Maeve Brown

"Leadership is all about breaking down structural barriers and helping people lift themselves up."

I moved to Australia in 2005 from the U.S. and the Parramatta area has been my home ever since.  I’ve been lucky to live, work, and raise a family in Parramatta.  I love the diversity and the multiculturalism of the area and that it’s a welcoming, safe and friendly place to call home.

I have been working in the community sector in Western Sydney for the last 15 years. I am passionate about human rights and equality, and working collaboratively to ensure that people seeking protection have the right to rebuild their lives in Australia in safety and with dignity. I’m also a wife, a mother of two amazing little humans, and a proud supporter of and participant in women’s football/soccer. 
 

For the last 7 years, I’ve been in a leadership role at Jesuit Refugee Service Australia (JRS). JRS serves and advocates for the rights of people seeking asylum and other migrants in vulnerable situations. 

For me, being a woman of colour in a leadership position, particularly in role that has a strong focus on social justice and equal rights, leadership is all about breaking down structural barriers and helping people lift themselves up.

Leadership can take many forms, but the framework that I’ve always most identified with is that of servant leadership. In its simplest form, it’s about focusing on the needs of others before your own.  It’s also a framework that focuses on upending traditional power dynamics, so that we ensure everyone’s voices are heard and we grow and achieve things together for the greater good. 

I think 2020 was a particularly challenging year for all of us. For me, as leader in a sector that is focused on working with some of the most marginalised in our community, it was a year of responding to compounded and protracted crises. As a leader, I supported staff through COVID-safe plans and a complete shift in our ways of working.  As an organisation, we supported the people we serve through severe disadvantage, poverty, food insecurity, unemployment, and risks to their health and their safety.  As a parent, I supported my husband (who did the bulk of the home schooling while I continued to go in to work,) to make sure our children felt safe and continued learning through a period of great upheaval. 

I’d tell my younger self to be confident that you know who you are, you know your purpose, and you know where you’re going. But along the way be as kind to yourself as you are to others, never stop learning, and use your strengths to help lift up others.