It was an unexpected act of generosity that enabled the organisation led by this episode’s guest to be in the position it is today. A donation of a property in Melbourne’s Toorak over 50 years ago is now impacting a large number of people, all living with the intention of bringing about positive change in the world.

For some of these people, it is their place of work. For others, it is where they live as part of a community. Others drop in from time to time either casually or part of workshops or other regular catchups.

It is an organisation that up until recently has described itself as an organism. Through some very careful and courageous change work, this group of people have been able to let go of what they once were to embrace what they could be.

The organisation is called Initiatives of Change, Australia, and our guest is the Executive Officer Athalia Zwartz.

I have had a number of interactions with Athalia where I have experienced her love of people, her desire for depth and honesty, her kindness and conviction.

I felt all of these in our conversation together, which I hope you enjoy as well.

If you do enjoy listening to Athalia, you may also enjoy listening to Gilbert Rochecouste on creating long-lasting change within a city, Maria Cameron or suburban communities, or Matt Wicking on cultivating an awareness of ourselves and our context.

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Transitions. I suppose we are always in a transition of some kind. Some are smaller, some larger. For some things the transition seems so slow that it takes effort and skill to notice the changes that are happening.

A book I read recently, called Sapiens, helped me understand two context awakening things:

1. That when it comes to our planet and universe, the timescales of transition are hard to fathom in relation to a human lifespan.
2. As humans we have the power and agency to change our systems, for better or worse.

For me I would like us to work incrementally towards changing our system from those that harm our species and ecosystem, to systems that work in harmony with them.

When it comes to our current economic system, it is clear that there are gaps: it is not working well for much of our species, with many people feeling disconnected, unwell, and excluded; and neither is it working well for our ecosystem, with signs of stress evident everywhere.

My guest for this week, Jodie Hampson, created Neeboz as a platform to enable a system of sharing resources that was an alternative to the current monetary economic system we find ourselves in.

While working as a community development worker she discovered that many of the people she worked to help were okay financially due to the welfare safety net, but emotionally and socially they suffered due to a sense of isolation, disconnection, and lake of opportunities to contribute.

Jodie realised they had skills and resources to offer, but there was no way to enable the connection of what they had to offer with those who needed it.

Jodie created her sharing economy platform to help addresses these issues. Allocating people points instead of money to use for trading services, and encouraging people to meet in person, Jodie has seen that this means of exchange can help unlock hidden resources, and bring people out of their isolation.

Talking about systems and economies is a favourite area of discussion for me, and Jodie is well-versed in these topics. I hope you enjoy our conversation.

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I like it when I come across people working on a number of different projects that, from the outside, look unrelated and disconnected.

And when I look a bit closer and get to know them a better, it becomes apparent that these things are actually related. That while nobody else would connect them, the fact that they are an authentic expression of this person makes the whole thing coherent.

For N’fa Jones, expression through music, through creating an a-typical Melbourne cafe, through working with indigenous Australia, and through speaking the truth for the greater good, are some of the things he uniquely ties together.

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I have been pondering the apparent paradox of constraints. In making certain decision to limit my choices, my things, my options, my tools, it seems to have the effect of opening up possibilities I did not know existed. Choosing these constraints seems to remove the constraints from my ability to think and act with creativity.

My guest for this week is Rebecca Lovitt (@beccabehere), and the theme of constraints came up a number of times during our conversation.

First, Rebecca lives at The Commons in the inner-north of Melbourne. The Commons is an unusual apartment development for a number of reasons, such as having a communal laundry on the roof, a roof-top garden for each of the residents, and perhaps most controversially for an inner-urban development, no car parking spaces. Moving to this apartment complex meant the adoption of a number of constraints into Rebecca’s live, including living more simply and selling her car. But despite these restrictions, results of this development for those that live there have been quite remarkable.

In the three years since it was completed, only two people have moved out. The features like the communal laundry and garden, and the low balcony walls between apartments, means that people have many opportunities for unplanned interactions with their neighbours. This, combined with the shared values of simple and sustainable living, has meant a strong and closely connected community has developed for those who live there. Neighbours know each other’s birthdays, know the names of each other kids, and instead of looking down when they pass one another in the lift lobby, actually stop and have a chat.

At the time it was a difficult move for Rebecca to sell her car in order to move into The Commons Rebecca. Not only was she confronted with her own doubt, but also some of those around her questioned its sustainability. But she discovered that in removing that choice, so many other options opened up to her. Riding her bicycle is now a regular activity, as is walking her son to school and catching public transport. And in turn, these type of transportation activities open up so many more options for connection and interaction with her neighbours and surrounding residents, options that the bubble of a driving in a car can deny us.

In other parts of her life constraints also feature: Rebecca is an artist; she has led the tech start-up BeCollective, managed and curated the art collection at a public hospital, and now is working at the Alcohol and Drug Foundation to help bring about change through the constraints in culture, funding and history she finds herself within there.

The constraints she has chosen to work within have led Rebecca down a path that I suspect is more diverse and fulfilling than any she could have imagined. When I think about her breadth of skills and experience, and the values she lives by, I am excited and intrigued to see the impact she will have through her current and upcoming projects.  I hope you enjoy listening to our conversation.

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I perviously lived in a one-bedroom apartment in the Sydney suburb of Surry Hills. In itself not that remarkable, but what I was surprised by was how much I enjoyed living in such a compact space, even when we added a very small third member to the mix.

The facts are that the proportion of the global population living in urban areas is increasing, as are the population densities of our cities. More of us are going to find ourselves living in apartment type housing, and living in closer proximity to our neighbours.

How then can we make this experience as good as possible, so that we enjoy and actually thrive in this new set-up, rather than feeling more isolated and unwell?

When I survey the apartments in Melbourne that I have come across, what comes to mind is poor quality dwellings that have been designed, built, and created by people who are quite a way off wanting or needing to live in this kind of accommodation. Developments that have risk reduction and profit maximisation well in front of design quality, wellbeing, and connection to community.

My guest for this week, Pino Demaio, started a conversation with his friends about the experience they had had of apartment living in Europe. For all of them this it had been a great experience, one that contrasted with their experience of living in apartments in Melbourne.

They look at each other and saw that between them they had the skills to start conceptualising an alternative. Six years later and they have sold all but one of the dwellings that have been the result of this conversation, a townhouse and apartment development in Melbourne’s inner north suburb of Clifton Hill.

Called 120 Roseneath, the project is notable for a number of reasons. For starters, the four directors of Assemble (the development business they created) are going to live on the property, along with a number of their family and friends. Throughout the process there has been a strong focus on community, both the community surrounding the development and those who will be inhabiting the apartments and townhouses. Communal spaces are integral to the design, including gardens, a workshop and BBQ area, facilitating the accidental interactions they hope will help build community. And of course the overall design and the design of each dwelling has been done so with principles of sustainability in mind.

I think I get excited about this project because it reminds me of where I used to live in Sydney, and inspires me that I may get to experience something even better one day.

Assemble and Pino do some other cool things, including Local Peoples – a branding and design agency, Fieldwork Projects – an architecture practice, and Assemble Papers – a online and offline publication about the culture of living closer together (one of four regular newsletters I read – the others being Dr Jason Fox, Future Crunch, and Brain Pickings).

The way in which we live together is a common theme throughout this podcast, and one I will be exploring in more detail next year. I hope you enjoy our conversation.

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I get consistently blown-away by the people I get to interview on this podcast. Its not just the way they are living, or the work and impact they are having, but also the way they are going about it. As a friend of mind puts it, it is the egoless-ness, humility and matter-of-fact way they are going about it that I also find inspiring.

This week’s guest, Shalini Samuel, is no exception to this. Whether it be talking about the people she meets through the interpreting work she does, the impact and way she affects people through the music she plays, or creating forums and platforms for large corporates or smaller social enterprises to have a positive social and environmental impact: Shalini talks about each with the same humility and purpose.

The impression I was left with after talking with her is that there is a congruence in all she does. This was apparent through her answer to the second last question I ask all my guests: about the disruption they would one day like to be part of. For Shalini her answer was that she is already part of it, through the work she is doing through the Global Women’s Project.

She reflected that if it ever occurred to her to be part of another disruption, the it would time for her to be part of it; then and there. The thing she is working on now is the thing she believes most strongly in.

It was a heart-warming delight to spend an hour sitting in the lounge of the Palace Cinema Como. I hope you enjoying joining us as well.

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I have vivid memories of my first ‘real’ job after university. I felt lost. I felt unprepared. I had had illusions in my head of changing the capitalist system; of learning the game and turning it on itself.

I had been so good at following the rules all through my childhood. Through school, church, and university. And it had worked so well for me. Great grades; loved by teachers; and landed the job I thought I wanted at a big 4 consulting firm.

But when I got there nothing was as I expected. The rules no longer applied and I didn’t know how to learn the new game. So I struggled. I got depressed, and in some ways it is only now, 17 years after hitting the workforce, that I have developed the skills to trust myself, to understand and follow my curiosity, and to feel confident enough to express and create the things that I want to bring into the world.

Forty years ago my guest for this week, Philip O’Carroll, with is wife Faye Berryman started a school in Fitzroy North. It was the 70s, and the hippy’s kids were coming to be of school age.

As Philip explains it, this was a time when our species had brought itself to the point of nuclear self-extinction, and this result on many of the assumptions and ways of doing things in our society to be questioned.

One of these things was education and the way we use the 13 years allocated to preparing young humans for the world of which they will become stewards.

Philip and his wife were sending their kids to an alternative school which collapsed, and instead of giving up on the idea they took it upon themselves to create something new.

In the downstairs of their Fitzroy North terrace house the started Fitzroy Community School. Writing up their way of doing school and putting an ad in the local paper, they soon had 20 students enrolled.

Putting and emphasis on inter-personal communication and education the whole child, they knew their approach would not be for every parent but wanted to offer a way of doing school for those who were looking for it.

Forty years later, and now with 65 students (and a long waiting list) across three joined and extended houses, the school is consistently in the top 1% of external school testing across the state, with secondary schools asking this primary school for more of the type of students that help nurture.

Philip reflects on the characteristics of the students that have come through the school: engaged and responsible for their learning; equipped to handle and adapt to new and unfamiliar situations; a curiosity and desire to explore.

While the school operates on a timetable, it is only there to fallback on when there is nothing better to do. There are free-periods every day and no timetable for Wednesdays. The take every opportunity to get out of the build, explore that Edinburgh Gardens across the road, or attending anything from the birth of a horse to regular swimming lessons. Camps and being in the outdoors are features of the kids’ experience at the school.

Intimate, the school is like an extended family, and gets me thinking that this is as close as I have seen to the feel of a village in an urban setting.

Despite its obvious success, Philip reflects on how difficult it would be to start something similar today, lamenting the lack of diversity available to parents.

Philip is wise, humble, and inspiring, and to me sums up the essence of a subtle disruptor. I hope you enjoy this conversation.

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A friend of mine recently posted on Facebook asking for recommendations for an accounting firm that was well suited to purpose-led social enterprises. I was interested in following the responses he got because I too was on the lookout for an accountant whose purpose was aligned with my own.

I’m not sure how he felt about it, but I was underwhelmed by the answers he got to his request. It wasn’t that people didn’t care. Its more that people seemed to be scratching their heads about who to recommend. Everybody seemed to know an accountant, but it was difficult to find one that had purpose and positive impact at its core.

It was for this reason I was excited to interview my guests for this week, Ben Walker and Harvee Pene, partners in the accounting firm Inspire CA. At the centre of their mission is to help businesses that exist to have a positive impact on the world around them. They know that in helping other organisations to be well-managed and profitable, the impact of Inspire CA is magnified as those businesses achieve their vision.

Appropriately we had our conversation at the headquarters of Thankyou in Melbourne, an organisation that donates all of its profits to helping eradicate poverty around the world. As Ben and Harvee point out, and echoing the advice of Matt Allen from a previous episode, it is imperative that organisations like Thankyou continue to make a profit if they are going to be able to continue on their quest. And essential to protecting their profit is being financially literate and responsible.

And this is what Inspire CA do best. They take something that can be difficult to break down and access, to something understandable and fun, both in their work and through this conversation. They don’t just give advice on how to reduce tax, but they encourage their clients to regularly pay themselves from their profit, to celebrate their success, and help them connect with a community of similarly aligned businesses.

Post disrupting accounting, Ben would like to be part of making a dent in the hunger and homelessness that exists on our planet, and Harvee would like to inspire more people to have a mindset of giving and helping others.

Although we recorded this conversation in Melbourne and it forms part of the Melbourne series of this podcast, Harvee and Ben are actually based in Brisbane, one of the cities I am looking forward to featuring next year.

Ben and Harvee break down the stereotypes of accountants in both style and substance. I hope you enjoy listening to our conversation.

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I am sitting on the sofa, next to one of my subtly disrupting heroes, in his house. The place where he does a lot of his work.

I feel honoured for a number of reasons: that I get to chat with him again on this podcast; that he has invited me into his home; and that he has carved out some time for me from what I imagine is a jam-packed schedule.

It is a Friday night when I chat with Dr Jason Fox, and before we start recording I do notice that there is a bit of tiredness about him; that it must have been a full-on week; and I wonder how this conversation is going to go.

I need not have been concerned. It was as if as soon as I turned on the mic something switched in Jason. He came alive as I asked him questions about what he has been up to, and even turned the tables on me to ask about my new project.

And I think that this in the key thing to come out of this conversation. That taking time to pause in our busy lives, to have questions asked of us and to ponder them without restriction, is some of the most valuable work we can do.

We all know that we are busy. Too busy. And we often feel guilty for having a good think, a coffee chat with a colleague, or going for a pondering walk. But is is precisely these types of rituals – the type that get us to slow down for long enough for empathy to build, for new ideas to form, for solutions to emerge – that will allow us to contribute our highest value work, the type that our species and planet need in order to find the unprecedented solutions to the unprecedented problems we are facing.

It is this idea about creating spaces within which we can ponder, that have led Jason to create the 1-day workshop he has called Percolate. At a time of year where people are starting to think about what they might intend for the next year, a time of year that is often even more packed with events and stuff to do, Percolate has been designed to give people a chance to pause and ponder. Instead of answers and to dos, speakers will be leaving participants with a number of questions Jason hopes will linger and shape their new year.

Jason is as warm as ever in this conversation, and I hope you enjoy listening to him again.

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A few weeks ago an AFL footballer gave a press conference. The captain of his club, he had just completed a 12 month ban and the football world was anxious to hear if he had decided to retire, or to play on next year.

He informed the media that he had indeed decided to stay on. But what I found the most interesting thing about the press conference was what this young man decided to wear. Written in green on the underside of the peak of his cap was the word ‘FEMINIST’.

I don’t know if this act sparked any conversations around the country; I’m pretty sure most conversations inspired by this press conference were about the fact he was coming back to play. But I was struck by it and it got me thinking about what a year of reflection away from the football world may have sparked in this man.

Perhaps he was shocked when earlier this year football power-brokers joked about drowning a female football media personality. Perhaps he started to noticed the casual and subtle (and sometimes blatant) ways women are often degraded by media personalities. Perhaps he was inspired by the launch of the AFL Women’s competition and the standard of football and sportspersonship AFLW players display.

My guest for this week is Carmen Hawker (@CarmenHawker). Carmen is a life-long football fan whose mission is to help make gender equality a reality, and to help everyday people understand its importance and the role they can also play in brining it into being.

Inspired by the way in which football, and sport in general, can be used as a vehicle for social change, Carmen is also involved in helping improving the lives of women both locally and around the world. Here in Melbourne Birth for HumanKIND helps women in disadvantage circumstances with resources and support during pregnancy and childbirth. In Cambodia and Nepal, The Global Women’s Project works to empower women to bring about change in their own lives and the communities they live within.

The work Carmen is doing is so necessary. I am inspired by the way she is able to uncompromisingly bring her values and her whole self to the world of football, a place where women often feel unsafe and belittled. It is an exciting time for sport in this city, where steps towards gender equality are being taken that I hope will also translate outside the football arena. While it may be hard to imagine what a truly gender liberated, multi-cultural society would look like, I am excited to think about the richness and depth it will bring to my life, and in making this livable city even more so for more people.

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