A passion for food, art and literature led Katherine Blizard to set up a café and bookstore with a twist. Founded in 2007, Katherine built her award-winning establishment by offering a unique 19th century experience in the heart of Paddington featuring one of the largest single-store second-hand book collections in Sydney and an ‘Art Space’ initiative and cooking school designed to mentor young emerging artists and chefs. The cooking school offers monthly tuition on a variety of culinary skills and the business attracts more than 3,500 people each week. Katherine, a board member of the Paddington Business Partnerships, volunteers her time to work with local businesses to encourage growth and foster a strong sense of community within the Paddington, Woollahra and Sydney City regions. Katherine is working towards becoming the first Eastern Suburbs café to be ‘Tick Approved’ by the National Heart Foundation as part of her commitment to supplying the highest standard of healthy food.

Starting as a part-time, one-woman consulting venture, French-born Corinne Bot identified a niche in the human resources market while sourcing staff for French businesses in Australia. Despite challenges with raising capital, in 1995 Corinne began international recruitment business Polyglot Group. Corinne says the Polyglot business model is 100 per cent based on harnessing what she describes as Australia’s biggest asset – its multicultural society. The business provides customised multicultural and multilingual solutions to international companies investing in Australia as well as Australian companies expanding overseas. As founder and Chief Executive Officer, Corinne has achieved average business growth of 30 per cent a year since 1995. She has offices in NSW, Victoria, Queensland, South Australia, Western Australia, as well as a partnership in New-Caledonia. As an advisor for French Foreign Trade, Corinne mentors many young visitors to Australia, ensuring they build useful networks and return with a positive view of Australia for the future.

After 18 years in the education sector, Amanda Tocci identified a major gap in the services offered to children with learning difficulties. Having a child who shares these challenges strengthened her desire to assist these children and their families so she founded the Australian Literacy Clinic (ALC) in 2004. Starting as a home based business, ALC is now a specialised literacy service that conducts research, assessment and planning for children from kindergarten to year six with learning difficulties. The clinic sees more than 200 children each week, conducts 20 educational assessments per week and provides online programs to children from remote areas of NSW. Having a strong presence in the Hunter with locations in Maitland and Newcastle, ALC receives 100 per cent of clients through referrals from local paediatricians, psychologists, speech and occupational therapist, schools and parents. Amanda is also undertaking her PhD in the School of Psychology through the University of Newcastle, focusing on reading intervention strategies.

Securing the Australian distribution of international jewellery brand PANDORA in 2004, Karin Adcock has developed the company from the ground up. Starting from a garage in Avalon, Karin now runs a highly profitable business with in excess of 250 staff members, more than 35 branded concept stores and more than 700 retail accounts in Australia and New Zealand. As Managing Director she is responsible for all aspects of the business, from future direction to sales, marketing, operations, human resources and finance. Under Karin’s leadership PANDORA has sales of $118 million and $188 million in 2008 and 2009 respectively with regional retailers reporting that PANDORA is a strong part of their business. Many of the initiatives Karin and her team have launched in the Australian market are used worldwide in other PANDORA markets. PANDORA also donates financially and in-kind to numerous charity organisations and community projects, including the National Breast Cancer Foundation and the Victorian Bush Fire Appeal.

Determined to work in marketing from a young age, Kylie Green’s career path led her to founding Kaleidoscope Marketing Communications in 1998. In 2005 she sold the agency to multi-national specialist marketing services company The Photon Group, and remained its CEO. With offices in New South Wales, Queensland and Victoria, Kylie focused on growth in turnover, staff headcount and footprint locations. In five years Kylie led an increase in Kaleidoscope's turnover from $2.5 million to $14 million with the agency's results in the past financial year the best to date despite the impact of the global financial crisis. In 2005 Kylie was voted by industry peers to chair the Australasian Promotional Marketing Association. Kylie has recently left Kaleidoscope and is currently exploring ways to advance her personal brand through speaking opportunities, authoring and ways of providing career advice.

As Chief Operations Officer (COO) and member of the Executive Committee for INGDirect, Anne Myers plays a key role in business strategy, planning and decision making. INGDirect was the pioneer for branchless banking in Australia; ideal for Anne given her long career in the finance industry spanning business and technology. In 2008-2009 working with INGDirect’s marketing department, Anne and her team developed a new card based transactional banking product, "Orange Everyday" which challenges the existing banking market by providing a full function transaction account with no fees. Recently she was appointed Trustee of the ING Foundation charity arm, which has provided an opportunity for her to use her business skills in a broader forum for social good. Anne is currently completing the Company Directors course at the Australian Institute of Company Directors and regularly participates in conference speaker opportunities. After completing her MBA she taught at the AGSM Executive MBA and in 1999 she attended a Harvard Business School Executive program.

Margaret Flynn is committed to social justice. In her early years as a Loreto Sister she volunteered in soup kitchens, refugee centres and shelters for the homeless. Today as CEO of the Catholic welfare organisation CentaCare Wilcannia-Forbes, Margaret works to improve the quality of life in rural and indigenous communities. In 1996 when the former teacher, school principal and family counsellor established the new CentaCare agency in the region, she had an old car, a borrowed desk, an electric typewriter missing several keys and an annual diocese budget of $3,000. One of Margaret’s greatest achievements has been in lobbying government to provide funding for remote rural areas of NSW. Today CentaCare’s budget stands at $16 million. Inspired by Mary Ward, the woman who started her order, Margaret vigorously champions the rights of women and indigenous communities. Of CentaCare’s 125 staff members, 85 per cent are women and 20 per cent are indigenous.

As Principal of Noumea Public School in Sydney’s west, Jenny Lewis transformed it from a school where student scores were rated in the bottom ten percent of the state to one of New South Wales’ top achievers in just five years. As CEO of ACEL Jenny has reprised that performance by turning an agency once floundering on the brink of failure, into the benchmark organisation servicing Australian and international educational leaders. Jenny’s passion for furthering learning has earned ACEL the reputation of being a vibrant professional organisation at the forefront of worldwide educational developments and trends. Named by The Bulletin magazine as one of the ‘Top 100 Creative and Innovative People in Australia’, Jenny has keenly embraced the latest online and digital technologies creating a ‘21st Century Learning Space’ to service educators and the community with innovative learning strategies. Jenny is also heavily involved in implementing new learning programs for developing nations such as Namibia, South Africa and Uganda.

Claire Robbs is Deputy CEO of Operations at not-for-profit welfare and community care organisation Life Without Barriers (LWB). Claire is responsible for operations that provide more than 4,000 clients with services including foster care, disability and mental health services. LWB has an annual income of $200 million and 85 offices throughout rural, regional and metropolitan Australia. Claire says LWB is one of the largest and successful providers of foster care services in Australia and cites its provision of services to unaccompanied young asylum seekers on Christmas Island as one of her most recent significant achievements. After an approach from immigration authorities, Claire mobilised her team and oversaw the establishment of resources, including carers from Afghanistan and Sri Lanka, to support the young asylum seekers. Claire advocated for LWB to diversify its care into immigration services, believing it could make a difference by developing culturally-appropriate models of support.

Physiotherapist Marnie Douglas turned her passion for education and training into founding her own physiotherapy clinic Ergoworks in 2003. The business soon expanded to include a national ergonomics consultancy after Marnie discovered a trend in ergonomic-related injuries. The consultancy assists companies with reducing workers compensation claims and helping to improve staff wellbeing. She says her greatest career achievement is the development of an online workstation assessment tool, ErgoAssess. The product is designed to enable businesses to determine the risk of injury for people using a computer and therefore minimise workplace injuries. Three years in the making, the ErgoAssess software is the first of its kind in Australia. Although Australian occupational health and safety laws do not require employees to receive a desk/risk assessment, the software empowers employers and employees with this knowledge. Marnie, a member of physiotherapy and ergonomics professional bodies, says her product has the potential to lower absenteeism and increase productivity rates.

Margaret Flynn, CEO of Catholic welfare organisation CentaCare’s Wilcannia-Forbes operations, is a vigorous champion for the rights of women and Indigenous communities. In that role Margaret introduced two new services targeted at teenage pregnancy and financial literacy. The ‘Strong Young Mums’ program was developed in response to concerns from the Departments of Health and Education about the number of young mothers unable to access support services. Working closely with TAFE, the program assists more than 50 young mothers a year with parenting skills and encourages them to re-engage in education. Margaret’s ‘Manage Your Income’ program employs and trains Indigenous staff as accredited financial counsellors to enhance financial literacy within their community. The program assists about 4,000 Indigenous people a year in learning financial skills to make informed decisions for their families. Margaret, a strong lobbyist for government funding for remote rural areas, leads a CentaCare team of 125 staff, 85 per cent are women and 20 per cent are Indigenous.

Starting her own freelance graphic design business wasn’t enough for Rebecca Mountford. She established a second venture, Fresh Start Health and Fitness in 2006 which led to an innovation in addressing community health issues for Australia’s aging population. Rebecca launched Fresh Start Thrive Over 55s Fitness, Australia’s first over 55s only health, fitness and brain training centre. The centre uses purpose-built fitness equipment for this demographic and brain training computer programs for post exercise involvement. The gyms are suburban-based, with Mona Vale chosen as the central location as it is home to one of Sydney’s most densely-populated areas of people aged over 55 between Dee Why and Avalon. Rebecca also launched a ‘FitKidz’ program to help combat childhood obesity. Fresh Start Health and Fitness has helped almost 3,000 members and its ‘Weight Loss and Body Shape Challenge’ has helped more than 170 people lose a collective total of 1,050kg in weight.

After completing a property vacating job as a favour for a family accountant in 2005, Lisa Oshlack realised she had stumbled across a unique business concept. Founding and registering ‘Moving On’ as a beginning-to-end fully serviced home preparation and relocation business, Lisa has never looked back. Lisa offers a reliable, efficient and compassionate range of services that make moving as stress-free and speedy as possible – specialising in relocations for people over 55. Using her organisational and project managing skills, Lisa’s services include relocating people to aged care and retirement living, preparing deceased estates for sale and home relocations. She also manages de-cluttering of homes to help give people a better quality of life. The business has a strong environmental philosophy, recycling on every job, reducing waste and supplying charities such as Oasis, St Vincent de Paul and the Salvation Army with useful household items.

After a life-changing experience nursing her late husband, Karen Playel decided to follow her passion for make-up to help those with skincare issues. Karen says her business was inspired by a trip to the U.S. that demonstrated the potential of cosmetic camouflaging products for people with scarring and skin conditions. Karen designed and patented a one-of-a-kind make-up tool, the ‘Mist Mirror’, for applying spray products to the face. She says her biggest challenge was convincing some in the medical field about the emotional impact that physical scarring and skin conditions can have on sufferers. Once perceived as superficial and unnecessary to a patient’s recovery, such products are now recognised for their role in regaining self-esteem. Karen also devotes private time to make-up workshops for burns survivors around Australia. She has recently launched 'The Healing Room' – a well-being business based in Hunters Hill and Rozelle which provides massage and facial treatments for those with scarring or disfigurement in a comfortable environment.

Taking a well-paid role that did not satisfy her hunger to grow prompted 30-year-old marketer Lauren Brown to strike out on her own. Seven years later, Lauren is steering a fast-growing business of 14 fulltime staff that’s looking to open a second office interstate. Lauren’s initial grounding was at McDonald’s, which she left in search of new challenges that did not eventuate. After launching her own business with a handful of clients things came full circle - a few years later she was employing her onetime mentor from McDonald’s as her creative director. Now winning awards in its own right, Pulse Marketing Group focuses on long-term client relationships and constant innovation. Its streamlined Pulse Package product enables small to medium businesses to have their own marketing programs. Away from work, Lauren has walked the Kokoda Track and attained her scuba diving qualifications, striking a perfect work-life balance.

After a successful career in advertising and publishing, at the age of 30 Helen Cartwright decided to focus her talent and passion on helping others. This decision led to Helen joining the marketing team at Opportunity International Australia in 2006. Opportunity International Australia is a not-for-profit organisation that aims to tackle world poverty. Today 34-year-old Helen is Marketing and Communications Director, providing direction and support across a range of marketing and communications strategies, specifically brand, donor communications, media relations and online. Helen says that 90 per cent of being able to sell a product is belief in it. Working for Opportunity International Australia, Helen aims to increase the organisation’s brand awareness and fundraising. Helen is involved in developing a community education and advocacy partnership with the Global Poverty Project. This is an organisation that is an advocate for the 1.4 billion people globally who are living in extreme poverty.

Combining her knowledge of physiotherapy and ergonomics, 30-year-old Marnie Douglas is the proud owner of Ergoworks, a physiotherapy clinic and national ergonomics consultancy based in Sydney’s CBD. Although trained as a physiotherapist, Marnie’s role is now concentrated on strategic planning and marketing. Identifying a gap in the Australian market, Marnie wrote and developed her own ergonomic software, ErgoAssess. The product has been introduced successfully into the workplaces of seven organisations both nationally and internationally. Marnie has a Bachelor of Applied Science Physiotherapy and was awarded the University of Sydney Rosemary E Wilson prize for caring and giving. Ergoworks won the Health & Fitness Services category at the 2009 Australian Small Business Champion Awards and Marnie was a national finalist in the Young Entrepreneur Award for her preventative injury solutions. Marnie is a volunteer for sporting competitions that raise funds for charities including the Oxfam Trail walk and 6 Foot track.

Debbie Kemp found an organisation at the crossroads when she joined the NSW Sports Federation as CEO in October 2007. Facing sponsorship losses of $100,000, an ineffective investment strategy and a membership questioning the relevance of the peak body for sport in NSW, Debbie embarked on an extensive consultation and restructure process. Three years later Debbie, 33, has enjoyed a 350 per cent increase in government funding and a new level of trust from members for the organisation. NSW Sports Federation is a reinvigorated advocate for sport, with the ear of government and industry. A former program manager for the Australian Sports Commission and co-ordinator for the National Heart Foundation, this active sports executive has qualifications in physical education, leadership and coaching. Currently on maternity leave, Debbie has set her sights on graduating to a board position and establishing her own business in health and nutrition.