I ONLY KNOW ONE MAN WHO IS THE HEAD OF A COMPANY.

I sat down with my coffee this morning planning to write about something completely different.

Laptop open. Café buzzing. Halfway through my second sip.

And as I started typing, the words that came out weren't the ones I thought I was going to write.

Because this week I've heard it again.

There aren't enough women on boards.
There aren't enough women at the top of big companies.
There aren't enough women in the highest roles.

And that absolutely is still a problem for many women. I'm not dismissing that. It exists. It matters.

But as I sat there, staring at my screen, something else started bubbling up.

When I look around my world... I don't see a lack of capable women.

I see women running entire companies.
I see women employing teams.
I see women making decisions that affect thousands of people.

And I caught myself thinking...

What if part of the story isn't just that women can't get those seats.

What if part of it is that some women don't actually want them.

Not because they're not ambitious.
Not because they're not capable.

But because it doesn't actually fit into our lives.

School runs from somewhere between 8 and 3:30. Then there's sports day. After-school sports. Music lessons. The non-stop sick days that come out of nowhere and wipe out a week.

The food shopping. The cooking. The cleaning. The bath and bedtime routine.

And we're meant to somehow still climb the "corporate ladder" on top of that?

Fuck that.

I don't want to climb someone else's ladder.

I want to build something that moves when I move. That flexes when life flexes. That works around school pick-ups instead of pretending they don't exist. Something that is mine.

So I started mentally scanning my community.

And that's when it hit me.

I know one man who is the head of a company.

And I know a shitload of women who are.

Hayley and Tammy, owners of Willow Bay.

I've known these women for years. I've watched them move through a marriage breakdown while still showing up for their business. I've watched exchange rates change overnight and wipe out profitable product lines. I've watched them launch into new countries, scale back when needed, create completely new products and pivot with the agility of a Russian ballerina.

The one thing I have never seen them do?

Take it personally.

They talk about the lessons as just that, lessons. Not failings. Not personal attacks. Just things you learn from and move on.

Gina from Daisy and Hen.

We've never actually met face to face (#instafriends), but I've watched her business grow from strength to strength, to setback, to strength again. I've watched her be torn down publicly for decisions that, if made by a man, would have been applauded.

When she closed her Port Elliott store she wrote:

"Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't."

And that line stuck with me.

Because that's business.

Sometimes it works. Sometimes it doesn't.

Soon after she opened her Marion and then Burnside stores.

Anna Diamond from Palas Jewellery.

This beautiful woman is always one of the first people I think of when you ask me about inspirational women. Not just because of the huge international company she has built, but because it is 100% possible to handle everything that life throws at you and still be kind, gracious, open and accepting.

A few years ago she spoke at one of our events and shared what it takes to build something global.

The answer?

Get back up.

Life can be beautiful and brutal in the same breath. Get up anyway.

Ally Aoukar.

From "Car Chats" to being the face of Commonry and having her picture up in LSKD, Ally is a force. I have never seen a woman own her shit and move as quickly as Ally does. Two years ago I asked her what her dreams were.

Now she's living them.

And I could keep going.

Joanne from Better Being Me, I never leave an interaction with that woman not feeling better about myself. Not because she blows smoke up my ass, the opposite. She calls me out. You can't hide from Joanne. She sees you. Probably better than you see yourself. And in those moments when my head is looping and I can't work out why, she gently but firmly shows me what I've been avoiding.

Bianca and Mel from Lollipop Collective. What started as markets a few times a year has turned into stores across Australia in some of the biggest shopping centres. They created pathways for small businesses to have their products in major outlets, while raising what feels like an entire soccer club of kids between them.

I'm literally getting kicked out of this café and I've barely scratched the surface.

And here's the thing.

This isn't just my little world.

Look around, in Australia today more than one-third of all small businesses are run by women. In the micro-business space, nearly half are led by women, and more than half of those have been started in just the last five years. Globally, women now make up almost two-fifths of all entrepreneurs, and that number has been steadily rising.

That's not a shortage.

That's a shift.

What if we're not underrepresented.

What if we're under-counted.

Because we're not climbing their ladders.

We're building our own tables.

I hate the saying that "you can't be what you don't see".

That assumes you have to wait for someone else to do it first.

You don't.

You can be anything you fucking want to be. Even if it's never been done before.

You just need to be around people who believe that you can.

And trust me.

There are more of us than you realise.

Thank you for coming to my TED Talk 🩷💙

Sandra x