Criterion Conferences

Mia Freedman is the co-founder and creative director of the Mamamia Womens Media Company, Australia’s largest media company for women. With its flagship website mamamia.com.au as well as the world’s biggest women’s podcast network, Mamamia employs more than 100 staff (99% of whom are women) in five offices around the world including in Sydney, Melbourne and New York. Mamamia has an audience of many millions of women every day across written, audio and video content and across social media.

The Mamamia Media company began as a personal blog in Mia Freedman’s lounge room in 2007 after she left a successful 15 year career in traditional media, most notably as the youngest ever Editor in Chief of Australian Cosmopolitan, a job she landed at just 24 after starting at Cleo magazine as an intern at age 19.

By 2004 Mia had become editor in chief of Cosmo, Cleo and Dolly and was well known for her body image advocacy. She was the first and only magazine editor to include women of all shapes, sizes and nationalities in every issue and has been Australia’s leading voice for two decades when it to the need for a more diverse and realistic portrayal of women in the media. In 2008 she was appointed chair of the National Body Image Advisory Group by the Federal Government.

Having built her career around creating communities of women in magazines and briefly in television when she worked at Channel 9 as an executive and launched a daily women’s panel show, Mia sniffed the wind of traditional media and knew the future of women’s media was online. Mia ejected herself from executive life in 2007 and launched a women’s website, Mamamia.com.au from her lounge room while wearing her pyjamas. From politics and feminism to pelvic floors and pop culture, Mamamia is ‘what everyone’s talking about today’.

Two years later, her husband came on board and together they grew her personal blog into an independent women’s media company. Each week, Mamamia publishes around 300 written articles, 15 podcasts and 40 videos and has a social media following of 3.5 million. Mia appears on TV regularly as a panelist and commentator, hosts podcasts and video series for the Mamamia Women’s Network and has written four books, her most recent, Work, Strife, Balance was released in April, 2017.

She has been an outspoken advocate for female entrepreneurs, women in business and has been an advocate for causes as diverse as body image and domestic violence. She has been named one of Australia’s Most Influential Women by the Australian Financial Review. She has three children.

Kathryn is the EA to the Chief Executive who sits within the Corporate Division of the Blood Service and provides comprehensive administrative services directly to the Chief Executive. This includes communicating and consulting with the Chair and Board members, providing high quality professional administrative Services to the Executive team and internal and external customers.

Christina Spinoulas is the Executive Assistant to Jane Lu (Founder & CEO) and Alex Durkin (General Manager) at Showpo. Christina ensures that everything in the professional lives of Jane and Alex runs smoothly in order to keep them at maximum efficiency. Starting out at Showpo in the Customer Happiness team when the staff headcount was 15, Christina has grown with the company now reaching over 150 staff and is able to wear many hats in her role from her experience over the years. From managing diaries and travel, to organising events and sample sales; Christina is versatile and determined to be as resourceful as possible for Jane, Alex and the overall success of Showpo.

Daphne has nine years of experience working as an Executive Assistant in the Media & Entertainment Industry. She is currently the EA to the CEO at Nova Entertainment, a role she has held since joining the company in April 2018. Previously she has worked as an Executive Assistant in 1:1 positions at News Corp Australia & Nine Entertainment supporting various C-Suite Executives. Daphne has completed her Certificate III in Business Administration and has 14 years of experience working in support positions.

Daphne strongly believes in the EA Mentor Relationship and utilising their knowledge and experience having used this to help advance her own career and continues to utilise her mentor relationships as she believes there is always room for growth.