12 minute read
Alumnae news
The courage growto
In mid February, Dio Old Girl Anna Squelch (2000) returned to school after almost two decades. Anna visited the Diocesan Junior School in a capacity she could never have imagined when she left Dio at the end of Form 6 (Year 12).
er mission was to run a series of workshops with the Year 6 girls, teaching them about emotions, mindfulness, friendships, self love, boundaries and vulnerability. While they’re topics Anna knows well, working with primary school children was a new but entirely uplifting experience for her.
“It was an absolute career highlight and I can’t wait to share this with more schools in the future,” she says. “It’s so nice, too, to go full circle and to go back to the place where I started.”
An integrative nutrition health coach and mindset and empowerment mentor, Anna launched Conscious World Wellness in 2017. She works predominantly with women in their 20s and 30s, helping them succeed and find alignment in all areas of their lives, from health, wealth and business to relationships, spirituality and mindset.
“We are consciously creating everything that is happening in our lives, first in our minds. I only wish I knew that 20 years ago when I was shaping my beliefs about the world. I could have saved myself a whole lot of pain and suffering. But it was necessary for my growth.” programmes. She currently has clients around New Zealand as well as in LA, London and Fiji. She also organises and runs retreats in Bali and Waihi, tailoring the content to suit her clients. Generally, her Bali retreats involve yoga, massage, surfing lessons, and workshops on goalsetting, visioning and holistic health.
“Connecting people, helping them fulfill their purpose and live up to their potential – that’s what I love doing,” she says.
But getting to this point wasn’t a straight forward path. Anna initially studied hospitality at AUT University, then worked in the hotel industry in Auckland. In 2006, she moved to Sydney and got her first taste of the corporate world working at Blackberry, first as a facilities manager and then on the marketing team running the company’s campaigns for Telstra.
“I’d only planned to be in Sydney for a year before heading to London, but I enjoyed working on the events and launch parties, and with US celebrities, so I stayed longer.”
But it was also a challenging role. In her mid 20s and with minimal training, Anna was given huge budgets and lots of responsibility – that’s when the self doubt began to creep in. “I started wondering if I was cut out for that world. I felt massively out of my depth and developed decision fatigue. I was incapable of making decisions. I just didn’t have trust in myself, and that spilled out into my personal life. Do I go to London? Stay in Sydney? Stay with this boyfriend?”
With Blackberry’s popularity waning, the fear of being made redundant prompted Anna to bite the bullet. In 2012, she moved to London and searched for a job in the lucrative financial services industry to help fund her European travels. She admits to embellishing her credentials a little to secure work.
“I said that I’d been an EA (executive assistant) before. And when I took that leap into the unknown, that set in motion an idea that maybe I am capable of doing this.
“I always say to my clients, going outside of your usual environment is the best place to anchor in any kind of transformation. I was on the other side
of the world without family and friends, and I decided to go for it. I was hired by a property investment management firm and worked there as an EA for 18 months; I just applied the skills I had and used my initiative.”
As an eight-to-five role, it wasn’t particularly taxing, but the pace, energy and crime in London, and the sheer number of people triggered something dark in Anna.
“That’s where my anxiety first developed, but I didn’t know I had anxiety. I experienced frequent nausea and could only travel short distances on the tube or bus. I developed emetophobia, which is a fear of vomiting or seeing others vomit, so I’d be scared to go out in public, particularly at night when people were drinking.”
Anna has been dealing with anxiety ever since, using nutrition, yoga, meditation, hypnotherapy and other modalities to manage it. At one point she tried to discuss her anxiety with a manager at work but was dismayed at how poorly they initially handled things. It’s something she’s trying to change. Last year, during Mental Health Awareness Week, she was invited to speak to Huffer and FCB Media about managing stress and anxiety in the workplace. Her website also contains some excellent advice for those encountering workplace stress. In 2014, Anna left London and returned to Sydney, working in EA roles at Goodman Property Group and Commonwealth Bank of Australia. Two years later, she flew home to Auckland, miserable after the end of a romantic relationship.
What might have seemed like an ending was in fact an exciting new beginning. Having moved countries six times in 12 years searching for something that would spark her passion, Anna was finally about to find it back home, thanks to another Dio Old Girl.
“My friend Seon Venville was studying to be a life coach and needed four guinea pigs to work with so I put my hand up,” explains Anna. “In our first session, we talked about what I really wanted to do. What’s my actual purpose? I had the inkling that the corporate world wasn’t it but I didn’t believe I could do anything else. I told her I’d always been interested in health and wellness and there was a course I wanted to do a few years back but couldn’t afford at the time. She said, I think that’s it. You need to explore it.”
Anna went on to become a Certified Integrative Nutrition Health Coach through the Institute for Integrative Nutrition in New York. She was also working full time for PHD Media, a communications planning and mediabuying agency founded by Dio Old Girl Nikki Grafton (Donald). “My very first client was a Dio Old Girl based in Fiji,” says Anna. “Working with her just felt right and that’s when you know something is in alignment. My grandma always wanted me to have a safe and secure job. She paid for my Dio education so I felt like I owed it to her to be doing something behind a desk. We always know what our true passions are – but we have all of these voices and fears and expectations.”
Anna has now found the thing she’d wanted to do all along: live and breathe health and wellness.
Her goals for the next couple of years include running regular workshops and events, launching her podcast and growing Conscious World Wellness into a thriving international coaching business. In addition to working more in schools, she also wants to expand into the corporate space.
“I want to make transformation and personal development available and accessible to everyday people. Emotional health is just as important as physical health. But I also want to explore the physical health side of things too. I love toxin-free products and skincare and I’d love to work with and promote other New Zealand wellness brands.”
UNDER
40 For the last two years, the University of Auckland has released its annual list of 40 exceptional graduates under the age of 40. The 40 Under 40 recognises University of Auckland alumni who are making huge contributions in various areas before the age of 40. With around 10,000 students a year 40 graduating from the University, making the list is a huge achievement. Amazingly, the 2017 40 Under 40 featured two Dio Old Girls (Mimi Gilmour and Qiujing Wong), as did the 2018 list, with Elizabeth Chan and Pippa Dryland.
Mimi Gilmour
is Creative Leader and CEO at Burger Burger Ltd.
Part of a family with a string of successful hospitality businesses to their name, Auckland restaurateur and entrepreneur Mimi Gilmour set up her first business at 16, helping to cater people’s dinner parties. In 2003, she studied Fine Arts at Elam and majored in photography.
At just 26 Mimi opened her own successful restaurant, District Dining, in Sydney’s Surry Hills, eventually launching a sister restaurant by the same name in Auckland. But she was lured back to New Zealand in 2011 with the opportunity to be creative director for food festival Taste at The Cloud as part of the Rugby World Cup.
More restaurant launches followed, including the Mexico Group in 2011, and Burger Burger, which expanded from a small space in Ponsonby Central to a second 140-seat restaurant in Newmarket and a third in Takapuna.
Mimi was named Restaurateur of the Year in 2012. Qiujing Wong
is co-founder and CE of Borderless Productions, a social change and storytelling agency based in Auckland.
Qiujing credits a Business in Society paper she took during her Bachelor of Commerce degree as the catalyst for creating Borderless. The agency turns a profit, employs a handful of staff, and a pool of freelance film production and creative staff, all while improving the lives of the subjects of its films, campaigns and advertisements.
Over the last 12 years, Borderless has grappled with complex social issues such as youth unemployment, violence prevention, environmental stewardship, and wellbeing.
In 2006 Qiujing was awarded the Carolyn Stolman Humanitarian Award in California for her work on A Grandmother’s Tribe. This film and campaign provided awareness and support for grandmothers in sub-Saharan Africa who raise the 14-18 million children orphaned after losing their parents to HIV/AIDs.
In 2012 Qiujing won a Blake Leader award from the Sir Peter Blake Trust for her work in establishing Borderless Productions and contributing to social change. Elizabeth
Chan is an associate at international law firm Three Crowns LLP and has been recognised in the Humanitarians category.
She holds degrees in law and arts from the University of Auckland, which she completed with a full University of Auckland Scholarship. While at university, she was the editor-in-chief of the Auckland University Law Review, and also attended Yale Law School in the US as a Fulbright Scholar.
At Yale, Elizabeth became involved in human rights law, assisting with cases brought before the European Court of Human Rights and travelling to Nepal to investigate a human rights issue concerning procedural justice. She is also a visiting faculty member at the London School of Economics and a teaching associate at Queen Mary University of London.
“I get involved in both international commercial disputes and also international treaty arbitration. I love the international dimension of the work,” Elizabeth says. Pippa Dryland
is a technical specialist at LabPlus (Auckand DHB) and was recognised for her involvement in a national newborn screening programme.
As a toddler Pippa was diagnosed with coeliac disease. She developed a keen interest in science at school, and at university she studied biotechnology, covering a wide range of scientific papers. Pippa went on to complete a PhD investigating nutrition and how it relates to a genetic type.
This eventually led to her current role, overseeing the first national newborn screening programme in New Zealand to test for Severe Combined Immune Deficiency. New Zealand is only the third country in the world to offer national screening for this condition.
“We test for rare inherited life-threatening disorders that, with early treatment, can save the lives or dramatically improve the quality of life for these babies. We test on average 250 baby samples a day and around 60,000 a year. It’s very rewarding to be able to make a contribution such as this.”
Working for women
Congratulations to current Dio parent and Old Girl Sarah Lang (Boswell) who has won the 2018 Women of Influence – Diversity Award.
The Women of Influence Awards celebrate women who have made a real difference in their communities, locally and nationally, and whose impact extends beyond their formal roles. These women are recognised across 10 categories. The ‘Diversity’ category acknowledges women whose advocacy has helped create a more diverse workforce.
“My work is usually under the radar, so it was a huge surprise to be nominated for my contributions, let alone to be recognised as the winner of the Women of Influence – Diversity Award,” says Sarah.
“For a long time, I didn’t really understand what the school motto ‘Ut Serviamus’ might mean for me. At Dio we have the privilege of education, networks and resources. More recently, I’ve begun to realise that we can all draw on these privileges to make a positive contribution to the community, in whatever way might resonate with us as individuals.”
Sarah attended Dio from 1982 to 1989, and her daughter Lilly is a current pupil. After school, Sarah was selected to go on a Rotary Scholarship to Bremen, Germany, something she describes as a life-changing opportunity.
“It exposed me to a different culture and language, and also to life as an ‘other’. It gave me an understanding of what it feels like to be operating on the margins of a culture. That experience had a fundamental influence on my work in the diversity and inclusion space.”
Sarah gained an MA (first class Hons) in geography from the University of Auckland, before joining the Economic Development Department at Manukau City Council. It was a great foundation for understanding New Zealand’s local government and political systems, she says.
Following some time in Singapore working as a consultant, Sarah returned home and set up her business, Lang Consulting, in 2002. She’d identified a niche for project consultants who could work across wider policy and strategy settings. Sarah now provides consulting services for local government and other public sector agencies, specialising in developing strategic plans and policies, economic enhancement strategies, cross-cultural and multilevel stakeholder consultation, and community development initiatives.
In 2011, Sarah joined Infrastructure NZ, a think-tank for the infrastructure sector. Her role as a project director sees her establishing strategic partnerships to improve the way infrastructure is delivered.
It was while leading a delegation of infrastructure leaders to Canada to look at best-practise infrastructure projects and attend a conference that Sarah got an inkling of how much better things could be back home.
“It was obvious that Canada’s infrastructure industry was much more diverse than New Zealand’s, with many more women there heading up
