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Jinan Budge is a woman working in a man’s world – workng in CyberSecurity she’s often the only woman in the room. She also has two kids, travels all over the world for her work, and has a life full of passion.
She wants the idea of balance to be something men talk about as well, and uses her position as an experienced working women to ajitate for change in workplace assumptions and expectations.
I really hope you enjoy this conversation. Jinan has a lot of passion around shifting the work-lifeexperience and and I loved chatting with her.
In this episode we discuss:
- Debunking the myth of balance. It looks like Jinan has everything all figured out, but she says things all fall apart all the time. We don’t see behind the scenes of other people’s lives so we feel like the only one struggling.
- Balance shouldn’t be just a women’s conversation. We don’t ask men, ‘how do you do it all’ when they have both career and family.
- Jinan agitates around this in her own workplace. When asked how she balances it all, she responds, ‘when was the last time you asked that of a male colleague?’.
- An army of support help Jinan make it all happen, and she’s very open about needing a nanny, a house keeper, and a helpful husband to enable her career.
- Her mother encouraged her to remain financially independent, stay in the workforce and do what makes her happy – even if it costs her money to get support in the short term.
- Maintaining financial independence is a significant issue for women, but there is a strong cultural message that we are better at caring and should be with the children.
- Cybersecurity is 9% women, and drops at senior levels, so Jinan works in a man’s world. On a call the day before this recording she was the only woman with 16 men, and feels being that one different person.
- There are no silver bullets for succeeding in a male dominated career, or for finding balance in your life. Jinan is driven by her values – freedom, pleasure and brilliance.
- Jinan uses the wheel of life to assess where her life is at ever three months. She is driven by her purpose, and that’s a really important part of giving her a well rounded life. Mothering is a PART of that purpose but absolutely not her whole purpose.
About Jinan Budge
Jinan is a dynamic and successful business leader with an exceptional background in information security.
She has a reputation for delivering outstanding results using strategic and innovative thinking, and for growing businesses year-on-year by maximising strengths in business development, client retention, stakeholder engagement and project management.
Jinan possesses a considerable talent for building global teams, combined with a proven record in focusing, motivating and developing staff to achieve and surpass objectives.
Acclaimed for her international presentation and keynoting skills, she has additionally written internationally-recognised and industry-leading information security research.
An energetic, driven and enthusiastic professional who lives life according to the mantra of Freedom, Brilliance and Pleasure, Jinan lives in Sydney with her husband, two kids and lots of pets!