Liz Cosson - Up to the job

Transcript

There was a view that that some people didn't want women in the army, they thought women had a different place in the army. We recognized in that 12-month course, we were paving the way to say, "No, actually, we're not there just to take minutes at a meeting or make coffee for our commanding officers".

I also recall, one of my first commanding officers had some visiting dignitaries visiting the unit and he said to me, "Right, I want you to look after their wives". And I said, "Well, okay", but I was quite confronted with that thinking or actually, "No, my role is beyond that". So there was a little bit of that.

But you also saw on the other side, where there were others who wanted you to demonstrate that there was a role for females in our Australian Army and throughout my career, that's what I saw, leaders who wanted to give you opportunity, leaders who knew females had that capability and that capacity.

And they gave you the opportunities and you just you just follow them. Those that did not want you to succeed, you didn't follow and you were just able to demonstrate you are up to the job.