Chancellor's Address: Women UNLIMITED Leadership Summit

The following address was deliverd by Western Sydney University Chancellor, Professor Jennifer Westacott AO at the Women UNLIMITED Leadership Summit on Wednesday, 1  October 2025 (please check against delivery).

I would like to acknowledge the Traditional Owners of this land – the Gadigal People of the Eora Nation – and pay my respects to their elders past and present.

It is a pleasure to be with you today for the Women UNLIMITED Leadership Summit.

My thanks to the team at The Hatchery for the invitation to speak.

And to Nicole Stafford for the warm introduction.

INTRODUCTION

As Nicole outlined, I’ve had the privilege of working across the four main sectors that underpin our society and national prosperity:

• Government;
• Business;
• The non-government sector; and
• Academia.

Driven by a sense of duty and public service, I had the honour of serving at the highest levels of those sectors.

I was a Departmental Secretary at the state level of:

• Housing
• Education;
• Infrastructure, planning and natural resources.

I’ve had senior roles in community services and led a major Inquiry into the NSW Health system.

I now chair the Bradfield Development Authority, which is designing and developing Bradfield City, the first new city in Australia in 100 years, adjacent to the first new airport in 100 years – The Western Sydney International Airport.

I was also the longest-serving CEO of the Business Council of Australia.

And I sit on the Board of:

• Wesfarmers – Australia’s largest conglomerate; and
• The Canada-based, global company, ATCO.

I was also a partner at KPMG for 6 years, looking after their NSW Government practice and establishing their climate change and sustainability practice.

I have been extensively involved in the non-government not for profit sectors, sharing my insights on how business and government work to ensure that everyone can have a seat at the table and reach their full potential.

I have previously served as the Chair of Mental Health Australia.

I am Chair of Studio Schools of Australia – an on-Country boarding school program for Indigenous students in the Kimberley.

And finally to academia, I am now the Chancellor of Western Sydney University.

THE CHARACTERISTICS OF EACH SECTOR

Throughout my career, I have had the great fortune of accumulating incredible knowledge and insight across these sectors.

Each has their uniqueness – but also incredible, foundational similarities.

So, what’s different, what’s the same, and what are my insights into the challenges for these sectors?

Let me start with government

Government

In liberal democracies, governments exist for:

• The public good;
• National and local security; and
• The wellbeing of the nation through the delivery of vital services and infrastructure.

The role of free and fair elections for every Australian and the responsibilities of serving – and being answerable ultimately to the electorate – is a profound difference.

The role of an accountable Minister is a fundamentally different organising principle.

It becomes the focal point for all direction and decision-making.

If I have a criticism of government administration, it’s the challenge of continuity and momentum.

Our electoral cycle and the combative nature of election campaigns where parties seek to differentiate themselves, means governments can sometimes be too captivated by populism and short term goals, rather than long-term stewardship.

Over the years, I’ve watched machinery-of-government changes that were of little public benefit.

And changes or tweaking of major policy initiatives, again which have been of little value.

Meanwhile, the big reforms that will drive better living standards get kicked down the road.

If you added up the cost of machinery-of-government changes that had little or no public benefit, over the years – you could have colonised Mars.

My point is that not everything or every program of a former administration is a bad idea.

This is where the role of the public sector becomes vital.

They are the custodians of long-term policy continuity, and I am a fierce defender of their independence.

I want to make this point, though.

We should never take our democratic system of government for granted.

The existence of:

• An independent judiciary;
• An independent public service;
• Free and fair elections; and
• Empowered regulators.

Have all been instrumental in protecting our freedom and our social cohesion.

As we see these institutions under threat in so many countries, we should do everything, and I mean everything, in our power to protect them.

Business

If I go to business.

Clearly, business exists to provide products and services that people want and are willing to pay for.

They exist – indeed, survive – because someone, as a shareholder or an investor, is willing to put their own dollar at risk to see a return on that investment.

This creation of value for shareholders and investors is a fundamental point of difference to other sectors.

That is why profits – ethically made – are crucial, and a good thing.

If companies aren’t profitable, they can’t invest, create more jobs and pay people more.

But remember, sustained value creation, means treating your customers well, treating your teams well, protecting the environment and supporting the communities you operate in.

Businesses that only pay lip service to serving their communities let us all down and are often quickly found out.

Australian business today is challenged by the incentive to invest, grow and be more productive.

The decline in productivity – which is responsible for pretty much all wages growth and living standards – is due primarily to a lack of business investment.

Particularly investment that drives growth and expansion.

Excessive regulation, high taxes and a shortage of skilled labour are crippling Australian business investment.

It is a cost on all of us.

Over the medium to long term, that failure will be a blow to the hip pockets of working Australians.

Non-government sector

If I turn to the non-government sector.

It is characterised by a ‘public good’ mission.

By a reliance on volunteerism and by localised, targeted service-delivery and community development.

The non-government sector is often the glue that holds societies and communities together.

But they are challenged by:

• Red tape;
• Short and uncertain funding cycles; and
• Fragmentation.

Too many small organisations spend way too much time fighting for their annual grant and filling in paperwork, diverting important time away from service delivery.

If you can, I encourage you all to give back and support the non-government sector in whatever way possible.

Trust me, the return on your investment of time or skills can enrich your life in ways you don’t imagine.

Academia

Then, to academia and to education more broadly.

The ultimate public good institutions.

I’m not confining that to universities.

Their role is enlightenment, knowledge, skills and workforce development.

They will be the lynchpin of whether our society will grow its economy and prevent inequality in the age of AI and technology.

Their role is to successfully develop the skills and capabilities required for the future.

And, of course, to conduct research that will underpin our technological and societal progress.

The university sector is facing enormous challenges:

• Tremendous funding pressure – due to low international and sometimes domestic student load and the increasing cost of degrees.
• The lack of a secure funding source for research.
• The asymmetry in funding between the Group of Eight and everyone else.
• Legitimate questions about governance and Vice-Chancellor pay.
• Most importantly, a system of accreditation and delivery that simply is not fit for purpose.

The tertiary sector is not equipped to prepare our society for the challenges it faces and to prepare Australians for the huge disruptions that will occur in the labour market.

It lacks personalisation and a student and skills centricity.

It lacks interoperability between TAFE and higher education.

It’s too slow.

It lacks a sustainable business model to rapidly upskill the existing workforce as jobs and tasks change.

At Western Sydney University, we are not waiting for the government to fix these problems.

We are personalising the student experience, through a new, AI-powered app.

We are:

• Making students the centre of everything we do;
• Driving high impact research;
• Collapsing 12 Schools into 3 Faculties to reflect the changes in modern occupations.

And we are focused on getting ahead of external factors and building resilience and growth.

THE SIMILARITIES OF EACH SECTOR

After highlighting the characteristics and unique attributes of each sector, I now want to turn to the profound similarities.

I passionately believe these sectors all exist for the public good.

I am always surprised when people say business is not.

Businesses:

• Employ the majority of working Australians.
• Create the bulk of net national wealth.

And of course, if you return to my point of difference – the role of shareholders and investors, then it’s useful to mention:

• The millions of mum and dad investors in Australia who rely on these dividends; and
• The superannuation funds that own 35% of the stocks listed on the Australian Securities exchange.

All these sectors have complexity – particularly large organisations.

They all have huge stakeholder obligations.

They all are accountable to independent regulators.

And they all succeed or fail off the back of effective and values-driven leadership.

EFFECTIVE LEADERSHIP

So, what is effective leadership?

Firstly, leadership is a collective dynamic.

You achieve things with others.

Effective leadership needs:

• A simple and compelling purpose;
• A precise strategy that has been developed collectively; and
• A clear and unambiguous devolution of accountability, which empowers people to achieve on behalf of the shared mission and purpose of an organisation; and
• Continuous and permanent accountability and feedback structures that measure performance and outcomes. Not the endless pursuit of activities.

In addition to these core attributes, there are leadership differentiators that are often not discussed:

• Creating an environment of hope and shared ambition;
• Unleashing the future through the most unsung leadership attribute – imagination;
• And of course, empathy, authenticity, and a constant desire to reward the achievement of others.

These are the things that drive high-performing cultures. Not culture workshops.

Values-driven leadership really matters.

This is not just a set of words on a wall.

It is a deep ethical commitment to a set of behaviours that guide what you do, and how you do it.

They are not always the same and they are not always good. History, and our alarming geopolitical landscape shows us that.

There isn’t a textbook template for values. They must be authentic. And for me, they must create a positive impact.

Perhaps the best way to talk about values driven leadership, is to talk about positive values driven leadership.

You need to think deeply about them.

Mine are:

• Integrity
• Compassion
• Courage
• Fairness
• And importantly to me, kindness – which we simply don’t make enough room for.

Values-driven leadership at an individual or collective level is critical.

At a personal level, it is your compass.

Am I doing the right thing?

Am I acting according to my values?

You can also see values playing out in policies and the actions of institutions.

When I see certain actions, good and bad, I often ask – what were the values that underpinned that decision-making process?

From my own career, I can think of a really good example – where people acted in accordance with their values and did the right thing.

Example 1: Wesfarmers

At Wesfarmers – the company that I am proud to sit on the board of – our values are underscored by a commitment to our people.

This meant that, during COVID, we paid everybody irrespective of whether they were able to work.

Sometimes we didn’t have work for people to do – but we paid them anyway.

Because we wanted them to stay with us, and we wanted to reward them for their loyalty and their service.

Wesfarmers is a very large organisation, and a very profitable one. Many organisations during COVID did not have that luxury.

But it was our values that fundamentally underpinned our decision.

Example 2: RoboDebt

On the other side of the spectrum – RoboDebt.

When I read the Royal Commission report into RoboDebt, I asked myself: What were the values that drove this program and the decisions that followed?

From my perspective it was from a set of values that assumed that all people on welfare are out to cheat the system and were not entitled to be treated with dignity and respect.

I know, from my own life experiences, that very few people choose to be on welfare.

Programs and policies must exist to serve people, not unfairly judge them.

LEADERSHIP IN PRACTICE

My career has shaped how I understand leadership.

My life, particularly my early life, shaped my values.

Leadership is not about personal gain. It’s about positive impact.

About contributing to something bigger than yourself.

The entity/ organisation

I have a few reflections on the important aspects of leadership. The first, is that the entity or the organisation you belong to, matters.

As a leader, your role is to serve the entity –

• Its purpose;
• Its strategy;
• Its focus and objectives.

So, make sure you’re working for an organisation that:

• Has a compelling purpose that serves the public interest;
• Supports its people;
• Brings others together; and
• Importantly – aligns with your values.

If you can’t tick all those boxes, it’s time to change organisations.

Or change your place in it.

The team matters

Effective leaders build strong teams, and strong networks – because leadership is a collective dynamic.

Having the right people around you is essential.

These are the people who will:

• Stand beside you;
• Help you deliver; and
• Challenge and support you.

Everything I have done that I am proud of was done as part of a high performing team.

Whether it was at the BCA, my leadership teams in the public sector, the wonderful board colleagues I have worked with – it is the team dynamic that creates real impact.

Nurture team talent

As a leader your job is to nurture talent.

To accept and take joy in members of your team being more capable than you in certain areas.

Women leaders are often told, “don’t pull the ladder up behind you.”

But that’s superficial.

My advice for women leaders, for all leaders, would be to:

• Be proud of your people.
• Don’t compete with your team in unhelpful ways.
• Let others flourish.
• Celebrate their success.

That’s how you build high-performing teams, and high-performing organisations.

At the centre of great teams sits two fundamental drivers.

Firstly, you have to teach people how to work in teams.

You have to set rules.

You have to be clear what you expect from people – because team work is not necessarily an intuitive second nature for everyone.

Secondly, you have to be willing to take people out of teams when it’s not working.

When they don’t share the values, when they are not able to serve the entity effectively, or when – despite your guidance and nurturing – they do not have the right skills or capabilities to effectively do their jobs – you have to act.

This is where kindness comes in. It is not kind to let individuals fail and to let teams fail.

Failure to reward excellence and failure to tackle poor performance, creates toxic and corrosive cultures and nobody benefits from that. But it takes courage as a leader to act.

Partnerships and collaboration

An extension of teamwork is the art of collaboration and forming enduring partnerships. I have done this all my working life and those partnerships have endured across all the sectors I have worked in.

Networking is not a drinks function. Instead it is the formation of alliances based on trust, shared objectives, compromise, mutual respect and understanding of different points of view.

I took a lot of criticism at the Business Council for having a convivial and collaborative relationship with Sally McManus from the ACTU versus a combative and toxic one.

I will not apologise for that because, trust me, when problems had to be sorted out, particularly during COVID, that capacity to work together saved tens of thousands of jobs.

Accumulate knowledge

My next piece of advice, is to accumulate knowledge.

I had the great joy of being with the great former Senator Pat Dodson recently, when we opened an on-Country boarding school program for Indigenous students in the Kimberley.

He said to the young people: “Knowledge is never a burden to carry. It’s a gift, but you have to work at it.”

So, work at getting the knowledge you need.

As CEO of the Business Council of Australia, I needed to understand:

• Education
• Natural resources
• Planning
• Health
• Disabilities
• Social services

Before I joined the BCA, I didn’t realise how important this knowledge base that I accumulated after years in the public sector and as a partner at KPMG would become.

As a leader, you must be trusted for your knowledge.

Each role is a chance to learn.

Each organisation is an opportunity to grow.

Be willing to explore different roles and different parts of the organisations you work in.

Understand how they operate.

Understand how they generate value.

Get on top of the detail.

And I say this to future women leaders in particular; you can’t lead major organisations without knowing how the money and the operations work. So, build that capability.

Know what skills you’ll need for your next big role – and start building them now.

The art of brevity

There will be masses of information to digest.

One of the greatest skills of an effective leader, is the ability to consolidate that information.

The public service, particularly when I worked in the Cabinet office, gave me a skill which is so underrated – the capacity to cut to the chase.

The skill of putting complex cabinet matters and decisions on one page, is an art that has stayed with me and served me well.

The clarity of thought that comes from being able to synthesise and quickly convey information is so powerful.

It’s also a vital skill in media.

The people who perform well in interviews, are those who can cut to the chase and convey a simple and compelling message.

As the world of social media paves the way for simple lies over complex truth, the art of effective communication has never been a more important leadership attribute.

Take risks

My advice to any leader is always to take risks.

Australia needs bold leaders – people who can take risks, inspire teams, and drive change.

One area where I encourage you to take risks is in your own careers.

Don’t look at org charts and think, ‘Gee, I'd love to be in that role.’

If you spend your whole career chasing org charts, you might get to the top – but you won’t necessarily enjoy it or be effective, when you get there.

Have real clarity on what you want to achieve in a job, as opposed to the job you want to achieve.

And be willing to take on the hard tasks, the new tasks, be willing to do the work.

Don’t be the person who, when asked to do something challenging, says: ‘What’s in it for me?’

Instead, seize the opportunity.

When NSW Minister for Health, Craig Knowles, asked me to take on the Health Council Review, I knew nothing about the health system, other than as a patient.

But I took the job – surrounded myself with experts and worked hard to learn the system.

Our work fundamentally reformed the NSW health system.

It led to a huge change in health provision and a massive injection of funding.

Act with courage

Finally, leadership is hard. It is about courage.

It is about standing up for what is right, facing down criticism and doing the right thing.

Carrying the weight of responsibility.

I grew up in public housing and witnessed everyday the stigma that was associated with living there.

I was determined to get into a leadership position to change that perception.

When I reached the top leadership team of the Department of Housing, I was shocked to witness the hatred – and it was a hatred – towards people who lived in public housing.

In partnership with Minister Craig Knowles and the Director General, Andrew Cappie-Wood and supported by a great team, we took the incredible step of reinventing a customer service mentality in the Department.

We offered voluntary redundancies to anyone who was not aligned with our vision and our values.

About 500 people took those redundancies.

In their place, we recruited people from retail backgrounds and customer service orientated organisations.

People who would consider and treat public housing residents as valued customers.

We went from almost zero to number one in the national customer satisfaction rankings.

That wasn’t the point of doing it. The point was to give our team members and customers dignity and respect.

That is an example of one of those great moments, where you get alignment between:

• Your values;
• Your organisation’s values;
• The capabilities of people; and
• The courage to act.

When all of these things come together – you can achieve great things.

Not just at the macro level but making someone’s life a little bit easier. Giving them a bit more hope and a sense of self-worth.

CONCLUSION

In a world where AI and social media can either enhance or undermine our way of life – positive, values driven leadership has never mattered more.

The extra territorial nature of these technologies, that is, being impervious to organisational and national boundaries, means we must take action to regulate the use of algorithms to ensure information is fact based and we shut down hate speech.

Importantly, we must give every person on the planet agency in AI, otherwise we will see greater inequality and social dislocation.

In a world where – for too many – hate speech is revered not reviled, and our social cohesion is under threat, positive values driven leadership has never mattered more.

When ancient hatreds are legitimised or worse manifest into acts of violence and intimidation in this country, we must act.

In a world where the institutions and the world order that have driven peace and prosperity are under attack, positive values driven leadership has never mattered more.

Failure of the institutional arrangements that underpin our liberal democracies will erode social cohesion and diminish democracy itself. We know from history that acquiescence and appeasement to authoritarian values and institutions – is a direct assault on peace and prosperity.

And it is the poorest people, the most vulnerable people that always suffer the most.

And in a world where all these destructive forces are coming together at the same time, the collective dynamic of positive values driven leadership, across all sectors and all nations has never mattered more.

Turning a blind eye to negative values, to negative leadership, to the forces of hate and division would be a colossal failure of leadership and a betrayal of trust.

Passive acceptance that these negative forces as simply inevitable would be unforgivable.

The task of positive values driven leaders, like all of you here today, has never mattered more.

It is time to reclaim moral authority through collective action. It is time to reinvigorate the institutions that drive justice and fairness.

This is our collective obligation. It is our moral imperative.

ENDS

1 October 2025

Media Unit.