I am a proud Western Sydney girl born and raised. I absolutely love where I am, what I do and the impact it has on my community. And on September 21 I have the absolute privilege to represent my community at TEDx Parramatta.
It is very common occurrence that growing up as a ‘Westie’ was seen as a stain on your career, business opportunities and pretty much life.
I am first in my family to attend university and now have three degrees across Business, Communications and Educational Leadership. Still, this didn’t counteract people’s attitudes towards me being from Western Sydney.
It wasn’t until I built my own company, Shoshanna Group Pty Ltd — which included Amanda Rose - Strategic Connector and global website Business Woman Media — that people started paying attention. Especially when I was mentioned on by Time magazine, CNN, Huffington Post and others as an internet winning blogger.
But it was my personal journey and battle against the ‘Westie’ stigma over the past 20 years that inspired me to develop two very important organisations: Western Sydney Advisory, the only business that represents the voice of the community to big business and Government; and Western Sydney Women, the only organisation to advocate for all women who live in or work across the inner west, greater west, north west and south west of Sydney.
One of the principles of Western Sydney Women organisations is that our women don’t have to pay a single dollar to participate, because we do not want to have even the smallest financial barrier to our the goal of having all 1.5 million women in the region become economically independent and confident.
Being the voice of the people is important more so now than ever before, especially with the infrastructure, development and interest in all things Western Sydney on the rise.
The us vs them mentality needs to change. Over the past five years with all the investment being made across GWS, there has been a shift in attitudes, mainly because we are now seen as a gold mine of opportunity and everyone outside the West is suddenly hungry to have a piece of the financial pie.
GWS is a global centre for trade, innovation and learning; with the third largest economy in Australia behind the Sydney CBD and Melbourne. Its population is the fastest growing in Australia.
This growth is great, of course. But it can put our community and small business community at risk if we don’t ensure our voices are being heard.
It is our responsibility to speak up. To ask questions, to listen to each other, and to work together in order to ensure our needs are being met and our future is being secured.
The multicultural community of GWS is one of the most diverse in the world with over 100 nationalities calling GWS home. We are varied financially and demographically. But we do have one thing in common. We love where we come from and where we live. We, the GWS people, have more power than we realise.
And this is what my TEDx talk will be about. The power shift that can occur if we, the people of Greater Western Sydney participate, collaborate and get hands on to design a future we deserve.
About TEDx
Evolving out of the success of TED, the TEDx initiative was created in the spirit of TED’s mission, “ideas worth spreading.” TEDx supports independent organizers who want to create a TED-like event in their own community. TEDx events are planned and coordinated independently, under a free license granted by TED
Amanda Rose is Managing Director, Western Sydney Advisory, Founding Director, Western Sydney Women, Publisher, Business Woman Media and a noted Strategic Connector.
