Hello.
My name's Santasha Nabananga Bamblet. I'm a proud yor the
Order Kerni Whoalbury and a waddery woman. And before we get started on She's on the Money podcast, I would like to acknowledge the traditional custodians of the land of which this podcast is recorded on a wondery country, acknowledging the elders, the ancestors and the next generation coming through as this podcast is about connecting, empowering, knowledge sharing and the storytelling of you to make a difference for today and lasting impact for tomorrow.
Let's get into it.
She's on the Money, She's on the Money.
Hello, and welcome to She's on the Money, the podcast for millennials who want financial freedom. My name is beck Syed and with me is Victoria Devine. Happy nato Q Weekfidi, Oh thank you.
I am very excited about this Happy naydoc Queak nato Week celebrates and recognizes the history, culture, and achievements of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples and we thought it was a wonderful opportunity to welcome back friends of the show and two very special women, the two directors of evolved Communities. Auntie Manya Andrews and Carla Rodgers friends, welcome back.
Great to be here, so gad to see you.
Thank you. We love the show. We're number one fans.
Oh you suer cute.
We are also so excited to have you guys back, because today we're going to be chatting about the challenges faced by black businesses in Australia, how we can actually show up as our lives, and how businesses can be more inclusive and honestly so much more. But to start off, guys, what does this year's NADOC theme, keep the Fire Burning Black, Loud and Proud mean to you?
Keep the fires burning It's about keeping the spirit alive, spirit of country, spirit of ancestors, and spirit of culture. Keep that burning because that's what guards us through life. And long as the fires are maintained, then we're maintained and sustained. So for me, on that very larger level, what about you color, Yeah, So.
A non indigenous ally, it's very much keeping the fire alive in the belly of supporting First Nations people and also the fire alive of us as non Indigenous Austrains learning from First Nations wisdom learning from the oldest continuous
culture in the world. There's so many ways that we can grow and heal as a country if we were to open our hearts and minds to First Nations people and their wisdom and always I have found First Nations people so generous and receptive and opening up their hands inviting us to come in on that journey with them.
That's really really beautifully said. Now, evolved communities exist to build awareness of Aboriginal terres Strait islander culture and encourage reconciliation and allyship. I can see literally that you guys have such a nice and close connection and comfort between you both. How did you come to the place of creating this organization and how did you to meet?
Always a story and I'm not a quick storytellerself, I'm trying to I actually found it evolved in two thousand and five. I was lucky to get this thing called a Churchill Fellowship, which enables you to go overseas and study something. We've exhausted all your study options in Australia.
So I was looking at the involvement of First Nations people in looking after country and when I came back, I was working in protected area management, and I was getting a little bit frustrated at the pace of change in government. So I started evolved to do this work. Fast forward about five or six years and we had a very large project up in the Gulf of Carpenteria, working in remote Aboriginal communities, helping them come up with their own solutions to some pretty tricky, hard yarns. We
call them things like suicide and alcohol and violence. And so I was a non indigenous person leading a team of Indigenous people and we needed a leader for that team and who should be recommended but Anti Monia, Yes.
And then so I came on board and really then Color and I got chatting about lots of things, but we discovered we had a similar vision, and that's to create a kind of more inclusive Australia. And so we got talking about things and realized we wanted to be out there educating people. So we decided to combine our skills where we've developed this business and allyship programs in particular.
Yeah, so this is a pretty lofty vision. You know, it sounds very nice, a kind of more inclusive Australia, but it was very much well, how do we do that? And that's when we thought, well, it's non indigenous people like me. Let's turn the lens on people like myself, the ninety seven percent of the population in Australia, and what is it. What do we need to know? What skills do we need to have, What understandings do we
need to have to be confident allies? And also to realize how much we have to learn and grow from this invitation. And that's when we developed what we call the Seven Steps to Practical Reconciliation, which underpins all our programs. It was actually sitting on a dock. I can remember where we were. We were sitting on.
A wharf and all the kids you jumping off them, yeah, and everything.
Yeah, and beautiful blue water and the genesis. I guess of a lot of these thoughts and frameworks and program.
So not in a fancy boardroom, in a dock or on a dock. I should say, that's much cooler than the way that we come up with ideas.
Back.
Oh, I think we do play that song in the background.
Yeah, I feel like it sounds good, but I want to know more because I feel like something that I have been really passionate about since having you on the show a couple of years ago. It's just getting more people across what you guys do, and I feel like you are popping up more and more, Like Auntie Manya see you on TikTok all the time.
It's one of my favorite things ever. I feel like you.
Are one of the warmest souls, like you answer questions so beautifully and it just feels, honestly like a little wholesome corner of the Internet.
It's my favorite.
But I want to know a bit more about the I guess idea that is so central to what evolved do allyship for all of us? How are we working towards that and achieving that? And you know, what can we do as that she's on the money community to more actively work towards that.
Yeah, really beautiful question. And just you having us on the show today and everyone in your community that we're reaching out to now, this is an act of ollyship. So you're doing it right now. Anyone listening is doing it right now. And what we emphasize that Evolve is that the first step in our yship is self education.
But it doesn't have to be complex things. It can be things you can incorporate into your every day finding out more about who the traditional owners are where you live, or people might be familiar with the cultural protocol and acknowledgment of country, and some people often aren't familiar with that protocol and may not know the difference, for example, between a welcome to country and acknowledgment of country. It's
such an important protocol. Welcome can only be done by a traditional owner from their land on which you're meeting or speaking. An acknowledgment can be done by anybody. So it's just such a practical step that we can all take. And when we're teaching people about how to acknowledge country authentically, we take you through a meditation where you put yourself in a place that you really feel connected to country.
So even if you want to think about that now, you know, is it at the beach, is it out on the lawn? You know, could be anywhere, and then going to that place and then we take you through a visualization of how do you feel in that place and what makes it special for you? And hear the wind and what are the sounds you hear around you, and then just leaning into that feeling of gratitude because we all have a deep connection to country and for
first nations, people, countries, family. So that's why a lot of our best ideas probably do come when we're out in country. And what we would encourage your listeners to do after listening to this podcast when you can is go outside and you know, if you can go into a lawn or somewhere and take your shoes off and think that where you're standing right now, for tens of thousands of years people have walked before you, and think of those footprints and the footprints of the people that
are coming. And then take that sense into when you're acknowledging country. You don't have to wait for a formal meeting to acknowledge country. How a go when you go for your walk today, and I'll even put that to both of you after the podcast. If you go for a walk, or if you're looking at your beautiful new baby, you know, have a think about, well, who the traditional owners are and why do you feel grateful for living
on this country and expressing that gratitude. So this is what we emphasize is that allyship is those sort of acts that feel genuine to you. It's about acknowledging the wisdom and feeling deeply grateful for what we all share here now, living on this country in Australia, anti money, What would you add to that?
Oh? Yeah, No. The other thing is that I think people may not know is that by acknowledging our ancestors, it's also about blessing you or getting protection. Australia is such a large country. It's easy to get lost, but if you acknowledge the ancestors, they'll guide you and will prevent you from being lost. And so it's about protecting yourself as well, so you get benefits from that as well.
You know, you might be about to step on a dangerous snake, for instance, but if you've acknowledged their ancestors, they'll look after you.
I adore that so much.
I think so many times when people are first introduced to this concept of allyship, you could draw the assumption that allyship is really about doing something for others and
it is. You forget about how much you get out of it personally, like acknowledgment to country and just being able to connect, Like who doesn't love the feeling of sands between their toes, or you know, fresh cut grass under their feet, or just feeling like you got out of the office today into the beautiful fresh air, Like I feel like it gives you such a deeper sense of connection that ultimately impacts your mental health, it impacts your physical health, like you become a better, more rounded
human by connecting in with this. It's like we talk about gratitude and how important gratitude is in everyday life, but by extending it and understanding where that comes from, you just have this deeper understanding of the world. You have a deeper connection with gratitude, but also a deeper connection with gratefulness.
Like I just feel so grateful to be.
Walking on the land that you know, people have looked after for years and years and years before me, like hundreds of millions of years before me, this land was walked by other people, And isn't it beautiful to not only acknowledge that, but really think about their journeys and how they're now guiding us, and that they're decisions really paved the way for us and what we're able to achieve today.
I don't know, I just.
Feel like it's selfish, but I get so much out of allyship and that's not why we do it.
But I adore it.
I completely agree, And you know, it's about acknowledging our ancestors, the ones who went before us, and they're not just my ancestors, they're your ancestors as well, because you live in this country and they're the ones who came before you, And so it's getting in touch with them so that they're walking beside us at all times.
And they walked so we could continue walking. And I think that that's why it's so important to acknowledge and just you know, really deeply connect with that, not just because it's important, but because it becomes intrinsic in who we are. And if we don't understand who we are or where we've come from, how do we understand where we're going and actually have a good, beautiful, big impact.
Like I'm just obviously passionate about this, not nearly as wildly passionate as you guys, which is why I was like, please get them on the show.
There's so much better at this.
They just kill it every single time I want to talk about I guess, what do we need to know when it comes to being really effective and competent allies? Beyond what we've been discussing, where do we begin that journey if we've never done it before?
How do we start?
And I know color you said before, like get outstanding the grass, Like what are some practical tips that I could bring to either my friendship circle or my workplace or you know, my home and family. That means that I can become an allay if it's not something that I have considered or really valued before today.
The first step is always self education. And it's interesting what you say about self reflection and learning more about yourself. All of our programs are very experiential and immersive and they're really about self reflection. It's like anything I guess you know that adage that you teach what you most need to know. Yes, I'm here because obviously what I most need to know in life is how to be an ally. So how do I do that is teach others. Big part of that teaching is sharing the many mistakes
I've made over five decades as an ally. So where do you start is self learning? And for example, we've got loads of resources. We've got a big bold obsession to have ten million more or half of Australia as allies, so obviously we need lots of touch points for that. So that's why we've got things like ask anti ask an ally and all sorts of resources on the internet, and we actually have this framework of seven steps and we can touch on what each of those are.
But where you.
Start is self education. There's so many ways you can do that. There's watching programs on TV, there's so much indigenous content now on mainstream media, reading books, but listening to people's stories. So probably where do you start? If we had to put it in one word, it would be listen.
I really like that. Start with your and start with listening, start with wanting to educate yourself, and start with yet just becoming open and exposing yourself to different stories, different experiences, different things like that. I think it's a really beautiful way to start, and it's really really beautifully worded. I think we should go to a really quick break.
Yeah, because on the flip side, we're going to be talking about Evolve and how they've been involved with some of Australia's biggest companies, but also how we as individuals and how businesses can develop and attract and really champion and indigenous talents. So guys don't go anywhere.
Welcome back everyone, and today we have Karl and Auntie Manya joining us. I just wanted to jump into Evolve. So Evolve has been used by Australia's biggest companies, Adobe, IBM, All Words, and the actual government and the literalmental Government, just to name a few, to help understand Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander culture and protocols, build allies and create
more inclusive businesses through their programs. Guys, what are some of the biggest challenges you think businesses face when looking to be more inclusive?
Think about inclusivity to do it properly, I guess it's the DNA of a business. It's who you are as a business, so it's your whole culture. The thing that's less scary is we talk a lot about what we have to learn from First Nations wisdom. Now, if there's anything that we can learn from First Nations people, it's about inclusion and belonging. They've been doing it for tens of thousands of years. One of our seven steps is about Aboriginal kinship and we do an exercise where everyone
is given a skin name. So Auntie mind, you just want to explain what skin is.
So right, across Australia, all of the nations were divided into kinship groups. The term we use in Northern Australia is skin ski n There are its equivalents in the southern areas. For instance, in New South Wales the term used to be meat meat, so when people met up with each other they would ask what's your meat, meaning what's your skin, So people would say, oh, it's possum
or kangaroo or koala. So that everybody's divided into skin groups, and each skin group, well, we're all related to each other, but has a particular relationship with another group in that society. It's a bit like having star signs. I suppose that there are some star signs that are compatible with others. Skin groups determine who you can marry, for instance, and so forth, and sets out particular obligations to each other right across the country. Now, how many skin groups there were,
different according to the nations. The one that we teach in our Googoes system has eight skin groups, some have four, six, eight, sixteen, thirty two and so forth, sixty four or one of the highest groups in the Northern territory. So that's what skin is.
In this exercise, everyone's given the skin name. We explain all the different relationships. It turns into a lot of fun when people have got to run around and find all their elos and we explain the different connections, so we actually use strings, so there's this beautiful web of connections. And then when we talk about the impact of colonization, we literally go through and save those connections with scissors, and it's just like there's gaps in the room, like
the grief and the disconnection is palpable. Then after going through this whole activity and explaining the extended Aboriginal families how inclusive they are, we ask people to think, you know, what are their insights from this activity, And the main insults are that you know, everyone's connected, you feel valued, you belong, you have a role, you're clear on your role, and there's this beautiful web of care in this kinship system.
And then we're like, okay, that's fantastic. So how you're going to apply that to your own self and your own leadership and the culture in the workplace. So circling back to your original question, well, what's one of the main challenges I think is that as organizations we don't
see how holistic this question of inclusivity is. But we have this amazing belief system, this amazing reality that's been successful for tens of thousands of years about belonging an inclusion It's not just a pahr buzzword in this system. There's a model there for us to learn from. Now, what stands out from that model for me, it's human needs that we all share. If this need to feel that you belong in the workplaces, you need to be
able to express yourself in the workplace. So in that sense, the needs of creating an inclusive workplace are common, They're not that complex. So I think the biggest challenge is seeing that it's holy sting, that it's about your whole organizational culture and it's not something that can be just achieved with one training program tick a box.
I was going to say that I feel like so many times inclusion programs are just.
Tick box exercises.
They fill a couoia, they have a number, and they meet it and they go great, no worries. You know, we have hired the right amount of Indigenous Australians and you just go, do you realize how much they.
Have to offer?
Do you realize like the beauty that they bring to your culture, to your environment? And you're not taking advantage of that, like you're not making the most of this situation, like it is a privilege.
And I think that.
Often it is that tick box exercise, tod it's really sad and it shouldn't be And you're so right, Karlor. It goes beyond that, like we're not making the most of a pre existing format and a pre existing framework of diversity and inclusion and working together and how to exist harm and I just think that's wild that we're not doing that. You can see how confronting it would be for big organizations who basically have no culture and don't do those things.
It's a big change.
So we're talking about transformation some of our clients and one of those, for example, is a you know, not for profit we've worked with for eight years now. They do put all of this team through our programs and it's very evidence based. They've seen major shifts in the organization.
There's two big things here we're talking about. One goes back to our vision at Evolve, and that's a kind of more inclusive Australia that celebrates and learns from First Nations wisdom and people's So there's a real emphasis on that we don't come from a deficit approach. We come from a strength based approach. Like what is it? And it's so true, Victoria. Like, we ran a program six years ago and it was called Bull by the Horns, was about leadership and what we as leaders can learn
from indigenous wisdom. When we first were promoting that program, we had so many people come to us and say, oh, fantastic, I've got Aboriginal manager. I really want to put them through this program.
And we're like, wait, what, No, you are point baby, it's you that needs to go through the programs.
That's the reality. You know, ninety seven percent of our population is non indigenous, and that's the narrative. You know, we've got something that superior First Nations people. That's their reality that they're always expected to step in and walk in our world. The other piece that's really important to all of this is all of our programs we celebrate First Nations wisdom and culture and we focus on that.
But you're learning skills. These skills are generic to all humans and to creating an inclusive workplace, no matter which cultures we're talking about, their generic skills.
I guess I couldn't agree more I feel like so many people just miss the point, even though the point is right there in front of them. I want to know, now, how can businesses actually attract, develop, and champion indigenous talent. I feel like you were saying something really good before, Carlor. You said so many times indigenous people are expected to step into our way of living and our way of working,
when that shouldn't be the expectation. So how can we attract talent that not only adds so much to our culture and so much to our business, but how can we make our environment a place that they want to be.
We've just literally finished writing a program on this, haven't we Antima, which we're filming at the moment. So our first program is called the Seven Steps to Practical Reconciliation. The second program is Practical Allyship at Work. We're specifically addressing that question. Yes, the first answer is about creating cultural safety in the workplace, and it's doing all those things that we just talked about, and again really encouraging people not to come at this from a deficit approach.
I've got to do this, but just celebrating in how much we can grow as businesses as a country. You know, when we get all these benefits of learning from First Nations people and wisdom. So the first thing is looking at, well, what is the culture of our company? How inclusive and safe is it for a First Nations person to come and work here. We find that the retention rates can be so low for First Nations people because those foundations
aren't in place. The workplace is very culturally unsafe. So that's the first place to start if you're really serious about this, is to looking at doing an audit of existing cultural safety. Now that organization that I refer to before our longest partner, they actually came to us evolved to help them do exactly this attract and retain traineeships.
Now that was like eight years ago. What we ended up doing with them was the first six years was focused on building cultural safety and competency in the organization because they realized that their trainee ships were failing because there just wasn't that level of cultural safety in the workplace.
And that's hard for them.
And I'm not saying that's hard in terms of, oh, they've got to do some work. That would be a hard realization to come to that you are not a safe space right now. That would be challenging, but the idea that they've stuck to it and said, no, we're going to continue this. We're going to get you guys in. We are changing. That's big, that's impressive.
It's massive, and they've just been so genuine about it. We've mentioned cultural change, but on an individual level, we're talking about behavioral change. And that's why everything that we do is called practical reconciliation, practical ourship because Auntie and I we are very practical. So anything you do with us at Evolve will focus on the practical outcomes. What are the behaviors that we need to change, What are
the practical things that we can do. You know, anything that you do with us is experiential, so it's a journey of growth. So like we've got lots of case studies of organizations doing this, there's some organizations that we choose not to work with because we can see that it is a ticker box exercise.
Oh God.
Where we start with the normally is we've only got three values at Evolve. One is kindness and kindredness, and another one is we are living our liies. And what that means is that we walk our talk. And that's what we ask of organizations, so we usually ask for senior leaders the executive to go through our programs first.
Yeah, yeah, as it should. Yeah, completely agree. I just want to know, through your work in community, do you have a sense of the challenges faced by black owned businesses in a Tralia.
I mean, we're majority Indigenous owned and our staff small team, but it's half half half. So I think stereotypes is probably the number one challenge.
There are incredible Indigenous businesses out there, quite diverse and doing amazing things like high complex IT stuff, delivering all sorts of things, and I think there's still a perception.
That Indigenous businesses only do Indigenous things, right it it's brilliant to support allyship, to support reconciliation, it's brillant to buy black and by presence from Indigenous businesses. That's only a small thing. Now, if you in your business need to get your air conditioning done in the building, or you need the building painted, have a look and see
if there's an Indigenous business doing that. There's a lot of Indigenous businesses in this service industry, in the construction industry, facility management, so not just in cultural related things. Yeah, so I'd say that's one big challenge Anti money, yeah, absolutely, and supply Nation. It's the organization to go to to find out what businesses are available. They have a list
of providers that they can supply to you. Some of the states have indigenous Chambers of Commerce, so for instance, we're a member of the New South Wales in Bridge, an organization Chamber of Commerce and they've been absolutely very
helpful to us as well. We were very excited this year for Evolved when the National Telstra Best Business Award for Building Community we were finalists in two categories, Building Communities and Indigenous Excellence Excellence and we were just so thrilled to win Building Communities because it's like.
That's what we're about.
Yes, they got us the winner last year. So in the Indigenous Excellence category is a business in Western Australia that specializes in geographic information systems, so just like you know, putting it out there that it's different things and they went on to win. There's the winner of the winners nationally.
So for this year, I.
Think there was over twenty thousand entrants and it's small and medium businesses, so medium businesses can have over one hundred million dollar turnover I can tell you Evolve is not.
Doing Oh again, no, she's on the money isn't either.
We're on the WAM and they one that being open to Indigenous businesses doing a whole range of things and maybe having a look at what's available in indigenous businesses first when you're buying something.
And you mentioned before Andy Vanya supply Nation, So I want to just flag that now, put that in the show notes. That is a resource that we are able to go to to find indigenous essentially workers across the board. So if we need someone to do some work, we can go there, check first, and then go outside of that. And I think that that's actually really helpful because a lot of the time we'll say things like oh yeah, look for this first, but let's be honest. Sometimes we're like, well,
I don't know where to look. And I mentioned just google Indigenous painter, Indigenous you know builder. And I think that having these resources means that we can actually go all right, well, I know that I can go there and find the right resource, And I think that that's really practical and helpful. How else can we as consumers show up for black businesses?
So buying black, we put out resources at Evolve each you and we'll share with you, you know, the places to go to find out certified Indigenous businesses. On social media too, there's a lot of groups popping up that I find quite useful, and you can join those as an ally, Like there's one on Facebook that I'm part of now and it's for Indigenous businesses to promote what they're doing. The idea of that is that non Indigenous people like
myself can join that and be across. And this is fairly informal, so it's for new businesses that might not have gone through all the formal steps yet, but all sorts of things. I think just start with some practical things. I think, well, okay, you know there's ten birthdays I buy for. I'm going to have a girl at two
of those, buying something from an Indigenous business. Start where it's a bit easier, Like when I've said that Indigenous businesses do all sorts of things, maybe you might want to start at some of the things that are a bit simpler, like obvious things like gifts. A lot of people told us Anti Manya's children's.
Book, Oh I was telling you that off air like Seasons is one of my favorite books. I know my son is only ten weeks old at this point in time, and yeah, so like he hasn't fully engaged.
But it's one of my favorite books to read him.
And you know, if it's my favorite, it's going to have to become his favorite. But that is a beautiful resource that you can give to children. And I feel like kids they connect even deeper than we can as adults who you know, are trying to reconnect like kids automatically get it. It's crazy how intelligent and smart and respectful they are from the get go. I feel like a lot of things that they learn and that they express as adults are learned behaviors, and that's really sad.
So I think start from when they're tiny and go from there.
Completely agree exactly.
So a lot of people did buy that book for Christmas as well this year.
Genius.
I had yours on pre order for ages Auntie Manya, and then when it arrived, I was shocked.
I was like, oh my gosh, it's here finally.
The practical thing people can do whenever they buy from an indigenous business is to share that we loved when we saw people with photos. For example, with Auntie Manya's book, and they put it on social media. What's been really lovely now is we're getting a lot of preschools. They're doing whole projects based on this book. But if you were to buy something wearable or even sheets, lately, I've
been buying all my linen in the indigenous designs. But take a photo of that, share it if you're on social media, share on social media, or if you really liked it, share it with your friends. Hey, I bought this, and you know you might want to think about something like this, So let's get the message out there. That's a really practical way everyone can support indigenous businesses. I think that what you do after you've bought it is probably as important as it's the act of buying it.
Yes, no, I agree.
I actually I think that's funny that you say sheets color because I recently had a baby. Not to keep bringing that up, but Harvey was born. And when you have a baby in Victoria, and I'm sure it's the same in every other state, they have some type of like baby bonus, And so for your first baby, they send you home with a baby bag and I'll send
you a picture. But inside the baby bag was this beautiful like Muslim rap for Harvey and like everyone gets the same one, and it's got the most beautiful indigenous print on there of like kangaroos and little footsteps, and I am obsessed with it.
It's like my favorite wrap.
And the second I got it, I was like, Ani Manya would love this, Like this is perfect and it's just these beautiful colors and you know when you just go, I wish this was something that if I had walked into like pure Baby, it was just on the shelves for me to purchase because it's just so nice to go. This feels connected. But also, let's be honest, the artwork is stunning. Why aren't we buying more of it?
Yeah?
I completely agree.
Yeah, actually you'll have a field day with little Harvey.
Now.
There's so many beautiful products for babies.
Now, just shifting kys a little bit. I want to know how have things changed for Evolve after last year's referendum.
Oh, big question? Next going hard.
We're talking about baby blankets and you're like, yes, but I want to know about them.
Let's schedule the nitty gritty.
Yeah, the referendum was huge. I think we did like fifty online yarning webinars to different organizations about it at the time and public it was devastating the result. And so what we didn't evolve is we allowed people space for grieving. You know, everyone grieves differently. Yeah, and I know many Indigenous organizations chose to have a period of grieving or sorry business at evolved. We decided to go straight to action because that's how we processed it well.
We particularly didn't want to lose sight of the fact that how many people can vote.
Over six million people voted voltag.
Yes, and to not lose sight of that, like that was goodwill.
That's special. It's not enough, but that is special.
Yeah, And we thought that's really significant and we don't want to lose that. And so we came out with a pledge soon after the Allied Pledge asking people to take the pledge to continue to show up for First Nations Peoples over three people pledge.
So we will definitely provide the link for that pledge.
Oh yes, please, We'll put it in the show notes. And I think that that is really really important knowing our community, maybe we could double that three thousand.
Yeah, absolutely, And so in terms of the demand and how it's affected things, it's increased demand, if anything, so it's highlighted the importance of this conversation to continue and the role of allies. It's even further galvanized our allied community. Yes, that's why we didn't want to stop, because we knew people were going to come to us and say where did we go and what's next? We don't want to
stop here. So it's actually, in an odd way, I don't think the desire, the fuel, the momentum for change has been stopped. If anything, it's probably increased.
That's really good to hear, actually, because it really was devastating. It just kind of made you realize like you're kind of living in your own little bubble. Sometimes you're like, oh, everyone around me is an ally, everyone around me supports yes, and how many realize it's not the case is really devastating.
Yeah, I found that very confronting. As somebody who you know was the hardest of yes is. I just assumed everybody else was too, because like the people that I surround myself with were unequivocally yes as well, and so it was kind of like, well, obviously it's going to
be yes. Like you know, Beck and I would talk about it I talk about with our producers, I talk about with my friends and my family, and not one person even expressed that no was even an option, And so I think when it came back negatively, I was just like, Wow, I am so privileged to live in a.
Bubble that is a yes bubble, but there are.
Still so many people who don't understand, so many people who don't have that privilege, and there's clearly so much work to do that it made me really think about how much we need to step up as allies and stop speaking just to our bubbles and start speaking outside of that and start going wow, like, you know, just because it's not a problem that I see every day because I'm not experiencing it, and you know, the Indigenous friends that I have, you know, one of one, like,
it's not something that we discussed because we're all just like, well, we're on same page, right, Like, how do we expand that outside of the conversations that we're having. And I guess that's why it's so important that you know, Beck and I use She's on the money as a voice for hopeful change and as a voice to educate us, because the more of us that talk about it the more change that can be facilitated. And sadly, it doesn't matter how much money is thrown at something like this.
You can't just put money in people's mouths and hope that they're going to change their mindset. There's so much of a shift that needs to happen that's mental, and so much of a shift that needs to happen that's about inclusivity. It's not actually just about you know, buying black and that's supportive, but it's not just that.
And I think it's reinforced by this year's message for Reconciliation Week. It's now more than ever we need your support and you know, given the results of a referendum and moving forward, we would.
Never be negative about people that voted no at evolved. We have a really simple three step approach to allyship, reflect, you know, identify what's the heart of the issue, relate, put yourself in the other person's shoes, and reconcile, find a way forward together. Everything in life is a mutual
learning opportunity. For example, if someone said something to me that I thought was racist, I would never do anything to suggest or even think that I know better or to make that person feel strong or shame, blame or guilt. It's a mutual learning opportunity if the other person's open to it. Yes, this is a growth point for the country.
So we certainly need to have those conversations. We need to understand why people voted no, and continue to have those conversations, exploring each other's different experiences and perspectives without making one right or wrong. I wasn't in a bubble. I kept putting up signs and they kept getting vandalone.
That's disgusting, honestly, Like it's not even just disappointed, it's actually disgusting, Like it's such a lack of understanding, the compassion.
And empathy and all these things like why would you do that?
And irrespective of what was on your sign, like, let people have their opinions, let people have their voice.
They deserve that.
It doesn't matter if you put a sign up that said my favorite color is pink, and then I'm jumping up and down and being like, but I like green, Like you can have your choice.
But it's all about education, right it is.
So in that case, I did apply the three hours. I did write a piece offering to meet this person. I'd love to meet you I'd love to buy you some nose signs.
You can have your little opinion. Absolutely that makes you a bigger person than me.
Color I don't know about that. Then someone commented, which I didn't know what it meant to virtue signaling, No, which I discovered means that you're just doing something to make yourself look good. And that's another big conversation we have around work. But you know, calling something work or someone virtue signaling, they're just ways of shutting down a conversation.
Yes, yes, you.
Know, I would have loved to have talked more about how was I virtue signaling? Let me understand that.
And also I think that usually virtue signaling is when you say, for example, you're not actually an ally and you're not actually wanting to vote yes, but you just say you are to look good.
This is kind of different, like a misdirected comment. Yeah, this is absolutely no way someone like you was true Signalingly.
You're actively putting yourself in a very uncomfortable spot. You're probably quite vulnerable and going to have your feelings talking to someone who is seemingly aggressively against everything that you stand for. And so I think that's really beautiful what you're doing. I think that's a really amazing way to go about it. So virtue signaling, I absolutely not.
We'll be like, no, that's not not happened, no sit down. I think it's a lack of education on their part. Even using the term virtue signaling to somebody like you, you'd be like, do you realize what that means? I don't think you've directed this in the right way completely.
It was a mutual learning opportunity. Like I said, I didn't actually know what that meant.
You're too kind.
You accepted it and said wow, okay, well I will take that on board, and sometimes you have to say absolutely not, well that's right.
Being an ally, it's so important to learn how to be open to feedback, in this case from First Nations people, and to learn from your own mistakes. Also important is self care. When we're talking about interrupting racism, we don't suggest you do it in every situation. You know, it's got to be a situation that's safe for you. As
an ally, You've still got to look after yourself. For us, non Indigenous allies at Evolve during the Voice twenty sixth of January is saying where can we step up and take the cultural load of Auntie Mania and our first Nation team members. That's huge. But even through the twenty sixth of January this year, even as a non Indigenous ally and director of Evolve, I had to step back a bit too, you know, I had to realize my
limits around self care. Some of the commentary on the social media on our posts around the twenty sixth January was really bad. It was really hurtful. So I didn't engage in that either. Fortunately we've got team members that did.
I was about to ask, how are you guys managing that? Because you need to keep your cups full so you can continue to pour from them, and stuff like that just eats away at you. And you know, you and I could sit down and talk about how, you know, obviously hurt people, hurt people, and not kind people make comments like that online. I mean, I don't think any one of us in this conversation right now would ever comment on anybody's appearance or what they're doing or how.
They're doing it.
We just go, that's absolutely gross, Like that's just not who we are or the types of people that we are, and the type of person that would past comment like that online you go, there must be something more going on.
But that's such a level of emotional.
Energy that you just don't have when our cause is so much bigger. So I was about to ask, do you have a team that takes that away and hides that from you so that you don't have to deal with that burden.
My team actually goes through my TikTok and removes all the negative comments before I can even get to look at them. That's one great thing. Yeah, we do.
And also, you know with the team too, going back to our three core values you know about kindness, is we also look at ways that we support each other as well. But they really stepped up. They always step up our team in terms of trying to decrease the impact of that cultural load and cultural burden. And that's another whole module that we teach around. When you're talking about attraction and retention in the workplace, we talk a
lot about what this thing is called cultural load. You know, that's a really important part of cultural safety in a workplace is knowing what cultural load is and addressing it. So an example of cultural load would be always going to your first nation staff member and asking them to organize something for NATOP week, for example, they might be.
The accountant, completely unrelated.
That's an example of what we mean by cultural loads. You know, it's not enumerated, it's just assumed. So something to be aware as an ally where we always start the journey of our lies. Well, I started in two places. One is craving for a connection with the First Nations person and this was at a very young age, at a young age, being very confused about the absence of Aboriginal people and culture in everything in my schooling, in
my community. This is back in the seventies. And then as I got older, realizing oh, there's more people like me, and also I feel quite scared about saying or doing the wrong thing. I don't know where to start. And then we've discovered, you know, there's so many more people like this in life, and that's why we make our learning environments free of blame, shame or guilt, and we do focus on the practical, simple things places you can start.
I love it.
I feel like your community is very much there's no such thing as a silly question community. And that might seem very funny to say, but you really do walk the walk in that aspect. Like I mentioned earlier that you know, obviously Auntie Manya. I'm friends with you on TikTok and I love seeing your content. But I feel like I've seen a shift in the way people ask questions, and they're now saying, oh, actually, I've always.
Wondered, is this okay for me to say?
Like?
Am I allowed to call you auntie Manya? And you're like, of course you are, Like are you allowed to do this? What does that look?
Like?
How does this work? And I think that sometimes we.
Actually have to strip it back to really bear basics and go, well, why do we call you Aunti manya?
How does that work?
Like?
What cultural significance does that have? I'm not indigenous? Am I allowed to refer to you that way? And I think that it's just broken down in such a beautiful way that it becomes part of our language and it becomes second nature. And I think that that's what you know, I'm hoping for, and I'm assuming you guys are hoping for that. It just becomes oh, yeah, of course we
know what that means. But right now we don't live in that privileged world of knowing, and you're extending that privilege to us to teach us, and I think that that deserves a lot more respect than it gets because that would be another massive cultural load being asked the same questions over and over being us. You know, when reconciliation happened fifty webinars, like.
My gosh, you would have been exhausted.
And I see why you're the gold standard of why people want to learn from you, but my gosh, you would have been so tired.
We're doing a lot and we have a great team, and we're expanding that team, so we actually have a whole pathway that people become a credited ally US and from that, we also have a select group of people that become accredited facilitators, so we have facilitators in each state and also facilitators doing online. So Auntie and I are pretty much only these days doing keynote speaking and the larger webinars. So we have a really great, sustainable, growing family of people that can do this work.
I adore it.
I know I have taken up a lot of your time today and I am very very grateful for it. To be able to share you guys with our community is an absolute privilege. So last question, I promise, but what kinds of resources can we as a community engage you guys in on. We know that you do keynotes speaking, we know that you go into organizations, but what else I guess what can we engage with you on?
Oh?
So many ways and this bold obsession for ten million more allies. There's so many ways that you can engage with us, so many free resources on our website, which the link.
Will be there, absolutely it will be.
We've talked about ask any question. That is our philosophy evolved. There's no such thing as a silly question. So jump online. You can ask anything on Ask Auntie or ask an ally and we do a short video response. There's our books. They're in all the formats. There's practical reconciliation which takes you through those seven steps we talked about. There's Auntie's children's book series, Ask Auntie. There's Auntie's book Journey into dream Time. You can listen to them on audible or
get the e book. They're in libraries. Apparently you can borrow them for free at libraries as well as an individual. You can become an accredited ally.
That's really cool.
I think we've got over five hundred accredited allies since we've launched that, and that's not just learning about these competencies and you need to demonstrate competencies. That's quite a longer deeper program. Any touch point you have with us, you're also joining a community. So our vision is of striving communities of allies across Australia. You can jump online
and do our adapted privileged walk activity. That's a really important activity to do as allyship is understanding your own privilege. There's a diversity quiz. We have a downloadable calendar with significant dates. We collaborate with Soiretta and incredible indigenous artists, beautiful artwork on that. So we just love yarning with people, don't we yourself? Please reach out to us.
That's amazing.
I don't for our listeners and also for myself even because I've really had the privilege of meeting you both today and it's been just genuinely really amazing.
Where can we find to you? Like, what do you have like TikTok TikTok? No you know I have you have anti monus?
So where can we find you?
Probably the main ways through our website so evolves with then s on the end dot com dot are you otherwise, we're on social LinkedIn. We do a lot on We have a lot of connections on LinkedIn. Auntie Manya is a leading voice on LinkedIn. In our organizational structure, they've got these co director and general manager. And Anti Manya is talent.
Oh, nobody is surprised she's the talent.
I like that.
How does that make you feel, Anti Manya or are you just like obviously anyway here I am, I adore it.
We can find you literally on any social switch. I love.
Will put obviously a whole heap of resources into the show notes where you can find Karla and Anti Manya. We're also going to put some links to Supply Nation and the Indigenous Chamber of Commerce. You know, I want to pop in a link to the ally prilege. Obviously you've had over three thousand people sign up to that, but I.
Think it can be way more than that, and.
You know, information on how to become an accredited ally as well. There's just so much of you guys to share, and I'm so grateful that we got the opportunity to have you on the podcast again. It won't be the last time, but unfortunately we have run out of time today so again, really appreciate it. I know that our community gets a lot out of you know, our yarn's on the pod.
I love it.
It's one of my favorite things. So thank you and I can't wait to cross paths with you again very soon.
We say go. Well, you did mention about potentially doubling our pledge through your allied community, so that's very exciting.
Yes, we're going to work on it. We're going to be across it, especially this week. Thank you guys so much.
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