A Gumbaynggir man from the mid-north coast of NSW, chef Clayton Donovan is the owner of the award-winning Jaaning Tree restaurant and Australia’s first Indigenous ‘hatted’ chef. Highly respected within the industry for his innovative fusion of Asian and European cuisine with Indigenous flavours, Clayton will soon be sharing his passion for native foods and sustainable food practices with a new audience. His new cooking show will debut on Australian television in mid-2014.
Clayton’s love affair with sharing culture through cooking began in his childhood when he would take wilderness walks with his aunties and grandmothers, tasting native foods and learning about his cultural traditions. As an adult, Clayton moved to Sydney, training as a chef under Kenneth Leung at the Watermark Restaurant, before travelling and working overseas in some of England’s finest five-star hotels and restaurants.
Clayton’s dream was to return to Country and give full expression to the ‘craft of cooking’ through his own restaurant. The dream became a reality in 2008 when Clayton launched the Jaaning Tree in Nambucca Heads with his wife Jane and with assistance from IBA’s Business Development and Assistance Program. Jaaning (pronounced Jaa-nee) is Gumbaynggir language for ‘wattle tree’, which has traditionally been an important food source for local Aboriginal people.
Clayton’s cuisine has been labelled ‘stunningly innovative’ by the Australian Good Food & Travel Guides Awards, which has awarded the Jaaning Tree a chef’s hat on three occasions.
All such accolades aside, however, it is his family and community, preserving and sharing his culture, and supporting the region’s food producers and growers about which Clayton remains most passionate.
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1. On harvesting the goodness around you: ‘More and more people want to connect with and to know where their food comes from and how it’s prepared’.
I picked out the name of my restaurant when I was a child. It is Gumbaynggir language mixed with English so it’s intertwined, which reflects both my cooking and what Jane and I wanted to achieve with the business. Since setting up the business, we have used local suppliers and producers; so whether it’s choosing food or people, we’re using all the goodness that’s around us.
We want to showcase that goodness because that makes it a uniquely local experience for people visiting the area.
We don’t want food coming in a box, which you stick on a shelf or in a microwave. We’re trying to concentrate on the old traditions and craft of cooking, preparing food from the start without all the technological gadgets. We make all our own stocks – it takes three days – and our own breads and pastas.
What we have been doing here at Jaaning was a big gamble, but I truly believe in staying true to yourself and believing you can make a go of it. Sustainability is increasingly what Australia wants, what the world wants. People are more interested in the old methods and traditions of foraging, sustainable fishing, and using local markets and community suppliers.
More and more people want to connect with and to know where their food comes from and how it’s prepared.
2. On carving out a business identity: ‘For Jane and I, it’s about making people who come to the restaurant feel like they’re part of a family’.
When we started out, we had the white linen and fine dining going, but that changed because of the more casual kind of dining necessary during the global financial crisis. But I think that’s great, because there are other restaurants doing fine dining. This is a little more relaxed and accessible, and it’s a place where people can feel comfortable.
The Jaaning Tree has become a destination restaurant; people stay in Nambucca Heads just to come here.
For Jane and I, it’s about making people who come to the restaurant feel like they’re part of a family. We will see them in the streets around here, or when we do cooking demonstrations down in Sydney and they’ll come up and say “Hi” because we’ve made a connection through that dining experience.
3. On keeping your chef’s hat in perspective: ‘There’s no point in being the best if no-one wants to work with you...it doesn’t matter what trade you’re in’.
We’ve learned a great deal about the challenges and pitfalls of business ownership along the way. Before becoming my own boss, I’d trained and worked in world-class, five-star restaurants where I had people who did my budgets and whole marketing teams; all I had to do was turn up, organise my staff and cook what was required. To start doing it all on my own ... there were things I had missed out on learning. But we asked our friends and our networks.
You need to ask questions, and then stand back and listen to others in business. Don’t be frightened, because no-one knows it all, and everyone’s gone through similar learning curves.
I had also worked alongside some good people down in Sydney, like Mark Wilson from Watermark Restaurant, and I learned a lot about managing myself and others from him that I still apply today. So that’s more about the type of chef you want to be, and the type of person you want to be. There’s no point in being the best if no-one wants to work with you ... it doesn’t matter what trade you’re in.
4. On turning flour into bread: ‘And that’s how I like to work; don’t tell me what’s wrong with it, tell me how to make it better’.
We had so many obstacles when we started out, but for me, it’s always been about, well how do we make it better? And that’s how I like to work; don’t tell me what’s wrong with it, tell me how to make it better.
I started life with not much at all, and I moved out of home when I was young, so I always had to make do with what I had, or make it better. That’s true with cooking too – you start with basic ingredients and turn it into something better – so flour turns into bread.
I’m a true believer; I believe if you have a good idea, something will come of it, the money and the people will come.
We’ve been lucky we have met some really good, well-connected people – people in the industry, financial planners, and the guys at Brookfarm [an award-winning macadamia producer in Byron Bay], who are really great mentors to us. All these people have helped us become a stronger unit. But that’s about being open to it too. It’s so easy to get engrossed in your own business, but other people looking in can offer a fresh perspective and say, “Have you thought about doing this or that?”
5. On bringing others to the table: ‘It’s because people are interested in what we do, which you don’t really think about until you start doing things on social media’.
Having worked in these great food establishments, I’d seen the way they focused and positioned themselves, placing more of their marketing cents in their internet presence.
With our online newsletters, forums and Facebook, we are connecting with people all around the world. It was Stefano Manfredi in Sydney who told us we needed to get on Twitter. He was up here, and as soon as he set it up and we photographed some finger limes it went ‘whoosh’. It was bizarre where it went to and how far. It’s because people are interested in what we do, which you don’t really think about until you start doing things on social media. It’s just us doing our thing during the week; which we take for granted. But people are really interested to read about me finding some native food, or Jane making some chutneys or an event we’re doing with the whole family. What’s normal to us is not normal to people who love the foraging and local produce and that kind of thing.
Jane has been producing and selling chutneys and other products infused with native ingredients at food markets and online, and they are going strong.
And people within our community like to bring their excess fruit and vegetables [lemons, guavas, chillies, bunya nuts] because they don’t want them to go to waste. So it’s that family/community/food connection thing again.
That sharing of food is a craft, and something we risk losing, especially on my side of the culture.
6. On chance meetings and dodgy knees: ‘The TV show will be my culture crossing over to contemporary cuisine, which is an extension of what we are doing here at the restaurant’.
I was doing a cooking demonstration at a festival. I was wearing this punk skull T-shirt with a mohawk on it and everyone else was there in their chef’s jackets. And Jane said, ‘You can’t wear that’. But I think people want to be entertained…and I thought I could make this really fun, so I went wild.
Afterwards I met a lady from the media industry while I was standing in a queue for coffee and we got talking about bringing what I do to television. I’d already been thinking about what I will do once I am no longer able to cook. We’d done some filming for a couple of television shows, and I was already thinking I’d like to do more of that sort of thing if I ever got the chance.
I can’t cook forever, and my arms are already suffering from all the tong work and lifting and flipping frying pans, and both my knees have gone.
So television again is about building a community around what you are doing and how you are doing it. For us, it’s ‘How do we promote bush foods to get them across the line and into Australian households?’ We know how many people are interested, so it’s about reaching people on a bigger scale.
The TV show will be my culture crossing over to contemporary cuisine, which is an extension of what we are doing here at the restaurant.
7. On promoting reconciliation on a plate: ‘We are governed by the need to eat; it’s the oldest ritual and there’s chemistry that happens around a table that people take for granted’.
Each episode we will deliver the story on traditional country, using the country’s Aboriginal name, and then its given name. So it’s Birpai country, and then it’s Taree or Port Macquarie… We wanted to develop an idea where we could promote reconciliation on a plate. It’s about showing everyone how they can easily integrate native foods into their everyday cooking. We sit down and eat three meals a day – isn’t that the easiest way to sell a message? We are governed by the need to eat; it’s the oldest ritual and there’s chemistry that happens around a table that people take for granted.
If you put food from another culture in front of someone, they will eat it, experience it and not be scared of it. In some circumstances, people won’t eat it, but at least they will have a try. And that’s OK, that’s what makes us all unique. Maybe that’s what we need to do with this whole reconciliation thing … just try it from different angles.
So the show will feature all these wonderful, quirky producers and growers who I work with. They’re not all Koori; they are from all walks of life and culture. It’s crucial for me to have these people enriching my life; they all play a big part in what the Jaaning Tree is. There are so many branches to that tree, and there’s room for everyone under it.
Find out more about the Jaaning and follow Clayton on Twitter (@jaaningtree) or Facebook. Or find out more about IBA's Business Development and Assistance Program.
After 14 days suspended above ground, every muscle aching from balancing himself on narrow scaffolding, Kalgoorlie artist Jason Dimer savoured the opportunity to lie down, look up and enjoy a ‘Michelangelo moment’, knowing his artwork was complete.
The journey to that moment began months earlier when Jason was commissioned by IBA to paint the arched dome in the entrance hall of a building on Boulder Road, Kalgoorlie. The building was acquired by IBA in 2003 through its investments program and refurbished to government office standards, with tenants including the local Indigenous Coordination Centre. Where possible, IBA seeks to extend the economic development opportunities provided through its investments to the wider community. To this end, the walls of the building have long showcased the work of local Indigenous artists, including Jason’s own father Neil and sister Miranda.
‘My sister’s piece is right inside, as soon as you walk in…’, said Jason. ‘And that’s what actually attracted me to the place. I used to drive past, and sometimes at night there was a light left on inside and…I could see her painting a mile away’. Jason decided to make a visit to Boulder Road to discuss having his own artwork displayed, but once inside it was the possibilities for the arched dome within the entrance hall that captured his imagination.
‘I looked up at the dome area above me’, said Jason, ‘and thought it looked really bland… Having that artist’s eye I could see it really needed something, and I started thinking along the lines of Michelangelo… I asked IBA about [painting] it and they were receptive to my idea. Once it was approved, it only took me a few days to come up with the whole concept for the art and the scaffolding’.
A curved plaster dome presents different challenges to working on a canvas or the linen cloth favoured by many Indigenous artists. So in creating his art concepts, Jason was required to factor in ceiling height, artificial and natural lighting, the scale of the dome and the absorbent nature of the plaster onto which he would paint. It was a challenge he says he relished both as an artist and as his father’s son. ‘I like a challenge’, he said, ‘and I just had to think on a bigger scale… There’s no such thing as can’t; that was instilled into me as a child by my father, and his father before him – it’s an inspirational line that runs through our family’.
Jason’s family ties span the length of the WA goldfields, from the Wutha Yilma people of the north to the Malba Mirining people in the south. After years of observing the painting techniques of his father and other community members, a teenage Jason took up his brush 23 years ago as a form of relaxation. He said: ‘My father was pretty surprised that I could actually paint. I said, ‘But I’ve been watching you do it for years!’ My style differs to my father’s though; his style was traditional contemporary whereas mine has a lot more symbols. I basically tell personal stories, and I pass those stories on to my children through my paintings… I am not telling traditional or sacred stories though, more about the things that have happened in my life. Most of those paintings will last 100 to 200 years….so those stories will eventually become a way of tracking the past for my family’.
It is a respect and love for family and his traditional lands that Jason has honoured in the newly completed artwork in the Boulder Road building. ‘The basic theme that runs through the painting is a central waterhole, which I believe depicts the meeting place or a place to come together’, said Jason. ‘Then there is a goanna and a snake. For me the goanna represents a protector of the land, the area that’s around here. And the snake represents the protector of the waterhole. So there’s the water and the land, being the goldfields in the Kalgoorlie area; or the Karlgurla area as we call it. Karlgurla means the silky pear which grows in abundance here, and those silky pears ring the whole dome [artwork]…’
‘There are some personal symbols throughout the painting too’, he said. ‘The way that the goanna is pointed north represents for me, on a personal and artistic level, the strength and power of my father… And the snake, pointing south, reminds me of my mother, in terms of being able to get through and adapt…as she faced difficult tasks and was able to get through’.
Jason drew on that strong personal and artistic legacy in tackling the project. ‘The wall paints that I worked with were very different to the paints I use on canvas’, he said. ‘Í know mine [canvas paints] off by heart, but these wall paints were unpredictable. I had to work out which ones drip a bit more, which ones I’d have to double-dot or come back and check, and which ones take longer to dry simply because of the pigment and make-up of them… It was pretty fiddly at times, and I was using unconventional methods such as pieces of dowel and then foam pads [make-up pads] on sticks, and using those to dot with’.
More challenging for Jason at times was the physicality of keeping his balance on the scaffolding for hours at a time. ‘I was standing at times, crouching and kneeling at times, and I ended up with sore knees and a sore neck…’ he said. ‘I was pretty much using all my leg muscles to keep my balance all day. My partner Jeanette was very helpful; she was there alongside me most of the way. We created a little pulley system where we had a bucket with a rope and I’d pull the bucket up with all the materials in [it]. It took about 14 days to complete and it would have taken a lot longer if Jeanette hadn’t been there to help’.
When asked how he knew the artwork was complete, Jason said: ‘Finishing a painting or piece of art is sometimes more difficult than it seems. I felt like I had to get down, and look at it, and then get back up again. I did that about five or six times before I was happy with it’. After watching her husband climb up and down the 14-foot scaffold numerous times, it was Jeanette who finally insisted that the artwork was complete. ‘I think the moment when my wife told me to stop was when I finally finished off’, said Jason. ‘An artist generally knows when a job’s done, but a little encouragement helps!’
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On any night of the week, you’re likely to find one or more of the Outback Global (formerly Australian Outback Apparel) team attending a 3 am meeting in the United States by videoconference; fielding a telephone enquiry from a customer somewhere in the Pacific region; on board a flight bound for China to audit a supplier’s production standards; or at home doing the business accounts. It’s a gruelling schedule, but a deeply rewarding one as the team goes about the business of taking Outback Global…well, global.
Established in 2009 by CEO Jasmin Herro and International Sales Director Michael Cima - and now a 100 per cent Indigenous-owned company - Outback Global sources and distributes a wide range of high-quality work and safety wear, uniforms, business attire and promotional merchandise. The company has more than 50 direct relationships with factories across Australia, Asia and the Pacific region, and recently established offices in the Chinese cities of Shanghai and Guangzhou.
But it’s the company’s recent joint venture with a US entrepreneur that’s requiring the late hours and early morning shifts; an agreement that has the potential to take Outback Global to a whole new level and corner of the world.
With several decades of business experience between them, the team behind Outback Global understands that strong and strategic relationships based on mutual respect and shared values are key to achieving the long-term growth and sustainability they seek. Speaking with Jasmin and her husband (Outback Global’s General and Operations Manager) Slay in Sydney, it’s evident that those quality relationships stem from the heart of the business itself.
‘The people we seek to form business relationships with are motivated, have the same ethics, are trustworthy – and we like them’, said Jasmin. ‘Michael Cima, for example, is one of the most motivated, driven people we’ve ever worked with, and we’re so privileged to be standing shoulder to shoulder and forging ahead with him’.
Another valued relationship is the one Outback Global formed three years ago with business-to-business membership body Supply Nation. Supply Nation aims to contribute to the growth of a vibrant and sustainable Indigenous business sector by encouraging diversity within Australia’s supply chain. The organisation does this by connecting Indigenous businesses (Certified Suppliers) with corporate organisations and government agencies (members) that want to buy their goods and services.
As a majority-owned Indigenous company, Outback Global gained Supply Nation Certified Supplier status in 2010, and since then has leveraged numerous business and networking opportunities to grow its customer base in Australia and overseas.
But as Jasmin is quick to point out, it’s what you do with those opportunities that matters. ‘Every time I attend a Supply Nation event my business grows’, she said. ‘But I also put my all into those events … In Australia, there aren’t many Supply Nation members that we haven’t sat in front of and told who we are. We’ve been very proactive here’.
Outback Global knows that its ability to deliver merchandise and apparel is what keeps new orders coming. According to Slay, sometimes turning down a lucrative order or contract makes the best business sense.
‘You have to be smart about it’, said Slay. ‘The hardest thing for any business that is getting opportunities thrown at it is to say no. But at the end of the day, you have to be able to turn around and say... “I can’t do that at the moment”. It’s not fair to muck up an order or job for somebody because it hurts your customer, your brand and your reputation.
‘We had one situation last year where we had to say no to a major corporation because we simply couldn’t guarantee delivery’, he added. ‘All it would have taken is one or two days of that order being held up at port or customs and we would have missed the deadline. And it hurt, because we had been chasing the customer for a while!’
Jasmin believes it is experience and maturity that makes those tough calls easier. ‘I think 15 years ago we were different people’, she said. ‘We still have the same ethics, but as people we are stronger now. We have seen examples of what we don’t want in our business, and what we don’t want to be. We are very clear about who we are and where we are going. I think it’s that confidence that comes across at all levels. It’s part of the culture of our business’.
The Outback Global team drew heavily on that confidence to pursue one of its most important business opportunities to date. With financial support from IBA, the team took up a Supply Nation invitation in late 2012 to join a 23-strong delegation of Certified Suppliers at a major business trade fair in Denver, Colorado. It was there that, exploring the possibility of expanding their operations into the US, they were guided towards American entrepreneur Donald Fairconeture, President and CEO of Unity Promotions.
‘Once again, we went along to that event prepared to work hard’, said Jasmin. ‘We made a decision before the fair that if we were lucky enough to find the right partner in the US, then we would go for it. Our time in Denver was spent talking to potential partners. Through our networks we were assisted by some fantastic people, especially Denise Coley from Cisco Systems USA. Literally on the last night we were there, Denise told us about Donald Fairconeture’.
As the first 100 per cent Indigenous-owned company outside the US to successfully obtain minority business certification, Outback Global entered into a joint venture partnership with Donald. The result is a new company – Outback Global USA – which, over time, will see the business expand its merchandise and apparel into the large and lucrative US market.
'We still have the same ethics, but as people we are stronger now. We have seen examples of what we don’t want in our business, and what we don’t want to be. We are very clear about who we are and where we are going. I think it’s that confidence that comes across at all levels. It’s part of the culture of our business’.
If that all sounds too easy, Jasmin says it wasn’t, and that preparing Outback Global to expand to this level has taken years of building solid business structures. IBA has supported the company in that process, providing business support and mentoring in the early stages of formation, and ongoing support to facilitate the Outback Global team’s attendance at Supply Nation events. In 2012, the company also received a short-term loan through IBA’s new Fast Track Loan Assessment service enabling it to complete a contract with a major corporate in the Australian mining industry.
‘This was not a case of being lucky’, said Jasmin. ‘So even though it appears to have been a short amount of time in which this has happened, it’s actually been a whole lot of hard work. All this time we have been delivering on our side too, so that we look attractive to a partner. We had already been talking to all the people who made recommendations to us [in Denver] for a number of years. We didn’t just rock up and have people say “look at this little Indigenous company, what can we do for them?” There is no handout mentality at work at [Supply Nation] events. We had the whole Outback Global team in Denver. There were tireless meetings, lots of presentations, getting together and working out exactly what we wanted’.
Signing the US joint venture agreement was just the beginning of what continues to be a very busy time for the Outback Global team as it starts establishing solid business foundations for the new US company while ensuring its Australian business stays strong. That’s the reason for the late nights, early mornings and frequent flights to meetings and discussions across a number of countries and time zones.
Jasmin says she and the team are excited about the challenges and opportunities ahead. ‘We have a wealth of experience behind us as well as connections, relationships and skills’, she said. ‘In 12 months time, the story will be totally different again. We are just holding on now – we have the knee pads and elbow pads and we’re just going to hold on’.
Find out more about Outback Global or IBA’s Business Development and Assistance Program.
Looking around the office of artist and business owner Wayne ‘Liwingu’ McGinness, it quickly becomes evident that the man needs a bigger whiteboard. The small board on which Wayne currently records commissions for his marine-grade Aboriginal steel sculptures is full, with entries including Wesfarmers, the state governments of Victoria and the Northern Territory (NT), and the 2012 Australian Paralympian Team.
Halfway down that list though is one entry that means the world to this quiet and unassuming artist—‘Billy Missi and Me’—representing the one metre tubular sculpture Wayne recently created in collaboration with Missi, an internationally renowned Torres Strait Islander artist. To have collaborated with an artist of that calibre, for exhibition at the prestigious Cairns Indigenous Art Fair, is just one of many rewarding creative experiences Wayne has had of late. Such experiences are testament to the rapidly growing reputation and demand for the art he produces through Aboriginal Steel Art, the business he operates from the backyard of his family home.
Just as important as the public recognition he is receiving, however, is the personal validation Wayne feels about the leap of faith he and wife Lucy took in moving their young family away from home, extended family and Wayne’s employment as a welder in the NT to test out their idea for an arts-based business in the tourism hub of Kuranda, near Cairns.
Now with their business galloping ahead faster than they had imagined, the couple are concentrating on ensuring both their business and family foundations stay strong to keep pace with the opportunities coming their way.
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Wayne’s love affair with steel began as a child in the NT watching his late grandfather, Val McGinness (Woodadudawich) at work. ‘I learned everything from grandad, who was a welder and mechanic’, said Wayne. ‘We started out with normal kid’s stuff—we made a sidecar for my bike. And we’d go to the tip and pick out all this steel and cut it up, and it was all old-style welding with gas bottles and torches. All the time I was learning from him about steel thicknesses and so on… My dad often says, ‘You’ve got your grandfather’s brain, and if he was around now think of the things you two could make together'.
It was in 2006, while fencing his family’s new home outside Darwin, that Wayne first thought to combine his love of art with his skills as a welder and steel fabricator. ‘We’d bought a little block of land’, he said. ‘I’d made a fence…and had this idea to make a solar-powered sliding gate. I wanted to put a wrought-iron decoration on it, but I didn’t want to do the normal vines and stuff you see… My parents are both artists, and as I started sketching I was thinking about mum and dad’s paintings… I did a couple of drawings of a four metre crocodile… Off I went to the tip, like I did with grandad, and got some rusty steel for $30 and made this sculpture that I attached to the gate… Dad was here on holiday, and he and mum were looking through my sketchbook and he said, ‘You could probably make a living out of that, you should do that’. Simple as that!’
So the family moved across the country to Kuranda, and Wayne began ploughing his 17 years of welding experience— and all the teachings of his grandfather—into a range of functional Aboriginal art (such as fence panels, gates and balustrades), as well as one-off fine art sculptures for sale through art galleries in Cairns, the Atherton Tablelands and the NT. As a newcomer to the art world, however, establishing relationships with retailers and gallery owners proved tough going, and the family soon found themselves under financial pressure. ‘There were a lot of dead-end phone calls and emails’, said Wayne. ‘I was thinking I’m going to need to go out and get a part-time job and earn money, because we’d put so much into this business… But Lucy said, ‘No, I’ll go and get the job and you can keep working on this’. All along she has been the person who has said we’ve really got something here, we can do this… It had gotten to a stage where we really needed to find some sort of [business] direction, and we thought there must be somebody out there who could help us’.
That help appeared in the form IBA’s series of three one-day Into Business™ workshops, designed to help Indigenous Australians explore their ideas and readiness for business ownership. On completing the free workshops in 2011, Wayne and Lucy received mentoring to move their business forward, and chose Elmarie Gebler and Graham Caldwell of Fortis One Pty Ltd in Cairns from IBA’s network of business consultants.
‘...early on you want to please everyone, get every little bit of work you can, and you’re scared you’re going to lose jobs… But Elmarie helped me realise that there will be other jobs, you need to stick to your pricing, and if a customer wants the work they’ll pay for it—and if not, somebody else will’.
To develop a more solid financial and administrative platform for the business, and a more consistent income stream, Elmarie and Graham encouraged Wayne to explore the corporate gifts market. This would require Wayne to produce multiple copies of his artworks, and Elmarie believes Wayne’s willingness to embrace that idea has contributed to the growth his business is now experiencing. ‘Wayne is not precious about his art’, she said. ‘He’s precious about wanting the world to see it, but not precious to the point of, ‘I will not feed my family because I want to create this beautiful [single] piece of art…’ When we first met, most of Wayne’s work was in galleries, which is lovely, but it’s all on consignment, and you have to hope somebody is going to buy it… So we went off and looked at the market for corporate gifts… The Cairns Convention Centre was the first company to say to Wayne, ‘We’d like to buy a few pieces from you’…and I think that gave him the confidence to think yes, I can do this… It was very hard at first to make those contacts, meet the right people, but once it gained momentum Wayne built up more and more self-confidence…’
Wayne’s confidence as an artist and businessman was further tested when it came to deciding on, and sticking with, a price for his artworks. ‘In the early days I did a lot of work that cost me more time than it was worth’, he said. ‘I found it hard to place a [dollar] value on my work. Everything was a first and there was no unit cost. Also, early on you want to please everyone, get every little bit of work you can, and you’re scared you’re going to lose jobs… But Elmarie helped me realise that there will be other jobs, you need to stick to your pricing, and if a customer wants the work they’ll pay for it—and if not, somebody else will’.
At those IBA workshops…the thing I learned was that the nine to five job is gone; now it’s five until nine and longer some days…’
And there has been no shortage of work since Aboriginal Steel Art joined the Australian Indigenous Minority Supplier Council (AIMSC) as a certified Indigenous supplier. AIMSC was established to assist Indigenous businesses to enter into commercial relationships and supply some of Australia’s largest corporations and government agencies with the goods and services they require. Aboriginal Steel Art continues to receive new and repeat orders from AIMSC members, and was asked by AIMSC itself to design the trophies for presentation at its annual awards in April this year.
At the time of interview, Wayne’s workshop benches were awash with 450 handcrafted steel butterflies commissioned by Wesfarmers (a frequent and loyal customer) for inclusion in a conference bag. Waiting in line was a commission by the Tali Gallery in Sydney for a steel sculpture of ‘Lizzie’, the frill-necked lizard and mascot of the Australian 2012 Paralympic Team.
This rapid growth in reputation and demand for Wayne’s art has brought with it a new and unfamiliar predicament: how and when to say no to a business or creative opportunity. It is a scenario that Elmarie had the foresight to recognise, and encouraged both Wayne and Lucy to consider to avoid overpromising to customers, and/or burning out physically and mentally from the workload. Elmarie said: ‘How much Wayne is there to go around? He is already working long hours to meet the production demands. With the demand as it is he will need to start saying, I can do this for you but you will need to give me ‘x’ number of weeks or months’.
Wayne’s growing confidence as an artist and businessman has enabled him to respond to that challenge. ‘I don’t want to be rude’, he said, ‘but I know I need to be firm [when saying no]… And I need to be pretty picky about what I send out because it’s going to represent the business’.
To cope with current production demands, Wayne has begun outsourcing some of the basic laser steel cutting of his designs, having first locked in non-disclosure agreements with suppliers to protect his art and intellectual property. This has allowed more time for the creative side of his business, designing and sketching new pieces. He’ll soon have even more time when Lucy joins the business on a parttime basis. ‘We thought long and hard about it’, said Wayne. ‘Lucy’s initially going to cut back to three days a week at her job [in real estate], and work two days a week with me. That way we won’t have all our [financial] eggs in one basket’.
Wayne is excited to have his biggest supporter finally working alongside him in a business she has championed from the start. ‘It’s going to be so satisfying for me’, he said, ‘because it really does become our business instead of ‘my art’. I mean I always refer to it as we, our, us but now it really can be our business’.
With Lucy having recently completed a Certificate IV in Frontline Management, the timing could not be better. The rapid growth of Aboriginal Steel Art has already necessitated a rethink of existing business practices and administration systems. In her new role, Lucy will take over much of the customer relationship management and maintenance of databases, while both she and Wayne continue to work with Fortis One on reviewing their accounting, reporting and business structure.
The couple is aware of the energy and time that their expanding business will continue to demand of them, and are focused on ensuring their family unit stays as strong as their business foundations. ‘At those IBA workshops…the thing I learned was that the nine to five job is gone; now it’s five until nine and longer some days…’ Asked how he juggles the demands of a home-based workshop with family life, Wayne said: ‘I don’t know that I ever really switch off from work. I mean I’m not welding roof beams out there [in the workshop]. So some mornings I wake up having dreamed about a design and map it straight out… But working from home, I do get to put the kids on the bus in the morning and be here when they come home from school. And sometimes that might mean working at 11 o’clock at night because I’ve done something fun with them in the afternoon. But I don’t mind, it’s nice and quiet at night and when you love it, it’s not a chore’.
With what they call the phenomenal support of close family and friends behind them, Wayne and Lucy’s excitement and enthusiasm at working together to move Aboriginal Steel Art forward is palpable.
And they’re definitely going to need a much, much bigger whiteboard.
Find out more about Aboriginal Steel Art and IBA's Business Development and Assistance Program.
Doctor Alanna Sandell isn’t all she appears to be. Speaking with her, it soon becomes obvious that beneath a warm and engaging exterior, there lies steely strength, determination and ambition. ‘I’ve been tough a long time’, she said. ‘I’ve got that type of personality’.
It’s this toughness that Alanna drew on in deciding to relocate her medical practice and family from NSW to WA last year. And it’s this toughness that is driving her burning desire to have a lasting impact on the health and wellbeing of current and future generations of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.
So far, this proud Ngarrindjeri woman is hitting the mark on both counts.
Through her business Monitor: Health Check Solutions, Alanna is helping Indigenous Australians maintain their fitness for work and for life, by providing pre-employment assessments and personalised health programs for high-risk employees. These packages are developed following onsite health assessments of a company’s Indigenous employees to identify any early health or safety risks.
As a qualified general practitioner (GP), Alanna has extensive experience in and knowledge of general and Indigenous-specific health issues, including orthopaedics, cardiothoracic intensive care, coronary care, drug and alcohol treatment and mental healthcare.
‘This business is here to help people’, she said. ‘It was conceived to focus on Indigenous health – helping Indigenous people maintain their fitness for work. Our business is designed to effectively address the needs of business by assisting companies in reducing downtime, retaining Indigenous employees and maintaining a safe and healthy workplace’.
Alanna explains that numerous health conditions are more prevalent within the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander population. ‘Indigenous people are affected early in life by many chronic conditions such as diabetes, heart disease, obesity, hypertension, mental health issues, lung disease and renal failure, which significantly affect their quality of life, including their work productivity and retention’, she said.
‘Indigenous people’s health is so affected by these diseases that their lives are shortened by 20 years on average when compared to non-Indigenous Australians’, she continued. ‘That should highlight to all industries that employ Indigenous people that monitoring the health of their Indigenous employees is of enormous benefit in retaining those workers’.
‘A lot of it is lack of education’, she said. ‘They [the clients] haven’t actually understood the disease process or the management involved. I have a very detailed and broad [medical] base. So that’s why I can work in an area like this and feel pretty confident. But it’s also being Indigenous myself and understanding cultural barriers. A lot of the Indigenous guys will speak to me and are more receptive [than going to another GP] in terms of their health. They feel more support from and have more trust in me because I can relate’.
Alanna gives an example of an Indigenous man who refused to take insulin to treat his diabetes. He had received negative feedback from his community about insulin and was frightened of taking it. By gaining his trust and understanding the cultural context, Alanna helped the man to begin treating his condition.
Alanna knows from personal experience the pain that can result from inequity in health, healthcare and health education. She says her childhood was very difficult. Her father suffered from health issues related to an ongoing struggle with his Indigenous identity, and left the family home when Alanna was young.
‘I look at my father - he was never settled, never truly a happy man. Not down to the core; there was a sadness in him for who he was’, she said.
Alanna left home when she was 16 years old and, with characteristic determination, put herself through the remaining two years of high school by working in a supermarket and lodging with a family. She said she was drawn to the medical profession, training first as a nurse.
‘Just to go to university was a treat. I was so pleased to have gotten into university. I did nursing but was never really happy with it. I am very nurturing, so it appeals to my personality, and I loved the health industry. But in nursing I couldn’t make my own decisions. I was being told what to do and I didn’t like that. I realised I had to go off and become the person that my brain wants me to be’.
Alanna moved to Newcastle in NSW to undertake an arts degree, but after being accepted into medical school, obtained her Bachelor of Medicine from the University of Newcastle.
Over the years Alanna has witnessed inequalities in Indigenous health first-hand, having worked in remote communities and within the Aboriginal Medical Service. But the first seed of her business idea was planted in late 2010 when she visited her brother in QLD and spent time at a mine where he was working.
‘Oddly enough, the business idea came out of the blue’, she said. ‘I always wanted to run a business but I didn’t want to run a general practice. I wanted a bigger business, something I am very passionate about; part of me wanted that challenge. I realised that to make any sort of difference you’ve got to put a business together.
‘Indigenous people’s health is so affected by these diseases that their lives are shortened by 20 years on average when compared to non-Indigenous Australians. That should highlight to all industries that employ Indigenous people that monitoring the health of their Indigenous employees is of enormous benefit in retaining those workers.’
As I found out through my research, there is a need for a company like mine to step in with the larger companies [and Indigenous workers] and help facilitate the individual and the company in getting people fit for work’.
Once she had decided on the focus for her enterprise, Alanna set about building a framework around her idea and in doing so came into contact with IBA. To help explore her readiness for business and to develop her idea, IBA invited Alanna to attend its series of Into Business™ workshops.
‘I did the three workshops, which were useful. It was great, such a huge learning curve’, she said. On completing the workshops, facilitator Garry King provided ongoing assistance over the phone to support Alanna as she developed her idea further.
Not long after completing the Into Business™ workshops, Alanna relocated to WA to take up a contract delivering health programs to a major mining company. But things didn’t go according to plan, and that contract fell through. With typical resolve, Alanna set about building relationships with alternative WA companies with whom she might work. She credits Donald MacIntyre, Senior Business Development Manager at Ngarda Civil & Mining (50 per cent subsidiary of Leighton Contractors Pty Limited) for going ‘over and above’ in introducing her to companies that hire Indigenous employees.
A meeting with Leighton Contractors and Broad – who are constructing the inlet and public space facilities for the Elizabeth Quay development in Perth – provided the turning point Alanna was seeking. Alanna attended Leighton Broad’s Elizabeth Quay Indigenous Business Forum, an event supported by IBA, aimed at encouraging employment and business opportunities for Indigenous Australians. The event outlined project opportunities, as well as the resources and strategies available to assist organisations to secure works on the Elizabeth Quay project.
As a result of attending that forum, Alanna was offered an opportunity to work with the Leighton Broad Elizabeth Quay project team delivering a pre-employment medical service for the employees. The company has also leased Alanna office space within its building so she can easily consult with those working on the project. ‘They are promoting Indigenous employment and training and I have slotted into that’ she said, reflecting on her good fortune. However she also credits Leighton Contractors’ employees Shirley McPherson, Group Manager of Indigenous Business, and Raylene Bellottie, Manager of Indigenous Employment for facilitating this initiative.
While her business is still in its infancy, Alanna says she has received a lot of interest from companies about what she is trying to achieve, and she is using every available opportunity to network and talk to people about her work. With the business gaining momentum, Alanna is excited that so many aspects of her past and her professional training are finally coming together.
‘I’m an obsessive person when I want something’, she said. ‘I have not stopped thinking about this business over the last two years. Not for one day. You cannot ever get something off the ground unless you are obsessed. Every day it has to be front of mind. Whatever you want in life, you have to be completely focused’.
‘You can have a goal, a dream’, she added. ‘You don’t have to get everything right all the time... You don’t always have to be the best of the best all the time. Life is part of learning and growing, and moving ahead is actually failing at things and trying again, and being happy with that’.
Juggling the role of medical professional and businesswoman, it is clear that Alanna is a family woman above all else. As a single mother, she is proud of the travel experiences she has offered her two children, and proud of the way they have coped and adapted with the move to WA and a year of drastic change.
‘It was a big thing for us to move and for them to leave all their friends,’ she said. ‘I’ve always kept them very close about what we are doing with the business. It’s our family business, and I wanted them to be a part of the whole thing’.
For all her determination and ambition, Alanna says she is happy to let her business develop at a natural pace, to ensure it achieves the long-term outcomes she yearns for.
‘So my legacy is to my children. I want to say to them that you can be Indigenous and be a doctor, and you can be Indigenous and a businessperson. At the end of my career I don’t want for anything other than to give the next generation strength. It’s very important to know who they are and be proud of who they are.’
‘I would like Indigenous people to have a better understanding about their health and how to prevent poor health, and if they’ve got chronic diseases, to make sure that they are more aware of treatments’, she said. ‘In an ideal world I would like to see no diabetes, or to see the gaps [in health] reduced, and I would like to know that I have picked up a patient’s disease at an early age and managed it.
‘When there are bad health outcomes, the whole fibre of a family is lost. It’s gone. It’s very important to keep all that together’.
‘So my legacy is to my children. I want to say to them that you can be Indigenous and be a doctor, and you can be Indigenous and a businessperson. At the end of my career I don’t want for anything other than to give the next generation strength.
‘It’s very important to know who they are and be proud of who they are. Then they’ll be a settled generation because they’ll be happy with who they are’.
Find out more about Monitor: Health Check Solutions and IBA's Business Development and Assistance Program.
