Colleen Callander
PROFILE
Colleen Callander is an award-winning CEO and an inspiration to women of all generations. She encourages women globally to have the confidence to believe in themselves, their ability, share their voice and break through glass ceilings.
Colleen empowers women to step up, take action and become the leaders they always wanted to be in business and in life.
Colleen also encourages organisations and leaders, both men and women to strive for a new era of leadership: one where we lead with kindness, trust, self-awareness, authenticity, and one that puts people at the heart of everything they do, and one that embraces more women at the helm. She is passionate about creating a world where people feel more confident to live each day with clarity and purpose and where organisations thrive through the way they lead.
As the former CEO for 13 years of two of Australia’s iconic fashion brands Sportsgirl, Colleen led with purpose, stayed true to her values, and created a culture that allowed people to thrive and shine. Colleen is a highly respected influential leader with a wealth of knowledge and a proven track record in building brands and is now sharing not only the past 13 years’ experience as a CEO but also the past 30 years of her fashion retail career and leadership knowledge.
In May 2021, Colleen launched her book ‘LEADER BY DESIGN’ which encourages women to live with purpose, change the leadership rules, find their superpower, and embrace the importance of self-care. She shares her thoughts on ‘life in balance’, her comeback from burnout and the power of building real confidence. Each chapter shares thought-provoking insights and advice to inspire all generations to live a life of passion and purpose, reach their full potential and create the life they deserve.
‘LEADER BY DESIGN’ has been met with rave reviews and immense success, including being nominated as a finalist in the 2021 Australian Business Book Awards. Most recently, Colleen has been listed as one of the ‘Top 10 Influential Business Leaders Making a Difference by World’s Leaders’ and in 2014 was awarded the Highly Commended CEO of the Year Award – The CEO Magazine.
Colleen is also an opinion columnist for the CEO WORLD Magazine.
Colleen is a highly sought after Keynote Speaker and thought leader and is no stranger to the media having appeared on Sky News, The CEO Institute, Ticker NEWS and has been interviewed by the likes of The Weekend Australian, Money Magazine, The Australian, Business Women Media, GT Magazine, Women On Topp and Thrive Global to name a few.
Beyond her amazing career, the most important thing to Colleen is family. Colleen’s sees her most important and influential role in life as wife to Nick and mother of three beautiful humans: Jake, Trent, and Macey.
SPEAKING TOPICS
Leader By Design
Leadership is something that I am extremely passionate about… not only my leadership but the leadership of those around me.
When I talk about leadership, I’m talking about leading not only in business, but also leading in our own lives whether that be in your community, school, workplace or even your home. Leadership starts with self…we need to be leading in our own lives before we can lead anyone else.
When I get asked about leadership, I always start with what leadership is not – title it’s not about a title, power, level of authority, size of your office, carpark, the number of direct reports you have or the size of your salary. We often look up to and admire people with titles, rank and positions of power, labeling them leaders.
What I learnt over time in both life and business is that these trappings do not automatically qualify a person for leadership. And in fact, you don’t even need a title to be a leader. Every day we have the ability to lead through every action, interaction, reaction and decision we make in business and in life.
We all have the ability to become a ‘Leader By Design’, we all have the ability to become the leader we always wanted to be, and the leader we always wanted to follow.
Change Your Story - Change Your Life!
One of the biggest challenges women face today is a lack of confidence. Lack of confidence is the reason we stay in a jobs we don’t like or stay in toxic relationships or the reason we don’t ask for that promotion or pay rise.
We need to start building real confidence so that we put our hand up for that promotion, walk into a boardroom and kill it with confidence and have a voice.
There are so many things we can do to build real confidence – one of them is to change that negative self talk. When you…Change your story – change your life!
We have this inner voice inside our head that is highly judgemental and says things to us like: I’m not good enough, I’m going to fail, I’m under prepared, I don’t fit in, I’m too young, I’m too old.
These stories can leave us feeling stuck, deflated and sometimes even sabotage our success.
We need to interrupt this story from self sabotage and start taking control and create a more empowering story that helps us feel confident to take action.
All Roads Lead to Confidence
The Power of Self
Burnout Breakthrough
