Bridging the gender gap and flourishing - Karen Downes

05/26/21 • 44 min

I heard Karen Lee Downes in an online interview a few months ago where she shared some of the work that her organisation — the Flourish Initiative, together with and Femme Q, were doing around bridging the gap between the masculine and feminine energies in the workplace. This subject appealed to me because I believe there needs to be more of a balance between the masculine and feminine in many spheres, especially around our current paradigm of plundering and pillaging people and the planet to make a profit.

In this episode, I speak with Karen about the work her and her partners are doing to bridge the gender gap and how we can create a better world for future generations and the planet.

During the interview we speak about her experience:

working in Bangladesh and India in the Hunger Project for women
being a student of Anthroposophy (works of Rudolf Steiner)
starting out in Australia and how her and her sister set up a multimillion dollar essential oil business (In Essence) with distribution in five countries
working in the UK with some of the biggest male-dominated mining organisations to create conscious-leadership programs
taking 1,600 leaders from a leading airline to uncover a collective experience of "burn out"
with her father that inspired her to do the work she does.

We covered a great deal more during the interview. If you have the inclination and are able to travel, I highly recommend the Femme Q course. If you can't travel, you can do it online as well.

Bio -

Karen Downes - Social entrepreneur, Spiritual Activist, Business Consultant and Facilitator (Australia / UK / Costa Rica)
Currently projects Costa Rica | Lead for Deep Collaboration | FemmeQ

Over her 35-year career Karen has built successful companies, supported civil society organisations to transform entrenched cultural norms, worked with global business leaders, designing and delivering culture change and development programmes around the world. Karen began her career as an alternative healthcare practitioner and a student of Anthroposophy. Over the course of time she has translated spiritual practices, principles of healing and systemic change into everyday life and business. Back in the 80s & 90s she built a multi-million dollar business in alternative health care, from kitchen table-top to a exporting training programmes and product to 5 countries. At the same time working on the ground in India and Bangladesh to transform the subjugation and marginalisation of women, seen as the key to end the chronic persistence of hunger. In 2002 she moved to London, developing and leading transformational programmes and retreats. She is the founder of The Flourish Initiative a consulting and advisory service to business, co-founder of FemmeQ: Feminine Intelligence, is a member of Gender Equality in Catalyst2030 and Lead for Deep Collaboration in Bounce Beyond. Her commitment is to catalyse the necessary shift from the current system of domination to partnership and to embed the feminine principle that has been missing, into all aspects of leadership, to create a flourishing future for all.

Websites:
https://www.theflourishinitiative.com
https://femmeq.org
https://www.costaricaregenerativa.org

In this episode, I speak with Karen about the work her and her partners are doing to bridge the gender gap and how we can create a better world for future generations and the planet.

During the interview we speak about her experience:

working in Bangladesh and India in the Hunger Project for women
being a student of Anthroposophy (works of Rudolf Steiner)
starting out in Australia and how her and her sister set up a multimillion dollar essential oil business (In Essence) with distribution in five countries
working in the UK with some of the biggest male-dominated mining organisations to create conscious-leadership programs
taking 1,600 leaders from a leading airline to uncover a collective experience of "burn out"
with her father that inspired her to do the work she does.

We covered a great deal more during the interview. If you have the inclination and are able to travel, I highly recommend the Femme Q course. If you can't travel, you can do it online as well.

Bio -

Karen Downes - Social entrepreneur, Spiritual Activist, Business Consultant and Facilitator (Australia / UK / Costa Rica)
Currently projects Costa Rica | Lead for Deep Collaboration | FemmeQ

Websites:
https://www.theflourishinitiative.com
https://femmeq.org
https://www.costaricaregenerativa.org

Previous Episode

Eco Business Mentor - Jannine Barron

Jannine Barron created her first eco product in 1998. Over the next 23 years she launched more than 33 zero-waste products. In 2000, she coined the phrase, “change the world, one purchase at a time” to express her brand activism, a phrase that many industries have since adopted. Now, two and a half decades later, and based in the UK, Jannine is on a mission to change business for generations to come, through mentoring a new generation of product makers and climate-conscious business owners.

In this episode Jannine shares her experience:

as an activist at Macquarie University
creating her first eco business with one product in her garage
starting and selling four businesses over 20 plus years
in helping aspiring ecopreneurs
helping women through the "B experience"
around the importance of having a business mentor or coach if you want to succeed.

I can highly recommend Jannine as a mentor, after all she helped me get Beaming Green started and has helped countless other businesses. She has a genuine interest in making a difference and provides a lot of enthusiasm and guidance in a constructive way.

Visit her website https://www.theproductmentor.com.au/

Next Episode

RiverTracks - creating a supportive community for youth

RiverTracks is a new Northern Rivers venture, inspired by the very successful BackTrack program that Bernie Shakeshaft created in Armidale, New South Wales to keep young boys 'alive, out of jail and get them back on track'.

Like BackTrack, RiverTracks will take an innovative approach to working with young people, 13-16 years giving them the skills and support so they can reach their full potential and have a positive impact in the communities they live in.

Despite limited government funding (5%), BackTrack is recognised across Australia and has an 87 per cent success rate of participants gaining full-time employment, training or education. The Tweed Valley community members who have established RiverTracks want to emulate the same community sponsored model to support their new program for young men.

RiverTracks will begin its local offering with a program that will run 1-2 days per week targeting disengaged young men in the Murwillumbah area. the program will connect them to a safe, supportive and inclusive community of mentors and peers who offer opportunities, including animal therapy, practical education and work skills development. The program will partner with training providers and focus on collaborative relationship building with participants to co-create the program.

In this interview I speak with a member of the RiverTracks team Roland Fraval, who talks about how:

the idea for the local project came about after local youth worker and co-founder, Ahri Tallon found out about the BackTrack program from a young fellow in living in residential care who said it was the best thing he'd ever done
the program is an early intervention program targeting young people that have disengaged from school and who are at risk of entering the juvenile justice system
one in four young people are dealing with a mental health issue and one in five are disengaged from school in some way and 28,000 are homeless or sleeping rough
successful the BackTrack venture has been, reducing severe psychological distress by half in young participants, reducing suicide ideation by 40%, resulting in a 70% drop in school suspensions and increasing school attendances by 66% and lowering drug use
beneficial animal training and therapy has been in the BackTrack program with dogs and how the local arm will use equine therapy to create similar outcomes
they want to ground the project within the local community and have already attracted support and interest from many local community members and some high-profile local businesses, including the Scouts, the Rural Fire Service, the Surf Lifesaving club, as well as the Murwillumbah bike shop
the program aims to be a social enterprise that creates real-world opportunities for young people to do things that interest them and make money in the process
the program will start with young men 13-16 and expand out to other age groups and girls once it gets more established
you can contribute to their fundraiser or through donating your time to skills like grant writing, cooking, mentoring etc.

Visit RiverTracks website for more information.

To contribute financially or in kind to their fundraiser to get RiverTracks started click link here

Be inspired by the success of the BackTrack project through this inspiring documentary about the program https://backtrackboys.com.

Beaming Green - Bridging the gender gap and flourishing - Karen Downes

Transcript

Jeremy Melder 00:00

Hello, my name is Jeremy Melder, and I'm the presenter from Beaming Green. Before we start, I would like to acknowledge that this podcast is being held on the traditional lands of the bundjalung people and pay our respects to elders both past, present, and emerging. The beaming green podcast is a podcast that will help you take out some of the stress and confusion about how to live your life more sustainably. We do this by introducing you to inspiring