Westbury’s Shannon Barwick aspires to be a leader in agricultural business banking, but she wants to be the type of leader who feeds back into the community as well.
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Ms Barwick, 33, won the Tasmanian Women in Agriculture scholarship to attend the Marcus Oldham Rural Leadership Program in Geelong this year.
Working as a rural manager at Rabobank on the road between Launceston and Hobart, Ms Barwick sees the leadership skills gained through her participation will help her at work and on the committees she is part of.
“I’m really looking forward to the leadership skills I can take back to my workplace and also those three different committees, that are all very varied,” Ms Barwick said.
“It should be great.”
Starting out as a picker at Blocker Freesias at Wesley Vale three years ago, Taylor Franklin-Smith, 23, now oversees crops production, irrigation and pest management for the business.
Ms Franklin-Smith, of Shearwater, won the Tas Alkaloid Scholarship.
“I’m looking forward to attending this program to help me build my leadership skills within my position at work,” she said.
“I want to become a bit more of a leader amongst the staff and try to transfer the skills I learn on this program to the staff as well; not just be a leader, but help them build their own skills as well,” she said.
Past scholarship recipient Samantha Sullivan, from TP Jones in Youngtown, said Tasmanian Women in Agriculture had offered such scholarships since 1997 and Ms Franklin-Smith and Ms Barwick were the 39th and 40th recipients.
“Our honour roll of previous participants is testament to the learning outcomes of Marcus Oldham Rural Leadership Program, with a lot of them going on to achieve in the sector,” Ms Sullivan said.
The Marcus Oldham Rural Leadership Program is an intensive five-day workshop at the Geelong campus.
More than 780 program graduates across the nation have participated in one of the longest running rural leadership programs in Australia, Primary Industries Minister Sarah Courtney said.
“It’s estimated that women produce at least 49 per cent of real farm income in Australia and it is exciting to see TWiA encourage members to expand their skills and continue to develop leadership capacity,” Ms Courtney said.
“Leadership skills help women to influence directions and priorities, create enthusiasm and purpose, and get things done in terms of engaging others to take action,” she said.