Sophie Conlon
Starting her local government career as a librarian for the City of Mount Gambier, Sarah Philpott said seeking knowledge helped her become chief executive (CEO) of the same council.
Growing up in Mount Gambier/ Berrin, Ms Philpott said she always wanted to be a librarian when she grew up, so went to university and made that dream a reality.
After working in law firm libraries, she returned to the Blue Lake city and gained employment with the council she now leads.
“So what a great springboard, it’s pretty amazing isn’t it, to have started in local government here in this council and ended up as the CEO of this council, back in your hometown,” she said.
Ms Philpott said working in libraries had shaped her career and she found value in undertaking different qualifications along the way to help broaden her opportunities.
“Over my career, I’ve really moved from that technical library skill base and added some qualifications along the way, I think that’s a really useful thing to do,” she said.
“I’ve added a postgraduate qualification in Business Administration, an MBA and I’ve added a postgraduate qualification in change management along the way, and each time I’ve done that it’s been in the context of broadening my career.
“So moving from libraries into libraries and community development, moving from that into community and corporate development, moving from that into executive positions that are about supporting an organisation and a community and then ultimately ending up in a CEO role in local government.”
First starting out, Ms Philpott said she thought she would be in libraries forever, but when she was early in her executive roles she dreamed of becoming a CEO.
“And then it kind of didn’t pan out for a while because I ended up working in jobs where I just loved what I was doing,” she said.
“For me, it’s not so much about the aspiration to get to the top of my profession, but to be doing really good and interesting work wherever I am.
“It’s not about thrusting for the position, it’s about adding value and contributing and making a difference and leaving behind a legacy of the place that you work in being better as a consequence of your work.”
Ms Philpott said personally she had not faced discrimination or barriers based on her gender and highlighted that within local government there were equality structures in place, but said she had seen it take place for women in other industries.
“But what we do know in local government is that women tend to be in parts of the business that might be lower paid more generally, libraries are predominantly women, administrative staff and so on,” she said.
“So you do kind of get that difference in terms of where women end up, but for me personally, no, I didn’t find that such of an issue.”
“I wonder sometimes whether we don’t necessarily put ourselves forward as the person who can learn and grow in a role, we feel like we need to be able to demonstrate that we can just do it all.”
On this, Ms Philpott said she found women were often more likely to downplay their achievements, but thought they had to take time to reflect on what they had done.
“One of the things women do as well is we expect a lot of ourselves and we think it’s easy to beat yourself up about stuff,” she said.
“There will always be more you could do, more you can try and achieve, there is always that kind of aspiration.
“But you have to take the time to look over and see what’s actually been achieved or what you’ve done.”
Ms Philpott said her choice not to have children was made independent of work, not because she thought she could not “have it all”.
“I didn’t ever feel like I had to choose one or the other because I already knew that path for me,” she said.
“But I look at women in this workplace and in others I’ve worked who manage all of that and I just think ‘how incredible, people are amazing’.”
No matter a persons family situation, Ms Philpott said it was important for a workplace to be flexible to support people in living their best lives.
She said the expectations of women in the workforce had shifted over the years, and people were become more accepting of women in leadership roles.
“For women who came before me, they had to work in particular ways to be able to get these opportunities, they had to be able tough it out with the boys,” she said.
“Whereas now I think there’s more acceptance that women bring diversity, they bring different thinking, that they can bring a sense of humanity and compassion to a workplace, and that hasn’t always been accepted in leadership roles.”
Looking back on the waves women had made in the past and acknowledging her privilege, Ms Philpott said action was still needed to ensure men and women were on par.
She highlighted older women were the fastest growing group to experience homelessness in Australia, women often took time off work to care for children or elderly relatives leaving them with less superannuation than their male counterparts and women were generally in lower paying positions.
“So that’s where the work is, and getting a recognition- whether it’s a man or a woman- that those things that they do in parenting or caring for parents are actually incredibly valuable and without them our society wouldn’t work and I think that doesn’t get seen,” she said.
Knowing she could provide inspiration for women who wanted build their careers, Ms Philpott said it was important to recognise not everyone wanted to become CEO and everyday women made amazing contributions.
“For women starting out it’s about recognising that you’ve got to be able to make a contribution, you need to find the right path in that for you,” she said.
“We often think you always have to aspire up and that success is when you reach the top of the tree.
“I look at some of the people I work with, some of the women I work with and I could not do my job without them; they’re not at the top of their tree but they’re at the top of their game.”
Overall, she encourages people to be open to learning.
“Be alert and alive to the possibility that you never know who’s going to teach you something which will be a critical factor in your success,” she said.
