The Human Story Behind the Business & Brand - Ros & Khatija

This podcast partnership with Women Making it Work aligns with but slightly deviates from my The Human Behind the Career Brand podcast series. The Human Story Behind the Business and Brand delves into those poignant moments, experiences and life lessons that shaped these high-performing professional women into who they are today. It discusses their fates, flaws, feats, fears and all the other fabulous human elements that have driven them to perform so well in their professional and personal lives. As has been encapsulated in the Women Making it Work celebratory anthology entitled Beyond the Business – Stories of Women Who Dared.The next guests for this podcast series are Ros Weadman and Khatija Halabi. Two of the authors and storytellers in Women Making it Work’s Beyond the Business anthology, representing those women who prioritise amplifying impact and communication. Two businesswomen who discovered their power through authentic communication and by creating transformative experiences.First up is Ros, founder and owner of PR and marketing consultancy Marcomms Australia, which she launched in 2011 after feeling the inner urge to run towards something greater. Ros is a self-confessed addict when it comes to language, storytelling and learning, which are three themes that have continue to fuel her career, underpinned by a desire to help people connect.  It’s been a continual evolutionary journey for Ros since she left the steady world of corporate communications, to help empower business leaders to be more transformative communicators. For a while she took on the persona of Super Ros, inspired by her business coach’s gift of a brand-themed doll that was often her ice-breaker at speaking engagements. She eventually retired that persona to go deeper in terms of finding her own voice and courage, enabling her to effectively elevate others in bringing to life authenticity, conviction and presence in their communications.My other podcast guest is Khatija, the owner of Casey Hearing as well as the chairperson of Women Making it Work. Originally migrating from South Africa to live and work in Gippsland in Victoria as an audiologist, when Khatija made the move to the big smoke of Melbourne to start up Casey Hearing, she didn’t know anyone and had minimal business acumen. It was when she joined both BNI and Women Making it Work that Khatija began to feel both immersed and evolved – the former for gaining foundational business knowledge and the latter for feeling a sense of human warmth and connection. Khatija lives by the Ubuntu philosophy that our own personal strength lies in supporting and bringing to life one another. And she learnt through those two business networking groups that a single connection should be transformational rather than transactional. Which she applies to her business in terms of helping people transition from isolation to connection. Collaboration continues to drive Khatija in both her personal and professional life.