andrew Taits of our world. So they're really deep thinkers. They really want to get it right and even part of that is the perfectionism Girls strive for perfectionism. Part of that comes from insecurity, because they're being told they're not good enough. It's a really messy world they're in.
Speaker 1:Well, it's great that Fearless Women is there to try and help manage some of the issues that are there, but setting up a not-for-profit, particularly in the current sort of environment, is not for the faint-hearted in itself. What were the challenges and the lessons that you learned along the way?
Speaker 2:Yeah, the challenges. I think the first challenge was navigating government bureaucracy. We had an angel investor sitting in the wings and that investment was the thing that was going to get us started. But we had to have DGR status and that was a huge challenge just dealing with the government to get that at the time, and that then led into having to curb my natural impatience. You know, I wanted it all now.
Speaker 2:Everything had to be done and so making sure we were doing things in a measured pace and getting it as right as we possibly could in the time, convincing people sometimes to have to invest in things that weren't obvious to them. So and I think the thing that comes to mind the most is our CRM. You know that's a huge investment, but a necessary investment to manage our data and our information. We started without it with our first mentoring cohort and I think we were running like 17 spreadsheets when we only had 20 people in the office and I went and it just takes one error, one error in one spreadsheet, and we'll be kaput. So, yeah, and then the time to invest to develop that, the time to build a website, yeah, everything.
Speaker 2:It was quite exciting because everything had to be done all the policies, all the procedures. So doing that, doing it in the right order and getting the right information. Um, yeah, we had lots and lots of helpers as well, and it's wonderful to help, but sometimes you don't need the helpers right now. You know it's like, oh, that's really great idea, but right now we have to focus on other things, and so managing other people's expectations as well was a challenge. And, of course, then just the ongoing funding. You're just keeping the flow of income so we can actually build and go forward.
Speaker 1:So if you were doing it again, heaven forbid, what would you do differently?
Speaker 2:I'd love to do it again. That's a really good question, because I think I was really lucky in that we did so many things the right way. I think one of the bonuses was having an extremely good board who weren't there for the ego. They were there to give their expertise, Because when you're the only employee, as I was in my sewing room at home, they had to give me the space to do what I needed to do, but they were my resources to draw upon. So we having the right. You know, we had someone who runs a marketing company and advertising an accountant having the right resources sitting around me. I'm just trying to think what I'd do differently.
Speaker 2:Well, it sounds like actually you had a model that worked pretty well, I think we had a really good model and I just think the openness and the honesty really helped.
Speaker 1:So you're a few years down the track now in terms of implementing and running programs. Yes, what sort of impact have you had?
Speaker 2:We've changed lives. We've changed lives for the better. So when I, you know, talk to girls and Actually I'll give you an example A few weeks ago I just happened to be in Civic and one of the young girls who, when we interviewed her several years ago to come onto the mentoring program, she was so traumatised. She was so traumatised she actually couldn't speak in the in the pro in her interview. She had had some serious demand involved with some serious domestic violence etc. And she was just, yeah, just coming into that interview but must have had a great a core of steel to actually come to that meeting, came to to the meeting with her parent and agreed to join the mentor program. And so now she's three years down the track for her.
Speaker 2:I happened to bump into her the other day and she has a lovely partner. She's in her late teens, she's got a lovely partner, she has been offered a terrific job and she said I think I've, but I'm deferring that decision for 12 months because I'm not 100% certain. So she's developed really good judgment and you could just see the confidence and the happiness in that young person and I remember her from, you know, three years earlier and that just shows the change that you can do.
Speaker 1:That's a fantastic story and I guess it must be really good to kind of see that happening. But I guess it sort of does raise a question for me. You talk about this girl having a core of steel, that kind of got her involved. But how do the kids get involved? Do they need to have enough resilience to say, actually I want to be involved, or is there someone sort of pushing them along the way as well?
Speaker 2:A little bit of both. Applications come in via our website and the application can be put in by the young person herself who has heard about us when we've been to talk at the school. Often it's put in by their school. The teachers will say oh, you know, do you think maybe you could do need a bit of support with this? So there's schools at the act. Schools are excellent at helping young people in that way. Uh, we get a lot of referrals from government agencies. More than half our referrals come from government agencies or other community services, like mary mead, um, whoever else is there, you know. So there's a lot of, as I said, part of that ecosystem we've seen as very much part of the support network.
Speaker 1:So how many referrals are you getting each year, roughly?
Speaker 2:About 400.
Speaker 1:And have you got the resources to meet that demand?
Speaker 2:So at the moment we have about 89 girls in mentoring and we've got about 200 on the wait list. In counselling we have have, I think there's about 38 girls currently seeing the counselors, plus the fearless together. So the small group empowerment program, uh, and I think we've got about 120 girls on the wait list for that. So, and you know, the school program, our outreach school program, we can only do what we can do when we have had to limit that just because we don't have the resources so um, we're not limited by mentors.
Speaker 2:The women in Canberra brilliant. They're absolutely wonderful the way they put their hand up and say, yep, I'll volunteer. I really understand what this these young girls are going through and I want to help. So we have enough mentors. What we don't have is the resources to actually grow. Yeah, and that's.
Speaker 1:That's a challenge, not resources to actually grow. Yeah, and that's a challenge not unique to your business, I suspect In terms of managing that volunteer base. You've got people putting their hands up wanting to be mentors. Are there particular compliance rules that frustrate you around that? Are there things you need to worry about from a health and safety point of view, from a working with vulnerable people point of view, that you need to need to manage?
Speaker 2:well, we do have to very carefully screen our mentors. One we are putting an adult with a vulnerable young person, so we have to make sure that that outhouse is safe. So of course we do. You know, yes, and working with vulnerable people is, you know, step one. Uh, step two is, you know, quite a comprehensive application process, because we need to get to know these people to make sure that they are in a good space to be able to mentor.
Speaker 2:We interview all our prospective mentors to get to know them a little bit, and then a mentoring. Then we run a mentoring program as well, as well as online sorry ongoing professional development, and by the time people get to the end of the mentoring, we know them well enough to say, yeah, this person's going to make a great mentor. Things like whether they mentor an older or younger person we all have our own preferences. I mentor a 12-year-old. I mean, I couldn't think of anything worse than mentoring a 16 or 17-year-old, because that's my preference. I get along well with the younger girls.
Speaker 2:So, yeah, we screen the mentors very carefully and we also with the younger girls. So, yeah, we, we've kept men. We screen the mentors very carefully, um, and we also with the young girls. We interview them and we make sure that this program is a program that they want to be part of, because if they don't want to be part of it, it's not going to work. We take time to also match the mentors and the young people with a commonality, because commonality is key to success. So we make sure that the outdoorsies are with the outdoorsies and the book readers like to be with the book readers.
Speaker 1:So a lot of work to do to get that right, I imagine.
Speaker 2:There is a lot of work, yeah, and the team we have a great. As I said, the CRM has it all slayed out and we have a great system running.
Speaker 1:Now it sounds like you and the team are doing an amazing job of helping our young women through some challenges, but I guess the broader question is well, you're kind of dealing with some problems that are emerging in society. What do you think we can do as a community to help girls and young women feel safe, valued and empowered?
Speaker 2:more generally, yeah, you know, we've just had International Women's Day and it's the themes were, you know, accelerate action. Well, you know, and what action is that? You know. So, you know, well, supporting the supporters one thing you know supporting organisations like Fearless Women, but also organisations like Men's Link, because Men's Link is growing. Good men, you know men who now know how to interact with women. So that's, you know, it's not all one-sided.
Speaker 2:Also, just being aware of what is happening around you and calling out bias, you know, if you see something or you think that's not quite right, calling it out, whether it's in a conversation at home or something you see on television or on.
Speaker 2:You know the kids are talking about whatever they've seen on their phone, saying, well, how does that really have a conversation with them about it? And something I saw the other day I was in a news agency and they had on the left they had the Home, beautiful and the cooking magazines and the Women's Weekly, and way over there on the right was the business magazines and the boat and camp and fishing and the gun magazines. And I looked at it and I went well, what message is being sent here? Home, cooking, women, businessmen. So I, you know, as you would expect, I went and spoke to the newsagent and said do you see what's happening here? And he actually looked at me and went no. And I said but the message you're sending to anybody who comes in to look at any magazine is that women don't belong over there and men don't belong over here. And he went oh okay, so I have yet to go back and check.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and it's an interesting point, isn't it? Because at one level, the newsagent may well be thinking well, we'll just put magazines that will appeal to a particular segment of the market together, which kind of is logical from a retail point of view. But you're right, it raises a really interesting question about the stereotypes and the expectations in a world where anyone can do anything.
Speaker 2:Yeah any man can decorate a house and any woman can run a business, so why don't we have them all mixed up alphabetically? Let's just choose a completely different way of doing it.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, really interesting conversation. Now, if our listeners want to get involved as mentors, supporters, advocates for fearless women, what do they need to do?
Speaker 2:Probably the starting place is our website. We have lots of information there and you can apply to be a mentor. But also if you have a young person in your life who's not thriving which is the word we use whether the girls are experiencing bullying at school, stress, have ADHD, are neurodivergent, families going through trauma which is affecting her development. And the girls we support come from all levels of our society, all socioeconomic groups, and not just from one particular area. There's an application form there. You don't have to go to a GP and get a referral. It's a very straightforward process. Yeah, so through the website and the same. If you want to support us or if you have a great idea for fundraising, you could pop that through. That way, being a small team, it's very easy to get things through to the right person.
Speaker 2:Excellent and your website is easy to get things through to the right person Excellent.
Speaker 1:And your website is fearlesswomenorgau. Fantastic, glenda Stevens, thank you so much for joining us here on the Canberra Business Podcast. I'm Greg Harford. I am the Chief Executive of the Canberra Business Chamber and I've been talking to Glenda Stevens, the founding Chief Executive of Fearless Women, a great organisation here in Canberra doing great things to try and help young women lead a better, more fulfilling and empowered life. So thanks for joining us, glenda. It's been great having a chat.
Speaker 2:Thank you very much for talking with me. I've enjoyed it.
Speaker 1:And just a reminder that this episode of the Canberra Business Podcast has been brought to you by the Canberra Business Chamber with the support of CareSuper, an industry super fund with competitive fees, returns, exceptional service and a focus on real care. You can learn more at caresupercomau and don't forget to follow us on the Canberra Business Podcast on your favourite podcast platform for future episodes. We'll catch you next time.