UN Women Australia’s theme for International Women’s Day is balancing the scales. We asked Aussie founders what balancing the scales means to them.

Hacia Atherton  founder Empowered Women in Trades

When I hear the theme “Balance the Scales,” I don’t think about equality as a slogan. I think about measurement.

As a CPA with a Master’s in Applied Positive Psychology, I’ve spent years looking at what businesses choose to measure and what they ignore. And here is the uncomfortable truth: the scales are still uneven because we are still measuring the wrong things.

We track revenue, margin and output. We rarely track the invisible labour that keeps teams functioning. We rarely acknowledge how psychological safety, respect, and belonging directly influence our performance.

The scales are uneven in women’s pay or representation, but also in expectations. Women are still expected to absorb emotional tensions, keep the peace, be the note-takers, the mentors and the mediators. We’re expected to be decisive, not difficult. We’re interrupted more and judged more harshly for our tone.

Women are expected to hold a workplace culture together without recognition for doing so. And then we wonder why burnout rates are higher for women.

If I could change one workplace norm tomorrow, it would be this: Stop treating culture and psychological safety as “soft” initiatives. Make them strategic performance indicators for everyone, applied equally, enforced from board level down.

Being a woman has profoundly shaped my leadership style. It has made me relational without sacrificing rigour. It has sharpened my ability to see systems, not just numbers. It has taught me that being authoritative does not require me to suppress my emotions.

This year, my commitment is to continue reframing equality as a commercial imperative rather than a more plea. Thriving businesses require thriving humans. And when women are psychologically safe and structurally supported, performance improves across all areas.

Lauren  Eckhorst Co-founder and COO Aristotle Metadata

For me, “Balance the Scales” in business is about closing the gap between access and influence.

In technology and leadership roles especially, credibility still isn’t evenly distributed. Women are present in meetings, on leadership teams and listed as co-founders. Yet we’re still expected to justify our roles, funding decisions and technical calls. We’re asked to prove our credibility, while men are often assumed to have it.

I co-founded Aristotle Metadata after arriving in Australia at 22 as an immigrant, with no financial support and no family network. We bootstrapped a company from nothing into a successful scale-up. Even now, I’ve been asked, to my face, why I’m in the room and why my presence is required. My male peers are rarely asked the same question.

The imbalance isn’t always loud. It’s subtle and cumulative. Women often carry the emotional labour of teams and the operational glue that keeps projects moving. We’re responsible for people and culture outcomes. Strategic and commercial authority, however, is more readily attributed elsewhere.

In high-growth environments like ours, funding pathways, procurement habits and leadership pipelines aren’t openly exclusionary. But they weren’t built with women in mind either. Too often, women and minorities are actively encouraged forward only when reporting requirements demand it.

If I could change one thing, it would be how we judge leadership readiness. We tend to reward confidence over competence and visibility over substance. Being decisive in a meeting or popular online isn’t the same as building something sustainable. I’d rather back leaders who collaborate, think long term and create real impact.

This year, I’m committing to action inside our own business. We’re creating clearer pathways for women and other underrepresented team members to take on decision-making roles sooner. We’re enabling real ownership and authority beyond just advice and encouragement. You don’t build confidence by watching; you build it by doing.

Beyond our walls, we’re sponsoring a Canberra women’s soccer team for the next three years and giving staff time to volunteer with charities supporting women, children and underrepresented communities.

Being a woman has shaped me into a systems-first leader. I’m not driven by hierarchy. I’m driven by building organisations where capability is shared and success isn’t dependent on one person. Balancing the scales means redesigning systems so fairness is structural and no longer an aspiration.

Tanya Phillips, Founder Best Fur Forward

For me, “Balance the Scales” isn’t about boardrooms or headlines. It’s about the invisible expectations I experience on an ordinary weeknight.

I’d just finished a full clinical shift as a veterinarian, 7:30 am to 4:30 pm. My son, newly in Year 7, is struggling with the new emotional experience of high school. My daughter, in Year 10, is navigating academic pressure. By 5 pm, I wasn’t a founder or a vet. I was now a tutor, counsellor, cook and household manager.

When my husband came home late, our son had been crying for hours. I asked him to step in and comfort him. Instead, he criticised dinner, ignored our son’s distress, and left in anger.

That moment captures the question of balance in one scene. The scales are uneven for women in terms of emotional labour, just as much as they’re uneven in pay and leadership representation. Our second shift begins after the paid one ends, regardless of how demanding it is.

If I could change one norm tomorrow, it would be the assumption that domestic and emotional labour belongs primarily to women. True equality in business cannot exist while many women are still managing a second unpaid shift at home. Changing social attitudes to shared household responsibility would be the cultural change that shifts the scales for women, more than any single workplace policy.

This year, I’m committing to modelling boundaries for my family and team. In my company, I’m building flexibility into how we work, as a principle. I want my children to see that ambition and wellbeing can coexist.

Being a woman has shaped my leadership style to be empathetic, resilient and pragmatic. As a Veterinarian, mother, and founder, I balance logic with compassion because I live that tension daily. I lead by solving problems, supporting others and showing up, even when the scales seem uneven.

Shani Taylor founder Scaledup.IO

I don’t experience business through a gender victim lens.  I experience it through standards.

When I hear “Balance the Scales”, I don’t think about waiting for fairness. I think about building leverage.

But let’s not pretend the scales are perfectly even. A direct man is strong. A direct woman is “a lot”. Ambition in women is admired, until it becomes intimidating. Our visibility amplifies that scrutiny.

I’ve lived that reality.

The traits that built my business – high standards, decisiveness, ambition – have also attracted criticism. At one point, a group of women who had joined my programs because of my ambition, power and standards created a private chat group against me. They flew in from around Australia and met at a café near my home. A public show of intimidation. The traits they once admired became the traits they attacked.

That experience taught me something brutal but liberating: admiration turns to resentment when you refuse to shrink. I refuse to dilute my strongest traits to remain palatable. Repelling the misaligned is as important as attracting the kindred.

I didn’t soften. I didn’t apologise. I doubled down.

There’s a silent tax women pay in business. We over-explain. We dilute our language. We monitor other women instead of monitoring our own metrics. We confuse attention with achievement. The energy we spend managing perception is energy stolen from doing the work.

If I could change one system tomorrow, it wouldn’t be a gender policy. It would be economic pressure. Productive business owners in Australia hand over 40–55 cents of every dollar created once you factor in tax across income, company, GST and operations. That impacts how bold and ambitious founders can be in realising their dreams.

Being a woman hasn’t made me smaller in business. It has made me sharper.

Judgment, to me, isn’t a threat. It’s a filter.

This year, I’m building balance instead of asking for it. I’m using my skills and uncompromising standards to get it.

Jane Ng Director of Marketing ESET

Working across the Asia Pacific means navigating very different cultures, communication norms and expectations. For me, “Balance the Scales” doesn’t mean everyone behaving the same way. It means opportunity and progression shouldn’t depend on unspoken rules about how someone is expected to behave in order to be seen as leadership material.

Visible or outspoken leaders are seen as more capable. But in many APAC cultures, where modesty is valued, highly capable women may not instinctively promote their achievements. This can affect how others regard their leadership potential, usually in subtle ways.

At the same time, there can be a narrower range of what is considered the ‘right’ tone women should use. Women perceived as being ‘direct’ can be judged differently, while being ‘measured’ can be mistaken for hesitation.

Leadership is also about building trust and holding the team together. Many women feel an added pressure to be the relationship-builder, the one who keeps everything harmonious while still delivering results. That ability to build trust is a real strength, but it can also mean carrying an extra layer of responsibility that isn’t always recognised.

As industries evolve, especially with AI reshaping how we work, leadership needs to reflect a broader range of strengths. Strategic clarity. Sound judgement. Cross-cultural awareness. The ability to build trust across diverse teams. These qualities do not always come from the loudest voice in the room.

If I could change one social convention tomorrow, it would be to normalise women expressing their ambition without criticism. Women wanting growth and progression should be seen as a sign of their professionalism.

We also need to expand our definition of executive presence. Leadership can look different across cultures and personalities. It should not be limited to one communication style.

Personally, I am committing to two things this year. First, being more transparent about my own journey, including moments of uncertainty, so young women can see that confidence is something learned.

The second is to be mindful not to equate leadership capability with constant availability. Sustainable leadership requires knowing when to step forward and when to delegate. Setting healthy boundaries supports both personal resilience and team performance.

Being a woman has made me more aware of the dynamics in the room. I notice who is speaking, who is holding back, and whose perspective might be missing. The best decisions happen when more voices are genuinely heard. I’ve also learned that the strongest and most influential leadership is built on consistency, credibility and transparency.

Early in my career, I realised preparation helped me develop more confidence and authority, especially in high-stakes environments.

Balanced scales are a performance advantage for any organisation willing to look beyond volume and recognise substance.

Anastasia Pshegodskaya, Director of Talent Acquisition at Remote

Balancing the scales means creating systems where opportunity is shaped by talent and skills, not gender or any other demographic factors.

For many women, career progression has historically come with difficult trade-offs, particularly when balancing personal responsibilities alongside professional growth. Balancing the scales means creating workplace environments where those trade-offs aren’t assumed or expected. Women must be able to pursue ambitious, fulfilling careers sustainably.

Even with near parity in women’s workforce participation in Australia, women still disproportionately carry the invisible load at home, with caregiving, household responsibilities, and you can never underestimate the mental juggling that comes with it. The continued existence of the gender pay gap highlights a clear disparity in how women’s work is compensated, and also means women are more likely than men to leave the workforce for caregiving or parental duties.

At work, this can influence who feels comfortable sharing strong opinions, which in turn hinders the perception of their impact at the workplace.

If i could change one policy or system I would move more organisations towards measuring performance and outcomes, rather than  hours worked or physical presence. In my own life as a mom, I block out non-negotiables like school runs, or doctors’ appointments, and constantly alternate my working hours by starting earlier or finishing later. It’s a constant search for balance, but being able to be there for your child on their first school play or finally making this doctor appointment you couldn’t get – all without missing out at work – is the benefit everyone needs to have.

Throughout my career, I’ve been intentional about choosing employers that give employees autonomy. Working at all-remote companies for the past eight years has changed my perception of how work blends into my life.

Success should be measured by results rather than time logged: did the project move forward, was the problem solved, and did the work create value? If the answer is yes, it shouldn’t matter whether that work happened at home, co-working place, or any other location.

My ultimate goal is striking a better balance between parenthood and work and becoming a more involved parent 🙂

Being a woman and a mother has taught me to lead with empathy and trust and accept that not everything will go according to your personal plan. Parenthood is about embracing the unknown and it translates greatly into my start-up/scale-up life. My five-year-old daughter and young puppy remind me every day that life doesn’t fit neatly around a work schedule, which makes me more mindful about intentionally creating space for people to manage both work and life.

For me, leadership isn’t about control. I hope to build an environment where people feel supported, trusted, and empowered to do their best work with confidence.

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