Articles
Changing Perspectives...
on Parenthood
The MFA DE&I Council would like to see an industry where everyone can thrive, feel heard, supported, and safe to do their best work. Let’s meet the Changers who are sharing their own lived experiences to inspire us all to change for the better.
Changing Perspectives...
On The problem isn’t becoming a parent; it’s the system we ask parents to return to
Lauren Thornborough, Managing Partner, Mindshare
Louise Wilson, Head of Growth & Mid-Market ANZ, LinkedIn – Founders of The Village
We started The Village because we were angry and frustrated.
For more than two decades, we’d watched brilliant people across Australia’s media industry reach one particular career milestone – becoming a parent – and then slowly disappear.
Not overnight.
Quietly.
They’d step back from leadership opportunities. Decline promotions. Move industries altogether. Or leave the workforce entirely.
For years, we accepted the story we’d all been told: parenthood changes priorities.
But after living it ourselves and listening to hundreds of other parents, we no longer believe that’s the full story. We’ve come to believe something much harder to admit:
The problem isn’t becoming a parent. It’s the system we ask parents to return to.
When we launched The Village – an organisation set up to support, connect and advocate for working parents in the Australian media industry – our ambition was to create a place where working parents could find connection and support. What we didn’t anticipate was that, in creating that space, we’d gain a window into experiences many leaders never see.
We’ve now spoken to hundreds of parents across Australia’s media and marketing industry. Different organisations. Different life stages. Different family structures. Yet the same themes surface again and again.
The mother who comes back from parental leave feeling she has to prove she’s still ambitious.
The father who wants to take extended leave but worries what his colleagues will think.
The parent who leaves work at 4:30pm for daycare pick-up, only to log back on after bedtime because visibility still matters.
The leader who genuinely wants to support flexibility but has never experienced the invisible mental load of coordinating childcare, school holidays, appointments and careers at the same time.
None of these stories are dramatic. That’s what makes them so easy to miss. They’re made up of thousands of small moments that, over time, can leave someone questioning whether they still belong.
The data tells the same story.
In The Village’s first industry survey, 80% of working parents told us they had considered leaving the media industry altogether.
That isn’t a parenting problem. It's a retention problem. And one our industry can’t afford to ignore.
The biggest lesson The Village has taught us is that while flexibility is essential, it isn’t enough. Policies don’t create inclusion. Culture does.
A flexible work policy has little value if people worry they’ll be judged for using it. Parental leave doesn’t change outcomes if employees return feeling they have to rebuild their credibility from scratch. Hybrid work isn’t equitable if career-defining conversations still happen after hours or in rooms some people can’t access. The gap between policy and lived experience is where talent is lost.
The good news?
Culture isn’t changed by one organisation or one initiative.
It’s changed every time a manager asks a better question. Every time a leader shares their own caregiving reality. Every time we stop seeing working parents as needing accommodation and start recognising them as talent worth retaining. When we started The Village, we hoped to create a community.
What we didn’t expect was that the community would change us.
It shifted our perspective from asking, “How do we help working parents?” to a much more important question:
How do we advocate to build an industry where becoming a parent is no longer a reason to leave?
Because changing that perspective doesn’t just benefit parents. It benefits every organisation that wants to keep its best people.
To broaden your understanding of DE&I, complete the SBS Core Inclusion course – Australia’s leading online DE&I training course – available for free to MFA member employees.
Changing Perspectives...
on Opportunity & Inclusion
The MFA DE&I Council would like to see an industry where everyone can thrive, feel heard, supported, and safe to do their best work. Let’s meet the Changers who are sharing their own lived experiences to inspire us all to change for the better.
Changing Perspectives...
What Golf taught me about opportunity, belonging & inclusion
Daniel Mitchell, Head of People, Wavemaker
Before I worked in People & Culture, I played professional golf (not very well, mind you). On the surface, golf can look like the purest version of merit. Everyone plays the same course. The rules are clear. At the end of the round, the scorecard tells you who performed.
For a long time, I accepted that story. Golf rewards discipline, preparation and resilience, and I still believe those things matter. But the longer I spent in the game, the more I understood that a shared scorecard does not mean a shared starting point.
No two players arrive at the first tee with the same conditions behind them. Some have had access to coaching from an early age, quality equipment, time to practice, financial backing and people who understand how the system works.
Others may have the same ability and ambition, but spend far more energy finding their way into the game, staying in it and proving that they belong.
That realisation changed the way I understood performance. Talent matters, but talent is not developed or judged in a vacuum. Confidence, opportunity, networks and belonging all shape what someone is able to show when the moment arrives.
When I moved from golf into People & Culture, I started recognising the same pattern in a different setting. Our workplaces have their own scorecards. We look at results, progression, visibility and potential. We often describe success as though everyone has been playing the same course under the same conditions.
But the conditions around performance are not always visible. We do not necessarily see who had a sponsor advocating for them, who was taught the unwritten rules, who felt comfortable speaking in the room or who was using part of their energy simply trying to fit in. We see the outcome, but not always everything that made it possible.
That is where my perspective on equality and equity began to clarify. Equality can mean giving everyone the chance to play the course. Equity asks a harder question: does everyone have a fair chance to participate, develop and perform?
Golf’s handicap system helped me think about that distinction. It does not remove the standard or the competition. It acknowledges difference so that people with different levels of experience, ability and background can participate meaningfully in the same game. It is not a perfect analogy for DE&I, but it challenged my assumption that fairness always means treating people identically.
In our industry, we rightly care about merit. The risk is that the language of merit can stop us from looking more closely at how it is recognised. If pathways into the industry are narrow, if ‘potential’ is assessed subjectively, or if opportunity depends on informal relationships, then using the same process for everyone can keep producing the same outcomes.
Golf also taught me that performance is not only technical. Standing over a shot, you need trust in your preparation, your judgement and your right to be there. In the workplace, belonging creates a similar foundation. It is difficult to do your best work when you are second-guessing whether your voice will be heard, whether you can be yourself or whether your difference will count against you.
That is why inclusion cannot live only in policy, training or a calendar of events. It is shaped in everyday moments: who receives the stretch opportunity, whose ideas are credited, how meetings are run, which behaviours are challenged and whether a leader remains curious when someone describes an experience different from their own.
My experience has also taught me to be careful about assuming that my view of the course is the course itself. What felt open or straightforward to me may have presented barriers to someone else. The only way to understand that difference is to create space for people to describe what they have experienced and to listen without immediately explaining it away.
There is another principle in golf: you play the ball as it lies, but you also leave the course in good condition for those who come after you. That is how I think about the work of inclusion. We need to respond honestly to the conditions people face now while changing the systems and habits that shape what others will experience next.
My perspective is only one perspective. Golf shaped how I think about fairness, opportunity and belonging, but people across our industry will have arrived at those questions through very different experiences. Those stories matter, including the moments when people felt seen and supported, and the moments when they encountered barriers others may never have noticed.
A level playing field is not something we inherit. It is something we create, deliberately, collectively and one decision at a time – for ourselves and others.
To broaden your understanding of DE&I, complete the SBS Core Inclusion course – Australia’s leading online DE&I training course – available for free to MFA member employees.
Changing Perspectives...
on Parenthood
The MFA DE&I Council would like to see an industry where everyone can thrive, feel heard, supported, and safe to do their best work. Let’s meet the Changers who are sharing their own lived experiences to inspire us all to change for the better.
Changing Perspectives...
On What coming back from maternity leave taught me about the leader I want to be
Elizabeth Clapson, Group Business Director, JOY
I’ve been at JOY for 10 years. I’ve grown up here professionally. I’ve built relationships, led clients, managed teams, been through the highs and lows of agency life and, like most people in our industry, worked through plenty of change along the way.
Then I took 12 months off to have my son.
A lot happened while I was away. There were big changes internally, new clients, lots of new people, and the business continued to move forward without me. I knew that would happen, of course. You don’t expect an organisation to stand still while you’re on maternity leave. What I wasn’t prepared for was how it would make me feel when I came back.
For the first time in a long time, I felt like I had something to prove. There were people sitting around the table who didn’t know me. They didn’t know the clients I’d worked on or the things I’d contributed to over the previous 10 years. They just knew me as someone who had been away for a year.
And, if I’m honest, I started questioning my own value. Could I still keep up? Was I still relevant? Had I missed too much? Was I still the leader I thought I was?
It was a strange experience because, on paper, I had plenty of reasons to feel confident. I’d been at JOY for 10 years and had returned to a senior role. But confidence doesn’t always follow logic.
The practical side of coming back was a big part of it too. I commute around four hours a day, two hours door to door each way, and I have a young family. For the first six months I was back at work, my husband was the primary carer for our son. That made a huge difference. He took on a lot of the mental load at home, which meant I could put my energy into work while I was rebuilding my confidence and finding my feet again.
The flexibility I had at JOY mattered just as much. I’ve always been ambitious and I’ve always wanted to do a good job. Having a family hasn’t changed that.
What has changed is that I can’t pretend the rest of my life doesn’t exist when I walk into the office. Working somewhere that understands that has been a big part of being able to come back and contribute at the level I wanted to.
Eight months after coming back, I’ve been promoted to Group Business Director.
That has made me think a lot about what I actually value in a leader. Before I went on leave, I measured myself by how much I could tick off my to-do list. Being across everything, solving problems, always being available. Coming back has shifted that.
I don't want to be the person my team needs for every decision. I want to build a team that is confident enough to make good decisions without me. That means giving people real opportunities to grow, rather than just delegating the tasks I don’t have time to do. It means helping people build commercial confidence and giving them exposure to things that might feel a little outside their comfort zone.
It also means being really clear. Agency life can be chaotic. There are always competing priorities, changing client expectations and a lot of noise. I’ve realised that one of the most useful things I can do as a leader is create some clarity in the middle of it. What are we actually trying to achieve? What matters most? What does good look like? What do I need you to own?
People don’t need me to have every answer. They need to know where we’re going and feel confident enough to work out how to get there.
I’ve also become much more conscious of trust. Coming back after a year reminded me that relationships aren’t something you can take for granted, particularly when some people know your history and others are meeting you for the first time.
For me, trust comes from being honest, reliable and giving people the space to make decisions and deliver.
I’ve experienced the value of that trust myself. JOY’s flexibility and trust in me as I returned to work has meant a lot. It has allowed me to find a way of working that works for my family while still being ambitious about my career, and it’s made me think more about the kind of environment I want to create for others.
I think that’s probably the biggest change in how I see leadership. The more senior I become, the less interested I am in being the person with all the answers. I want to create an environment where other people can lead, make decisions, take ownership, have a point of view, make mistakes and learn from them. And where they don't have to fit their entire life around work to be successful at it.
I still have moments where I question whether I’m doing enough. I don’t think a promotion magically gets rid of that. What has changed is what I use to measure myself against.
I don’t need to be across everything. I don’t need to prove myself to every new person who joins the business. And I don’t think my value as a leader is measured by how much my team needs me.
If anything, I’d like it to be the opposite.
I want to build capability, create clarity, earn trust and enable people to do things they didn’t think they could do. And if, one day, I can step away from the room knowing my team has everything they need to make good decisions without me, I’ll know I’ve done a pretty good job.
To broaden your understanding of DE&I, complete the SBS Core Inclusion course – Australia’s leading online DE&I training course – available for free to MFA member employees.
Redesigning the Agency Value Model
Explore what may be limiting your agency’s pricing power and where to focus first.
What you need to do
- Complete the Agency Model Map diagnostic by 30 September 2026
Each agency brand should complete one diagnostic. -
Complete it with your leadership team
We recommend bringing your leadership team together to complete the diagnostic. The questions prompt valuable discussion about your current commercial model and where change may be needed. -
Let us know when you’ve completed it
Email Amy@mediafederation.org.au
The MFA has partnered with the Value Model Institute to bring the Agency Model Map diagnostic to MFA member agency CEOs and CFOs across Australia.
The Institute's research, led by Brian Kessman of Lodestar Agency Consulting, author of the VoxComm guidance paper Redesigning the Agency Value Model, has identified four patterns in how agencies are changing their commercial model. Each model has its own advantages and its own constraints.
The diagnostic maps your agency to one of those patterns. Your leadership team gets a clear, shared read on how your model is affecting business performance, and a personalised roadmap for what to change first.
Your responses also inform The State of the Agency Value Model: MFA Edition, published by the Value Model Institute, produced with Lodestar, in partnership with the MFA so your market can see where it stands.
Responses are confidential and anonymous, reported only as aggregated results.
Agencies have sold their work by the hour for decades. That model is breaking. AI is eroding the value of the work and procurement keeps pushing fees down. Clients, meanwhile, want to pay for outcomes. Most agency leaders have two or three years to redefine what makes their agency distinctly valuable beyond what AI can produce, and to shift to a commercial model not tied to hours.
The Value Model Institute sets the standard, drawn from guiding hundreds of agencies worldwide that have already made the change.
FAQ's
The Agency Model Map is a short online diagnostic completed by the agency's CEO or CFO. The questions cover how your company packages and prices its work, how its revenue relates to its headcount, how it responds to pricing pressure, and a small set of firm characteristics used for benchmarking, such as size, discipline, and region. No accounts or passwords are created. Questions are multiple choice and can be answered based on leadership's existing knowledge.
The recommended approach is to complete it with the leadership team in the room together. The questions prompt a discussion most leadership teams have not had about their own commercial model. Companies report that the conversation sharpens their priorities faster than the results alone.
The CEO or CFO should lead the conversation, with one response per agency. Where more than one leader is involved, the response should reflect an aligned answer. For holding companies, each brand counts as a separate agency and therefore should complete its own diagnostic.
Each agency receives its results immediately: its archetype (one of four commercial model types identified by the Institute's research), a read on where its current model is helping or hurting business performance, and a personalized roadmap.
The roadmap sequences what to change first across the four levers of the value model: how the company defines, designs, delivers, and captures its value. If your association enters into a paid program, then there is a workshop video library to provide further guidance for how to make each change.
The Institute collects diagnostic responses directly, as per the terms and privacy policy presented to each agency at the point of collection. Individual results are visible only to the agency that submitted them.
Findings are published only as aggregated, anonymised results, and any segment that falls below the Institute's minimum response threshold is not reported, so no thin slice of data can expose an individual firm. The Institute never shares or sells agency data.
Changing Perspectives...
on Industry
The MFA DE&I Council would like to see an industry where everyone can thrive, feel heard, supported, and safe to do their best work. Let’s meet the Changers who are sharing their own lived experiences to inspire us all to change for the better.
Changing Perspectives...
On 'No, I’m not from Venezuela'
Alan Valenzuela, Implementation & Activation Executive, EssenceMediacom
“You must be from Venezuela!” is a statement I’ve heard more times than I can count, and while often well-intentioned, it perfectly encapsulates a subtle but present challenge in everything we participate in: the tendency to make assumptions.
My last name is Valenzuela.
Assumptions by definition are things that are accepted to be true, without evidence. Though they often start out innocent, assumptions in their best cases come from personal biases, or in worst cases rooted in racism, sexism or stereotypes. This can extend beyond cultural identities, leaking into assuming we know the best way to communicate, understand and engage with differing cultures often often causing a division, false narratives and marginalisation that some might not even be aware of.
I was born in the US, raised in Adelaide and in regional Victoria by proud Ecuadorian parents. I speak Spanish, but have an Australian and American accent. More often than not, I’m categorised (sometimes implicitly) in one of these groups: Latino, American, or “the kid from regional”.
Experiences like mine accentuate something deeper; how complex and often misunderstood identity can be.
Identity is knowing who you are. However, to many this becomes puzzling and profound when factors such as migration, languages, and career come into play. Do you identify yourself as someone who works in the media? A hard worker? An Australian? An immigrant?
Whatever your answer, the introductions we give ourselves rarely tell the whole story. Your boss may be struggling with their mental health right now, the hard worker you know could be suffering from burnout, or the woman who introduces herself as Australian may still be questioned about her background because of the colour of her skin.
Too often, we think we know something or someone, but in reality, we don’t.
We combat assumptions by challenging, rethinking and connecting to create greater clarity, inclusion and success.
Working at EssenceMediacom, I have worked on and witnessed hundreds of incredible campaigns and this is what has become clear: the best media campaigns happen when people move beyond assumptions and genuinely engage with diverse identities and cultures.
This means moving beyond passive cultural observation, relying on assumptions and simply “watching” culture, inclusion and diversity from a distance, to becoming active cultural participants. It means engaging, asking questions, embracing nuance, and recognising that learning is ongoing. Every person, experience and perspective is an opportunity to deepen understanding and challenge your own assumptions.
Assumptions and accepting a lack of knowledge can lead to missing cultural nuances and mistaking identity. Targeting diverse audiences means knowing diverse audiences. As Australia continues to become increasingly diverse and out industry evolves, beyond curious about diversity and culture will enrich your understanding, allowing the opportunity to create campaigns that don’t just win awards and achieve a goal, but truly resonate with the audiences all work so hard trying to reach each day.
We spend a lot of time around our peers, so I encourage you to look beyond labels and make space for deeper, more meaningful conversations. Everyone has a story worth hearing.
Our industry is amazing, dynamic, fascinating and often demanding, but it’s also full of opportunity. We might not be saving the world, but we’re helping shape it. Let’s continue to come together in a positive, exciting and inclusive way.
To broaden your understanding of DE&I, complete the SBS Core Inclusion course – Australia’s leading online DE&I training course – available for free to MFA member employees.