We are delighted to welcome back Maria Pantalone, Business Communication Consultant, Infinite Growth, for our session on 29 March to present insights on Providing Clarity in Business Writing.

In this session, Maria will be providing business writing tips and applying them to the writing of emails.

The areas that will be covered include:

1.         Dealing with email fatigue

2.         The tone of words and their impact on your message

3.         How your choice of words can bring clarity to your message

This will be an interactive event and one activity will require members to use a piece of paper.  Please have this ready to use during the session.

Maria Pantalone is an experienced facilitator, coach and business writer.

Organisations that have engaged Maria’s services include Surf Life Saving NSW, Amway, NSW Police, Aussie Home Loans and the Parramatta College, to name a few.

Maria works with both individuals and teams. She conducts workshops and coaching sessions to help professionals confidently deliver their verbal and written messages.

Her company, Infinite Growth, has been recognised for its commitment to excellence in both regional and national business awards.

Look for the registration link in your email from CPA Women.

Women in Business Discussion Group 22 February 2022

To kick-start our WiB DG Community for 2022, our first session will be a reflection on 2021.  This will include a special visit from fellow discussion group member and immediate past President of NSW Divisional Council, Lisa Gill. 

Lisa will share with us her learnings and achievements as President.  You will also have the opportunity to share with your fellow discussion group members what resonated with you from our discussion group in 2021 and what you want to see more of in 2022.

No need to register for this event.  Link to the Webex link will be emailed to you the day prior to the event.

We look forward to seeing you all virtually on 22 February, starting promptly at 6pm!

Leveraging your Superpower

Women in Business Discussion Group Tuesday 30 November 2021 | 6 – 8pm | Via Webex

Did you know that being a female CPA is a secret superpower? When you use it wisely it can supercharge your career and when combined with solid support networks, your professional and personal opportunities are amplified. If you would like to learn more about this superpower and some tools and tactics to leverage it, this session is for you.

Danielle Dobson is a former CPA and over her 14-year career held almost every finance role you can imagine and worked in private practice, NFPS and global Fortune500 companies. Living and working in 5 countries Danielle learned the importance of perspective, empathy and connection and how they can be the foundation for personal and professional success. Now the Founder of her business, Code Conversations, and a leadership coach, facilitator, speaker and advocate, Danielle focuses on supporting professional women to use the strengths and attributes they already have, to achieve their own unique version of fulfilment and success. Danielle is also an author of the book, Breaking the Gender Code and is given plenty of opportunities to practice her leadership insights in her most challenging role of all - being Lead Parent and Family CEO to three rather energetic boys!

To register, use the link in your email from CPA Women@gmail.com

Creating Authentic Connections

 Women in Business Discussion Group Tuesday 26 October 2021 | 6 – 8pm | Via Webex

How we connect with colleagues, business partners and clients in an authentic way that feels good and fosters productive relationships is essential to business and career. It is an interactive session where you will learn to recognise four primary behavioural styles and how they connect and interact. We will also be looking at what separates us from each other and how we can close the gap. If you are a logically / technically minded professional, this session is for you.  

Anna Bashkirova, CPA, is the founder and the Principal Consultant at EQuilibrium Consulting & Coaching (www.equilibriumconsulting.com.au). Anna is a human behaviour specialist and a self-leadership coach focusing on sustainable high performance. 

Prior to coaching, Anna had a successful career in accounting and IT where she consulted accountants and CFOs around accounting systems. This path led her to the realisation that most software implementation issues turned out to be people related. As a result, she devoted a few years to become a human behaviour specialist. Anna is a Professional Coach, qualified Extended DISC behavioural profiler, Meta Dynamics practitioner and a PROSCI certified change manager. Anna is passionate about helping accounting, finance, IT, and legal professionals unlock their potential as organisational and business leaders by enhancing their soft skills, particularly emotional intelligence and fitness.  She works with clients individually and in groups. Anna’s clients appreciate her empathetic and personable coaching style.  

Anna is also a property developer and a mum of a 22-year old engineer. 

To register, follow the link in your email from CPA Women

Deepening relationships for well-being and success

 Women in Business Discussion Group Tuesday 28 September 2021 | 6 – 8pm | Via Webex

Science shows that supportive relationships are the single most important factor in our health, happiness and success. To thrive, we need them in all areas of life: work, home, friendships and communities, local and professional. Yet building and maintaining caring, beneficial connections can be challenging, particularly in these times. The result is soaring levels of isolation, stress and mental and even physical illness globally. Presented by Dr Alicia Fortinberry, an organisational psychologist, best-selling author, business advisor and executive coach, the session will give you science-backed facts and tips to help you find and strengthen relationships that boost your confidence and wellbeing. You will have a better understanding of obstacles in yourself and circumstances that might hold you back from the relationships you want, and how to overcome these. Come prepared to ask questions, share feelings and observations and enjoy your community of CPA women.

Dr Alicia Fortinberry is an internationally recognised keynote speaker, best-selling author, teacher, business advisor and executive coach. An organisational psychologist who draws on the latest research in a wide field of behavioural sciences, Alicia offers proven, practical concepts and tools that enable individuals and organisations to achieve successful relationships, resilience, culture, leadership and strategy. Alicia works extensively with top-tier professional and financial service organisations as well as Global Fortune 500 companies in the US, Europe, Asia and Australia, including all the Big Four accounting consultancies and Australia’s major banks. Books with her partner Dr Bob Murray include two New York Times best-sellers Creating Optimism and Raising an Optimistic Child (both published by McGraw-Hill, New York) and two business best-sellers: The Human Science of Strategy: What works and what doesn’t and Leading the Future: The Human Science of Law Firm Strategy and Leadership (both ARK Group, London).  

To attend, use the registration link in your email from CPA Women.

How to stay connected to your network

 Women in Business Discussion Group Tuesday 24 August 2021| 6 – 8pm | Via Webex

As most of us continue to rely on digital communication and have limited in person interaction, how do we stay connected to our network? For our session on 24 August, we are excited to welcome Tamara (Cohen) Leizer FCA, FCPA, Director, Program Management Office, Fast Rail, Transport for NSW. Tamara will share her insights as an experienced leader and Fellow CPA. We will learn how to be proactive in staying connected, build our networks and develop strong stakeholder relationships. Look for the link to register in your email from CPA Women.

Excel Power Query

Women in Business Discussion Group Tuesday 27 July 2021| 6 – 8pm | Via Webex

The Women in Business Discussion Group are delighted to welcome back Neale Blackwood, Microsoft Excel expert. Neale will demonstrate how Power Query allows you to automatically perform data cleansing routines on your data sources - no manual intervention required. Simply refresh and your data is ready to use. You can use csv files; txt files; databases and existing Excel tables as your data sources.

Continuing his Power Query tips from his last session, Neale will start working with multiple files. For example, you may have 12 separate CSV files in a folder. All with the same layout, one for each month of the year. Power Query can import all 12 files as if they were a single file and create a table for the whole year

This session covers

• importing multiple CSV files from a folder
• a technique to capture the file name in a field (column)
• importing multiple Excel files
• merging data from multiple tables
• Extracting header information into a column from multiple CSV files

Neale Blackwood is a Microsoft Excel expert with over 30 years’ experience as an Accountant and consultant and over 25 years’ experience using and writing about Excel. Neale has been a regular contributor to INTHEBLACK since 2002. He has written over 200 Excel articles for the magazine. He answers Excel questions via email from CPAs from around the world.

He has written and presented numerous Excel sessions at CPA events around Australia over the past 10 years. He has recorded over two dozen Excel podcasts for the CPA Australia podcast series. His first book, Advanced Excel Reporting for Management Accountants, was published in 2014 by Wiley. He has presented over 350 live webinars on Excel since 2012 and written over 400 blog posts.

Neale works with organisations, large and small, to help them make the most of Excel by:

Speeding up reporting processes by re-engineering their current Excel files
Reducing re-keying by creating new reporting solutions
Removing manual processes by automating tasks using Power Query and macros
Providing targeted Excel coaching (in person and online)
Providing customised Excel training (in person and online)
Running live online webinars both free and paid