Gender in the Workplace: Difficult Conversations for Men with Peter White AM, CEO FBAA; David Walker, Head of Sales, Lab 49; Dan Poynton, Executive Officer, GippSport.

Worried about “doing the right thing”, unsure how to have difficult conversations with your female colleagues, unsure how to handle bullying claims, these and many others will be discussed by leaders. Understand the consequences of doing nothing & learn winning ways to overcome these barriers. Gender equality & workplace inclusivity create more profitable & productive companies, the business case is clear. However, dealing with people is always the hardest thing for a leader.

In this Lunch & Learn session, we will discuss how these leaders have handled difficult situations giving you a roadmap for the future.

Join Us:  October 25th, 12pm to 12:45pm

Peter White AM

Peter White AM is the Managing Director of the FBAA, and first started as a volunteer with the FBAA in 2003.

Peter’s banking and finance career spans over 44 years covering retail banking, Head of Private Banking, Associate Director of Marketing and Distribution in Investment Banking, established RAMS Home Loans first sales office in 1993, and has run mortgage management businesses and has had several broking businesses of his own.

A strong and passionate advocate for industry, Peter spends a significant amount of time with regulators and government, as well as being a Registered Lobbyist in his own right, and is the leading advocate and Ambassador for Mental Health Awareness in our finance industry which he started the awareness conversation in 2016.

In 2016 Peter established and is the current Global Chairman for the IMBF (International Mortgage Brokers Federation) which is a collaboration industry association in 6 countries and is a world’s first of its kind.

He also sits on the Small Business Association of Australia’s Advisory Board, and is a champion and campaigner for mental health issues & the needs of parents and carers of Special Needs Children.

Peter was recognised in the 2019 Queens Birthday Honours with an ‘AM’ Member of the Order of Australia, for significant services to industry and the community.

And, in 2021 was awarded in the Australian Broking Awards as the ‘Industry Thought Leader of the Year’ and in 2022 ‘Wellness Advocated of the Year’ and was recognised in the MPA 2022 Global Top 100 mortgage influences.

David Walker

David leads sales and relationship management for LAB49 across the APAC region.

David’ background has seen him gain insight across 3 broad sectors – Social Sciences, Banking and Technology, having worked for major companies like Royal Bank of Scotland, NAB, Macquarie Group and Tech Mahindra.

David holds a double major honours degree in Sociology & Criminology from Cardiff University. He started his career in Criminology interviewing and counselling violent offenders with drugs and alcohol addiction. This foundation in human behaviour, managing difficult conversations has allowed David to successfully navigate the next 20+ years of his career across Banking and Wealth Management; building real and meaningful relations with some of Europe and Australia’s leading Family Offices and Corporate Executives. Over the years David has added qualifications across Capital Markets, Insurance, Wealth Management and Banking in both the UK and Australia but he still sees his most valuable qualification and attribute by far as the ability to connect genuinely and passionately to understand the other person.

David also enjoys contributing to advisory boards across start up, innovation and diversity and has been involved in various board roles such as Brunswick Business Incubator, Barayamal First Nations Entrepreneurship, Melbourne Innovation Centre’s Food Incubator and West Australia Head of D&I for Macquarie Group

Dan Poynton

Dan Poynton is the EO of GippSport. Dan has an unwavering commitment to gender equality and plays a key role as an ally within GippSport, Gippsland, and more broadly across the Victorian Sport
sector.

Under Dan’s guidance, GippSport has delivered many sector leading initiatives such as:
 The Balancing the Board program, providing Governance training and mentoring to women aspiring to leadership roles in sport
 Gippsland girls in sport forum –where GippSport bought 40 young women (16-18yrs old) together to co-design what a supportive and inclusive sport environment should look like for young women
 The Changing Gippsland’s Game initiative, which supports a network of professional women in sports administration roles.
 In partnership with Latrobe University’s Centre for Sport & Social Impact delivered the ‘Men as allies: supporting women & girls in community sport’ research project

Internally, Dan has actively promoted and empowered women in leadership positions and has facilitated a significant number of development opportunities for women in the GippSport team
including, most recently:
 Successfully nominating and sponsoring one of his team to participate in the Victorian Government’s Joan Kirners Emerging Leaders program
 Sponsored another colleague to be part of the Office for Women in Sport & Recreation’s delegation at the International Working Group World Conference on Women and Sport in New Zealand in November 2022
 Supported a team member to participate in the Office Women in Sport & Recreation’s Next Generation Leaders program in 2023

Collectively, these achievements led to GippSport being recognised in the 2022 Recalibrate Gender Equity Awards winning the Best SME as well as Best Organisation overall.