Leading from conviction

Good morning everyone.

I begin by acknowledging the Traditional Custodians of lands, waterways and skies across Australia. I pay my respects to the Gadigal people of the Eora Nation, on whose country we meet today, and honour their culture and Elders, past and present. I also extend my respect to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander colleagues who are here today.

Reflecting on the enduring connection of First Nations people to this country, I am reminded that we are all beneficiaries and custodians of things that began before us and will continue after us. That sense of stewardship - of being entrusted with something larger than ourselves, and having a responsibility for what happens to it - is an important part of leadership. And it is an idea I will return to shortly.

It is a real pleasure to be here with so many leaders from different organisations and sectors, and at different stages of our careers.

This year's conference theme is: The courage to lead differently. And what I want to focus on today is one particular expression of that courage - leading through conviction not consensus.

No matter your role or industry, right now every one of us in this room is leading through a time of heightened volatility, uncertainty and polarisation.

Technological developments are reshaping the way people live and work. The energy transition is transforming our economy. Geopolitical pressures are changing the environment in which businesses and institutions operate.

At the same time, cost-of-living and cost of doing business challenges continue to shape the choices facing households and businesses. And expectations of government, business, not for profits, community organisations and regulators are also changing as the policy and economic environment becomes more complex.

Together, these forces are interacting in ways that create competing pressures and difficult trade-offs for leaders and institutions. In this context, certainty and consensus are often in short supply.

Our roles and responsibilities as leaders may look very different, but the questions we are all wrestling with are similar.

What is the ultimate objective we are here to serve? How can we make a meaningful contribution through the roles we hold? How do we know when to listen, when to decide, and when to act? And what legacy will we create through the teams and institutions that have been entrusted to us?

These questions go to the heart of what it means to lead - and, ultimately, to lead with conviction.

For me, conviction comes from knowing the purpose we are here to serve, grounding our judgement in evidence, holding ourselves accountable to the impact we are here to create, and taking responsibility for what we leave behind. In each of these I am always conscious of my particular responsibility as a woman leader.

Taken together, these principles - purpose, evidence, impact and stewardship - provide a basis for exercising judgement when the path ahead is difficult or uncertain.

And it is these four principles I will explore today.

Purpose: protecting the integrity of your mandate

I will start with purpose and its role in protecting the integrity of the mandate of the organisations we lead.

At the ACCC our mandate is to promote competition and fair trading, to protect consumers and to regulate national infrastructure for the benefit of all Australians.

The law at the heart of our work is now more than fifty years old. Much has changed over those five decades, and the law has evolved through successive amendments. But its fundamental purpose has endured: to enhance the welfare of Australians.

As the first woman to serve as Chair of the ACCC, I often return to the work of two women leaders Professor Maureen Brunt and Ruby Hutchson, whose ground breaking work set the foundations for competition and consumer protection law in our country.

Ruby Hutchison was a single mum with 7 children and a member of the parliament of Western Australia. In 1959 she was the founder of the Australian Consumers Association, now known as CHOICE. Ruby had a vision for an organisation that would better inform consumers and arm them with objective advice on the things that mattered for their families. The growth and success of the Association and the issues it raised, provided part of the groundswell for the consumer protection provisions in the Trade Practices Act 1975.

Professor Maureen Brunt was Australia's first woman to hold a professorial chair in economics. Her research in the decades before the Act identified the significant levels of anti-competitive conduct and restrictions on competition applying in Australian business, as a norm of business behaviour. This work provided important evidence for the need for the competition promotion provisions of the Act.

Both of these women worked and acted with courage, conviction and clarity of purpose.

Professor Brunt understood that competition law is ultimately about people. As she put it, regulators must "keep our eyes on the ultimate objective, namely the protection of the consumer by means of an efficient competitive process."

That is a useful discipline for an independent regulator operating in an environment of competing interests and expectations.

Governments have policy priorities. Businesses and investors have commercial interests. Consumers and the broader community have expectations of us.

All of these interests and expectations are legitimate, and our job is not to give any one of them automatic priority but to consider them through the purpose of our mandate.

Consumers expect affordable, reliable and high-quality goods and services. Businesses and investors need confidence that efficient investment will be recognised and rewarded. Governments look to markets and infrastructure to support broader economic and social objectives.

Good regulation takes all of this into account.

And that discipline - weighing competing interests and possible actions against a clear sense of purpose - is relevant for all leaders.

Leadership inevitably involves moments when the immediate pressure can obscure the longer-term responsibility. A difficult stakeholder relationship. A competing priority. A decision that may attract criticism. In those moments, it can be tempting to focus on managing the pressure in front of you rather than the responsibility you have been given.

Purpose helps us protect the integrity of a mandate - by helping us distinguish between the pressures that are ours to manage, and the responsibilities that are ours to uphold.

Evidence: when to consult and when to decide

Leading from conviction means being clear about the purpose we are pursuing and the principles that guide our judgement. But it also requires the discipline to keep testing that judgement against the evidence.

As a competition law adviser, I was fortunate to work on transactions that involved significant changes in markets and industries. I also worked with industry associations and governments on regulatory design and policy. I was always interested in understanding the broader impact of the decisions and changes I was advising on.

My experience on the boards of the Sydney Children's Hospitals Foundation and the Reserve Bank's Payments System Board reinforced that perspective. These experiences gave me an appreciation of the importance of effective engagement between private initiative, investment and public policy - whether in supporting public health or in shaping a payments system that balances efficiency, safety, innovation and competition.

Good leadership starts with listening, and good decisions benefit from a range of perspectives.

At the ACCC, our work often involves complex, interconnected challenges, playing out in rapidly changing markets. Good decision-making therefore requires us to remain open to new information and evidence.

That does not mean abandoning the purpose that guides our decisions. It means being prepared to test our ideas, challenge our assumptions and change our approach where the circumstances require it.

That is why consultation and engagement are so deeply embedded in the way we work.

We consult consumers, businesses, industry associations, community organisations, experts, governments and other regulators. We seek formal submissions through our Consultation Hub, conduct market studies and inquiries, and hold roundtables, workshops and consultation exchanges. We undertake surveys, interviews and focus groups.

We have standing relationships with consumer representatives through our Consumer Consultative Committee and with stakeholders across a range of sectors through our other consultative committees. We also work closely with international counterparts and participate in international regulatory networks, sharing experience and intelligence about markets and regulatory challenges that increasingly cross borders.

And we draw on the intelligence that comes through our everyday work - consumer reports, business reports, market monitoring, research, data and information from regulated entities and other sources.

But while consultation strengthens the evidence on which we base our judgement, we retain the responsibility to exercise it. As an independent regulator, we cannot outsource our decisions to the stakeholders we regulate or the people we serve. Nor can we allow the prospect of criticism to become a reason for inaction.

At the ACCC, we often need to make decisions where the issues are complex and the available evidence does not point to an easy answer. Our responsibility is to listen, assess the evidence, consider the different interests involved, at all times to apply the statutory test and purpose and then exercise our judgement.

All leaders will face difficult decisions where every available option carries a cost or trade off. And where the decision may not be universally welcomed.

Leading from conviction means being prepared to exercise judgement in those circumstances - informed by evidence, guided by purpose, and accepting responsibility for the decision that follows. It is critical to be frank and clear about the reasoning for the decision and that we as leaders are accountable for the decision and its consequences.

Impact: being accountable for your contribution

We are entrusted with authority, expertise and resources for a purpose. We have a responsibility to use theseto make a difference, and to be clear about where our efforts can have the greatest impact.

At the ACCC, we cannot pursue every matter that comes to our attention. We need to set priorities and focus our resources where harm is greatest and where our intervention can make a meaningful difference.

We also need to consider which tools are most appropriate to achieve the outcome we are seeking. That can mean taking enforcement action where we see conduct that breaches the law. It can mean investigating markets where we see evidence of systemic problems. It can mean making recommendations to government where our experience points to gaps in the regulatory framework. And it can mean speaking publicly about emerging risks and issues where doing so can improve understanding and behaviour.

In each case, the question is the same: what impact can we make with the responsibility that has been given to us?

I think this is a critical question for leaders and for us today as women leaders.

We all have limited time and resources. We need to make choices about where we can make the greatest contribution.

When I began practising as a competition lawyer more than 35 years ago, I was often one of very few women in the room, and frequently the only woman.

Competition law was also a relatively new field in Australia. Compared with more established areas such as corporate finance, banking and large-scale mergers and acquisitions, it had not yet developed the same entrenched hierarchies and pathways.

In some ways, that created space. People who did not necessarily see themselves reflected in those more established fields could build expertise and leadership in a field that was still defining itself.

That was certainly part of my experience. And early in my career, I made a commitment to myself: if I was in the room, I would contribute on the issues I believed mattered.

When we are given an opportunity to contribute - whether through our position, our expertise or our experience - we should take that opportunity seriously.

I have carried that principle throughout my career. Whatever the setting - an internal meeting, a boardroom, a community organisation or a not-for-profit - we should understand why we are there, what we bring to the discussion and where our contribution can make a difference.

Sometimes it means asking a question that has not been asked, challenging an assumption, raising a risk or offering a perspective that is not otherwise represented. And sometimes it means saying something that is difficult for the room to hear.

This is particularly important for people who bring diverse perspectives that might otherwise be missing.

Much has changed since I started my career. But many people - particularly women and people from diverse backgrounds - still find themselves in environments where they feel new, uncertain or different.

My own experience of that reinforced a belief I still hold: that diversity makes organisations both fairer and more effective.

Different perspectives can change the quality of a decision. They allow us to see risks, consequences, possibilities and opportunities that might otherwise be missed, and they make debate more robust and decisions more informed.

I have also tried to apply this principle to my own leadership in a number of respects. First, I know that I am not in my position as a token appointment, I am there to express and bring the benefit of my diversity. To think and lead differently. Secondly It is very important to listen to and engage closely across the breadth of your team, to meet with your women and employees of diverse backgrounds and hear their perspectives, their challenges and their aspirations. Third I have learnt that your people will value if you are honest about the challenges you have faced, the mistakes you have made and the lessons you have learnt. Sharing your own vulnerability and how you have managed pressures and stresses, builds stronger connections and more resilient teams.

Through the ACCC's reverse mentoring program, I have had the privilege of being mentored by by a key member of our First Nations employee network and have worked closely with a number of our First Nations people.

These relationships have challenged and developed my understanding of the continuing impacts of First Nations dispossession and the importance of remaining deeply engaged with culture, family and community.

It has also reminded me that leading from conviction means having the confidence to contribute your perspective and the humility to listen to perspectives that may challenge or expand your point of view.

Stewardship: taking responsibility for what you leave behind

I will now return to the idea of stewardship.

Every leader is entrusted, for a time, with something larger than themselves - a team, an organisation, a purpose or a mandate.

We are beneficiaries of the work of those who came before us. And, for a time, we become responsible for what comes next.

The decisions we make today can shape the organisations, systems and relationships that others will rely on in the future.

Some of the work involved in strengthening an institution takes time to deliver results. Building capability, developing people, improving systems, strengthening relationships and adapting to new technologies are all investments in the future - and their full value may not be realised during the tenure of those making them. But that is part of stewardship.

At the ACCC, we are making these investments now, through our 2026-29 Strategy.

We are modernising our ICT infrastructure and building our capability in technology, AI and data, including secure environments in which we can test and responsibly use new applications. We are strengthening our relationships with domestic and international regulators, government stakeholders and advocacy organisations - because increasingly, the issues we deal with cross institutional and national boundaries, and our ability to share intelligence, learn from others and contribute to regulatory cooperation is an important part of our effectiveness. And we are continuing to develop the skills and knowledge we need to respond to changing markets and emerging issues in uncertain and highly volatile times.

Stewardship means keeping the longer view in mind. It means recognising that the consequences of our decisions extend beyond our time. That some of the most important things we do may not be about responding to an immediate pressure or producing an immediate result, but keeping true to principles, to maintaining the conditions for opportunity, initiative and innovation for current and future generations, including for the most vulnerable members of our community.

We cannot know exactly what challenges the next leader, the next team or the next generation will face. But we can decide what we leave them: the strength of the organisation, the clarity of its purpose, and the capacity to meet what comes next.

Conclusion

I started this morning by naming four key themes - purpose, evidence, impact and stewardship - that provide a foundation for testing our judgement as women leaders. Does the decision serve the purpose we are accountable to? Is it grounded in evidence? Are we focusing our effort where it can make a meaningful difference? And are we strengthening the organisation and the people who will carry the responsibility forward?

Those questions will not always produce an easy answer. They can, however, give us a basis for leading with conviction when the path ahead is difficult or uncertain.

None of us can control the circumstances we lead in or guarantee that our decisions will be welcomed. What we can control is whether we forge our paths with courage and with conviction.

Thank you.