Brisbane businesswoman wins top leadership honours in Australian HR Awards

2024-04-20 10:58:54 Education

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Tricia Velthuizen has only taken up the reins as CEO at Churchill Education in the last year, and she?s already winning national accolades for her leadership of the staff at the Samford-based registered training organisation. The AchieveForum Australian HR Champion (CEO) of the Year Award is in recognition of Tricia as a CEO who has ?driven successful HR strategies from the top by putting people first and championing innovative HR values.? this award acknowledges Tricia as a CEO who drives, motivates and inspires her staff.
A former Crown Prosecutor with the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions in Queensland, Tricia stepped into the role of CEO of the company she co-founded with her husband, Randall Smith, when his health prompted him to step aside from the post. As a senior detective with the Queensland Police Service for sixteen years, Randall?s service career ended in 2005, when he found himself completely sidelined by Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) ended his police career. It was this, Tricia says, that ultimately started them on the path to establishing Churchill Education, and helped shape her ideas and practice of leadership.

?Our family?s experience of mental health issues, together with my years spent working with victims of crime, particularly, specialising in prosecuting adult offences against children, really made the biggest impact on my personal approach to leadership,? Tricia says. There were days it seemed we could go no lower, there were days that hope seemed slim. And yet, with very rare exceptions representing the very worst of the worst cases, two things were clear: we all have a story to tell. And so much of that story can change if those around us believe in us and become our champions.?

It is this philosophy and her continued advocacy for the power of education to change lives for the betterthat has won Tricia admirers on the public speaking circuit, and ensured that Churchill Education is part of a rewarding chapter in the lives of thousands of Australian students. The organisation continues to thrive under Tricia?s care (and has won awards for innovation in addition to this latest honour) but Tricia and Randall?s family life has had ups and downs during this time, she says. Not least among them, Randall?s relapse with full-blown PTSD last year. ?It was tough,? Tricia confirms. And some days, I would drive home wondering how I could do this, help him, raise our children and be a CEO. But every day, I would get in the car and drive back to the office because every day I had the opportunity to work with some extraordinary people who were prepared to believe in me just as much as I believe in them.?

?I have always taught my children that it is a privilege when people come to work with us. Each team member chose us, just as much as we chose them. And because they chose us, they want us as leaders to show up, authentically.?

And show up she does. With the trajectory Tricia Velthuizen is on as a leader, it seems likely that this latest feather in her cap is just the beginning of her rise!

About:Churchill Education is a Registered Training Organisation that specialises in both Recognition of Prior Learning and delivering quality training qualifications from Youth Work to Business, and many more in between.

For further information or comment, contact:

Churchill Education
2 Cliff Salisbury Court, Samford Village, QLD 4520
phone: 0423 777 252
http://www.churchilleducation.edu.au
email: angela.mcneill@churchilleducation.edu.au