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I'm really excited this week to have our first Australian softball representative on the podcast.
Ilse Wakeling was a part of the Australian softball squad in the early to mid 2000s
and played in the Italian Professional League
before making an incredible return to the side in her 40s after giving birth to her son.
She has transferred her elite mindset into the workplace,
working with Victoria Police since 2006,
currently an acting superintendent
before returning to the Critical Incident Response Team as an inspector.
Ilse is incredibly disciplined and shares some awesome lessons
she has learned around leadership, fear and looking after your body and mind.
I hope you enjoy it.
Ilse, welcome to the Female Athlete Project.
Thank you for having me, Chloe.
I'm really looking forward to
tapping into some of your incredible experience that you've had across both careers in a sporting
context, but also your work with Victoria Police.
But can you take us back to Ilse as a little kid and describe what you were like?
As a little kid, I was one of four children.
I was the youngest.
And a thing that we'd quite often talk about was sibling rivalry as I was growing up.
So you're always demanded or wanted the attention.
And so I would do whatever I could just to get that attention.
And all of my sisters played softball, which is where we were brought into the sport.
My dad played baseball.
Mum played softball.
Mum was pretty much the manager in Jacketball Trades.
And dad ended up being our softball coach.
And I think we were really drawn into the sport quite early.
Loved a lot of variety of sports as well.
But I think this is where my passion was.
So to draw that attention,
I had to figure out how to actually be the best in my family or be the best to get the
praise and accolades from my folks.
So that sort of was the beginning of how my softball career started.
We didn't really have a lot of, with my age, we didn't have a lot of opportunity to see
how we can develop and how we could learn.
So we used to read a lot through books, my dad and I, to understand how to actually pitch,
So to learn how to pitch, we'd read through the book, trial it, and see how it went.
So it was a trial and error sort of situation.
Didn't have the fortunate opportunities I do nowadays, just jump on the internet and
find whatever you need and how to grip balls and all that sort of stuff.
So it was quite a challenging time.
But at the same time, it was a really great learning opportunity.
And it was very much a textbook style that I had.
And growing up through my teen years, I played a few different varieties of sport.
And again, I just always was drawn back to softball.
And at the time, I was not even aware.
And I think more so because I was a country girl.
I lived in Ballarat.
We weren't aware of what opportunities there were in sport, and especially in softball.
I didn't know how far I could actually go in a career with softball.
So it was more just the passion that I really enjoyed.
And by the time I was, I played all club levels.
I never played in my teens.
And by the time I got to my 20s, I was asked if I would,
you know, trial for state.
And I ended up striking out most of our state players, which was not expected.
But we had developed ourselves, Dad and I, through that time.
And admittedly, I did trial for state in under-16s and didn't make it.
I felt that I was good enough, but didn't know what I was missing.
So Dad and I just kept continually learning and progressing in the sport.
So by the time I actually, you know, was playing against state players,
I just realized that I actually had an ability there.
So I made my first state team at 23s, under-23s, which was pretty cool.
Quite late on in my career.
But at the same time, I think, realistically, it allowed me to still have that passion,
but probably get all my schooling done.
I started working at a law firm at the time and really wanted to engage
in this softball side of things and see what could come of it.
So after playing under-23s, the next year I played my first state team.
And that's when you had scouts that were...
At our games and observing some of the stats that I would see.
And I got scouted straight away.
I had the opportunity to play over in Italy.
That same year, I made our Australian squads, the AIS squads, and it really took off from there.
And that's when I really discovered the opportunities that were there for the sport,
but at the same time, sport in general, the opportunity to be able to have sport take me around the world,
play against other countries.
And see how they develop and lead their teams and how they implement their strategies and ways of thinking.
So I felt it was a really great opportunity to play overseas.
I probably sacrificed a little bit of Australian opportunity to play overseas,
but I felt that it was something that would develop me in who I am as a person as well,
living in a different country and really trying to nut out all those issues that you probably wouldn't
realise unless you're an athlete that you're going into a new country.
You don't speak their language.
Your coach at the time was Cuban, but he didn't speak Italian either.
And navigating through life at the same time as playing a sport,
being paid to play it professionally and having to perform every week.
So that was a good chance for me to learn the importance of time management.
The importance of the professionalism.
It wasn't just about that you got paid to play a sport.
It was about all these other skill sets and all these other values that really came around
it to understand who I was as a professional, but at the same time, what qualities I can
take from that and take back to whether it's my state teams, whether it was to the Aussie
teams or as you know now in my career in policing.
There's some really interesting themes in there that I'd love to kind of touch on.
And let's start with this concept of that wanting desperately the approval and attention
I think it's something where sport is often a vehicle for kids who want to kind of prove
their worth in a way.
And sport is often a way of saying like, hey, I'm here.
I want you to recognize me.
I'm trying as hard as I possibly can.
Where do you think that came from for you?
Um, I would looking back on it now, I would definitely say.
It was probably, um, a setup of an imposter syndrome.
Um, I wanted to feel good enough or valued or that I was good at something and recognized
Um, my dad and I, you know, I love my parents.
My parents gave me the greatest upbringing.
I was very fortunate.
They had great values.
Uh, they're great people.
Um, and I always look at it and think what my dad knows is what he was taught as well.
Um, so through his sport and also his work, he was also, uh,
So, you know, we have somewhat of a paramilitary lifestyle, uh, when we're growing up.
And I guess, um, because there was four of us, it really was about how do you get the
attention of mom and dad when you're the youngest.
Um, and I look back on it now and recognize that, um, you know, a lot of things that I
did, I remember saying, um, when I first wore the green and gold, I remember saying, you
know, someone said to me, are you excited?
Are you happy about it?
I said, I just want.
My dad to be proud.
And it was true because I do want him to be proud.
But at the same time, I'd lost the true value of what I was doing, um, and appreciating
why I was doing it.
Um, so it did take me back to understand the importance of, um, uh, representing your country,
um, bringing out the best version of me, um, really wanting to, um, create an environment
that allowed me to succeed.
Um, but also working through that with.
The team psychologists to understand, uh, where imposter syndrome fits into that, um,
the, the value part of it, the perfection part of it.
And there's still things that I work on now.
Um, there were things that I worked on when I was 22, 23, I'm, you know, 45 now, and I'm
still working on the same, the same things I'm enhancing, improving and getting better
But you're right.
It is something that, um, you know, it sets in purely because I just wanted to be, um,
something that my parents would be proud of.
And you know what, regardless of whether I played sport or where I am in my policing
career, I know that would have been proud of me.
Um, but it was that own inner monologue that I kept telling myself.
So probably learning and developing through that in a monologue to understand and accept
vulnerabilities, understand and accept success and failure, or as I say, triumphant disaster,
um, and be able to move forward through those.
It's really interesting.
That term of the inner monologue, it takes me back to being a little kid.
There's, there's definitely some parts.
Of your story that really resonated with me.
Like I was probably quite similar.
I still am a real perfectionist in a, in a lot of ways.
And I was doing cross country when I was about 10, 11 years old, so still pretty young.
And when I was 11, I won national cross country.
And so kind of backed up, did all this training, like dad would drive around once the sun had
So I'd have to come home from school, do my homework.
The sun would go down.
Dad would follow me in the car so that the lights could light up the way of where I was
running to do my training and made it back.
So I went back to nationals as a 12 year old and mom traveled with me to Adelaide and I
just had this in a monologue that if I don't win again, my whole family are going to be
so disappointed in me and they won't see me in the same way.
So I woke up the morning of the race and I said to mom, I've been vomiting.
And I hadn't, I was completely fine, but I had almost psyched myself out that I was so
afraid of letting people down that I told myself this story that they, they were going
Like, I guess, lose the identity of who I was as a person.
That's exactly right.
And it does become quite challenging and debilitating because you, you do, you create that narrative
in your own mind, whereas it wouldn't matter what I did.
My parents are always going to be proud of me, you know, and I feel the same way about
You know, he, he's a funny young boy, uh, but at the same time, you know, when he does
things wrong, we talk through it and we find our learned, what have we learned from it
and what are we going to do about it?
Um, it doesn't matter what he does.
I'm always going to be proud of him.
So I know my parents would have been exactly the same thing, but yeah, that inner monologue
really did become debilitating at times.
And, um, it's, I find it's great now to be able to have that reset, to be able to, um,
reflect on that and understand even now in some of the behaviors that I have and why
I have those behaviors, which have drawn all the way back to my teen days.
Another thing that I wanted to touch on was this idea of kind of being a late bloomer
in terms of like your state representation.
Because I think there's so many kids that kind of go through those teenage years and
they try as hard as they possibly can and they might not crack it for whatever reason.
But this concept that you were an adult by the time you made that, that first state team,
like what, what do you think you learned throughout that process?
I know what I learned when I applied for the under 16 team and didn't make it, um, that,
uh, I realized I wasn't resilient.
I realized that I didn't have, um,
good processes behind me to accept failure so my way of dealing with something like that um that
type of failure was to never put myself in that vulnerable position again um by the time i got
a little bit older i didn't have as much fear um which you usually you'd think about it and think
that children are fearless and as you grow older you develop that fear whereas getting into my
20s i still had you know certain fears but um i felt that i was a little bit more confident in
who i was and that um it was okay um if things weren't um exactly right or things weren't perfect
um it's something that i i think is still developing i think um i i specifically understood
the difference between what i was like as a 23 year old to when i went back to softball at 40
um and played for australia again those differences were incredible
because i really understood how how powerful it was to not live in fear um at the age of 23 i still
i developed it a little bit where um i wasn't as vulnerable uh resilience was building by the time
i'm 40 the resilience was built so much that my theory was well if i'm not going to do i get
another three people on the dugout in the dugout that are ready to step in at any point and that's
not a bad thing back when i was 23 that somewhat was a little bit difficult for me to be able to
do that but i think that's a little bit daunting because i think someone else can step into my
place whereas when i was 40 i was thinking you know good for me because i probably only got
four innings in me rather than a whole seven inning game so it would actually be beneficial
so i i see resilience um had been built at that time i see the fear of failure was not a concern
to me i was prepared to be vulnerable i remember and i'm probably jumping ahead here but i remember
going back at the age of 40 and the coach saying to me after the first game we played
against italy um which was kind of good for me because i i was familiar with the italian style
of play because i played over there um but coming back into that environment he said to me after
that game we did lose 2-1 um which was okay but i still played a cracker of a game and he said to
me ilsa how after 13 years of not playing for australia could you come in and play a game like
that and i said to him i don't have any fear you know i gotta work um and at the time that
environment was different that things could be different and i said to him i don't have any fear
be a life and death situation i go to sport and i love this sport i'm here because i enjoy it i'm
playing in a team of australian representatives that want to be here have the same drive and
passion as me and i just i just want to win and whether that means that i'm standing on the plate
throwing the pitch or whether i'm standing in the dugout participating as a team player
watching my team um i'm still participating and i'm still part of that win so i think um yeah
it's interesting to see that transition as a team
of completely being in fear to my 20s of overcoming a little bit of that and understanding
that i need to actually um provide myself opportunity by to develop uh and then as a
40 year old um fearless absolutely fearless i love that can you give us a bit of insight into
softball in australia it's been a sport that has been in and out of the olympics and i imagine that
that probably has impacted it particularly as you've been involved through the sport throughout
in terms of funding media coverage um resourcing things like that when it's been an olympic sport
versus not being an olympic sport yeah the biggest challenge that i always found with
softball and um this is probably more of an individual perspective is coming from a country
background um to get good um coaching and opportunity you needed to be in melbourne
as mentioned coming to playing softball in my 20s meant that i would move to melbourne
and relocate down here um uh to play for australia back then we would pay a levy
um so yep you've been nominated in the australian squad um now here's your levy that you need to pay
you would still get supported and you'd still go away um the girls would go away to uh international
series and um you know you get per diem um your your trips are funded but at the end of the day
you're still still paying a levy to play for you and it's been a really good experience for me and
your country. That blew my mind. And I guess that's probably where I look at a lot of other
sports that do have a lot of funding behind it and can appreciate that they've got that support.
But I think it also afforded us to keep grounded. It afforded me to understand the importance of
still having something else outside of my sport, which is why my sporting career did come into it
because... Sorry, my policing career came into it because I wanted to still strive for what I
wanted to achieve in my career and I always wanted to be in policing. So, it still allowed me to jump
into that space. Watching... When I played in Italy, it was in the early 2000s and I did strive
to want to be in that Olympic team. I never made the Olympics. But it was a strive to want to do
that. But unfortunately, my last year in Italy, I ended up...
Getting an ankle injury. I broke my ankle. My Achilles was too tight. So, instead of that
going, it was my ankle, which put me out for the rest of my season over there. And so, when I came
back, I rehabbed it, got back in, played a national series here and then couldn't go back in. I then
decided I'd apply for the police force and see how that went before I knew it was a transition
within six months and I was in the academy. The funding itself with softball has been really
interesting to watch over the years and watching us go in and out, as you say,
of Olympic games has been really challenging as well. And you can see the change of the teams.
You see the people that are in the teams. We had a really strong 2000, a really strong 2004,
2008. They were great years. And to be able to make an Australian team or sit in the squad
in that era was just unbelievable. And I remember standing the first time I played for Australia
and looking down the line and seeing the people that are standing.
And just being absolutely blown away that I got that opportunity. I had Tanya Harding standing
next to me. I had Nat Ward standing next to me and one of my long-term friends, Natalie Thickham,
she was also in the team. And that was just so inspiring. But there just simply wasn't that
funding there to keep people like that around. So, they did play back-to-back Olympics. But then,
all of a sudden, it's back out of the Olympics. And then,
what all the girls strive for then is your world championships, which doesn't give you the same
headline, doesn't give you the same wrap around that sporting context. So, it really suffered a
lot when it was withdrawn. And again, it's been withdrawn. And I really feel for the girls because
I worked so hard currently watching them when I was in my 40s. Watching them work so hard to get
there and then not get that next opportunity in another four years.
It's just heartbreaking. It's not a lot of sports that have to suffer that.
I'm still thinking about this concept of you coming back at 40 and just killing it,
playing for your country. Have you watched Lauren Jackson's return to basketball at all,
the way that she kind of had some time off and was forced to retire from her body and she's come
back? I feel like there's some real parallels in this sense of perspective that you can have at
that point in your life that sounds like it's really quite liberating, that feeling of going
back and playing. Yes, absolutely.
And I can really see where she's come from in wanting to do that because it is somewhat your
identity. I know that my sport, even though I played it as a very young child in the outfield,
picking daisies and not really participating all the way through to representing Australia,
it is a part of who I am. Any involvement that you can get when you're not playing,
that's why I became a director. That's why I...
Wanted to be a specialist coach. That's why I ended up being an assistant coach
because you just wanted to continue to give back to that sport that you absolutely loved
and had passion about. So when I watched someone like Lauren come back and I'd been involved a
little bit through my ex-partner, my ex-husband was involved in basketball. So I had a fairly
decent understanding of the culture around basketball. And what I really appreciated
in watching the basketball culture is that the men and women really supported one another.
And I know that my...
My husband was quite supportive of Lauren and her career. When she came back,
it was quite inspiring. And what I really love now is seeing other sports as well.
You've got the soccer and the Matildas when they've got their kids on the sideline,
just seeing those sort of environments. And that was one of the inspirations for myself at 40
is my son was four at the time and he used to call softball golf ball. But him coming along
and having photos in green and gold with him standing next to me is priceless. We're going
to have that forever. And...
And that was something special for me. And it was just an added bonus to be able to play
for my country again, but have my son there with me.
Yeah, that's really, really special.
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When it got to a certain point, it was unfortunately out of your control having to make that decision
to retire from softball. Can you share a little bit more about that experience?
Yeah. So it was just prior to COVID actually. I'd finished the Australian Asia Pacific series
here in Australia in Sydney.
And at the time, I was an acting senior sergeant. I was over at Caulfield Police Station and
was going through a transition of getting a promotion. I was going through a separation.
I had started my uni degree and was trying to juggle all of that at the same time as
have, you know, 50% custody of my son. So there was a lot of things going on in my world
and COVID had just hit.
And I remember...
And I remember...
And I remember getting my first injection. And prior to it, I had marks coming up on
my hands and I didn't know what it was. I thought it was lupus. My sisters had lupus
for her whole life. So that's what I thought it was. So, you know, I took a synthetic steroid
to try and calm the rash and it didn't go.
The shorter version of this story is I went to a dermatologist, went to a rheumatologist.
I ended up getting muscle and skin biopsies to determine what the disease was. And the
It's called dermatomyositis. The dermatomyositis being the skin, myo being the muscle and cytos
being disease. And so basically what it meant was my skin would come out a rash and my muscles
would deteriorate. So within a fortnight, my muscles had deteriorated so badly that I went
from what I'm normally about a size 11 into about a size 6, 7. I was struggling to fit
And I was in a fortnight. And I remember looking in the mirror thinking, what's going on here?
Why am I losing significant weight and muscle? Mind you, as an athlete, as you'd be aware,
you work so hard to get that strong shape, that strong figure. It's a lot of time and
effort to get that and then maintain it. And especially as you get older, trying to keep
that maintenance of it. And so for it to go, it was almost, you know, it's another identity
of me. And yeah, when the disease came about, it basically means that when your muscles
deteriorate, you've got no strength. So I'd lost a lot of...
Energy. I was very lethargic. I was pretty much a victim to the disease at the time.
So going to the rheumatologist, he was quick on it. Within, I would say, a month, I started
all types of medication. I went on a drug called methotrexate, which is like a cancer
drug. So it's also used for autoimmune diseases. And I had a really bad experience with that.
And so I ended up jumping off that and onto a different type of med.
So I now do IVIG, which is done every six weeks, so intravenous immunoglobin. So I go
and get hospital treatment for a day. And that's where they put antibodies back into
my body. The way that I managed it was making sure that I could continue doing what I'm
doing, try and listen to my body. It was about that slowing down process and understanding
what was going on and how do I best set myself up for success. So I put a lot of processes
At the time, I retired from softball because I knew that I just physically could not play.
I couldn't do anything like that. I maintained a gym program purely because, sort of similar
to MS, that you need to keep your body continually moving with this disease because if it stops,
it will seize up. So the gym side of it was just maintenance, making sure that I kept
strong and I didn't overexert myself. I did have a lot of trial and errors where I was
too much gym sessions. It would actually create too much CK in my bloodstream and would
poison my bloodstream. So I'd sit back five or six weeks. So that was a trial and error
sort of experience. But all in all, it's something that we had to try and prevent cancer from
coming. We did the preventatives. And to me, it was about how do I set myself up to succeed
in this environment and this situation. So it was about getting...
Early wins. So I'd set myself up to do box breathing exercises in the morning, no electronics
for an hour. I would do hot and cold showers and I'd do stretching all before I left the
front door. I'd even, as they say, make your bed because it's a small win. Those sorts
of things that would set me up for success. And then when I came to work, I would do my
full duties. I was fortunate to have colleagues at the time that were really supportive of
me because it was during the COVID period.
Where everyone was isolated. So I didn't feel like I was isolating myself too much. But
they would help me out and be outside doing the operational world and I'd do the strategic
world of protests and policing at the time. So to me, it was something that I didn't want
to stop playing because I have such a passion for it. I had to stop playing. But at the
same time, I didn't want the disease to take over and be who my identity is. So I had to
be who my identity was. So how do I still maintain who I am and continue progressing
So setting up all of those little habits, I truly believe now that it was actually somewhat
a blessing in disguise because otherwise I might not have, I might not prepare myself
as best as I do now. And it leads into my healthy living lifestyle with my son. It leads
into how I lead at work and my considerations for how I look after myself.
My considerations for how I speak to my people and make sure that they look after themselves
as well. So some really good wins came out of it.
It sounds like you are incredibly disciplined. Like you've been through something that is
out of your control. And I imagine like you touched on like took away a lot of your identity
and sounds incredibly draining and frustrating at times. But it sounds like you're really
disciplined in your approach to really, I guess, take back control over the things that
you can have control over.
Spot on. And I don't realize how disciplined I am until I can reflect on something like
that and understand the impact it had on me. But to me, it was just absolutely important.
If I wanted to continue to do what I'm doing, being who I am. And as I said, I had so much
going on. I didn't want to drop my uni stuff. It was about engaging with the support networks
that I had around me. You know, my academic advisor was completely supportive.
He gave me some extensions to allow me to actually find time to do all my study. With
work, I had a really good network around me there. My support network from home, my parents
would come down. One of my sisters should come down frequently to either look after
my son when I had treatment. The gym sessions to me is that's again, as you know, through
as an athlete, your gym is your identity as well, because it's almost like your solace.
It's not just the lifting of weights. It's almost like it's my version of cheers. You
know, everyone knows your name. You get in there, you get amongst the people that are
there. You're enjoying a session. At the same time, you happen to be getting gains from
it. So, you know, there's benefits that come from it. But, you know, I really wanted to
still be who I am, but I had to do everything in moderation. I had to consider what was
being put in my body. I had to consider what was being put in my body. I had to consider
what type of products I was using on my skin. So, there was a hell of a lot of things that
I had to consider. But to me, this was the best way that I could work on me and the best
opportunity that I could give myself to succeed in it. So, absolutely discipline. But again,
probably came from my early days in Italy where, you know, you had to understand the
importance of discipline, the professionalism and commitment.
Before we hit record, I kind of got a rundown of what I was doing. I was doing a lot of
all of your jobs and the career progression that you've had with Victoria Police. So,
some of them you started as in uniform policing. Then there was the critical incident response
team or CERT, I think is that if I got that acronym right. Yep. A sergeant, a senior sergeant
with the public order response team. You've worked with the assistant commissioner in
part of human resources command, also acting superintendent, currently an acting superintendent.
Have I got that right? Yes, that's right. Currently. And then heading back to the
to CERT to be an inspector with CERT. Is that correct? That is correct. Yes, I got it right.
Is there a highlight when you reflect on your career so far with Vic Police?
I think there's probably a lot of highlights in your policing career. I guess the way that I look
at it is probably what in my, what's my idea of,
success. And so I would say I've had a lot of disasters throughout my career. I've lost in
appeals where I've got a job and then someone appealed me and I've lost it. But to me,
a highlight is when you see something succeed. Not necessarily a moment in time, but it might
be something that takes time to actually succeed. I'd probably say one of my highlights currently
is in the role that I'm,
I'm currently sitting in. I was,
I was put into the role in May last year and my commander at the time informed me that I could
own the position. I'm now in a position where I feel that we have progressed in the work that
we're doing. I feel that the people have that psychological safety in the environment that
they're in, that they're comfortable to speak up in any meeting. They're comfortable to come and
see me about whatever they need to speak to me about,
whether that's personal, whether that's work, whatever the circumstances are.
And I feel that I've created that environment that people want and have a desire to actually
come into work. And I know that it can, it has a couple of different elements. It has the element
of, we need to get this done. So I need to put our heads down and get this work done.
It also has an element of fun and enjoyment when we're in the workplace. So I've developed who I
am in the terms of being a leader, in the terms of my vulnerabilities.
I consistently tell my team that I do still have imposter syndrome and I am a perfectionist and I
am working through that. So I'm happy to display that kind of vulnerability. But in all honesty,
to me, that is a highlight because I've been able to see in a short period of time that I've been
there, 10 or 11 months, that through that style of leadership and me developing what that leadership
is, which I believe is transformational.
I'm certainly not autocratic unless it's time critical, but it has highlighted to me the
importance of putting our people first. It's highlighted the importance of people feeling
valued. And that's really rewarding from my perspective, receiving really beautiful cards
and thank yous from my staff as I'm about to move out of there and move on to my next journey at
CERT. It warms my heart knowing that, you know, while we're all still working on ourselves in,
who our true authentic leadership styles are, I feel like there's been some really good wins that
I've been really, you know, humbled about.
You're about to, as you said, you're about to head back to that CERT, so the Critical Incident
Response Team. And that, from what I understand, involves negotiations and working in sieges. Can
you kind of give us a bit of insight into what that actually looks like as a police officer?
As a police officer?
So, well, when I was at CERT, because I probably couldn't give you exactly what it's like right now,
and I have no doubt that it's changed in the last nine years, but when I was there, it was about
sieges, suicide intervention, barricades, edge weapons, and those higher end jobs that have
developed a little bit more where they've got a task ops, which basically means they do task
operations of incidents that might be happening and they can work with other units within Victoria
Police to execute certain...
Might be a warrant, for example.
The negotiation side of it, although, again, has developed and changed since the time that I've
been there, they've got some brilliant leaders there that really lead the way in the terms of
how important and how pivotal a negotiation can be. What I always found was going into a place
like CERT and being a negotiator myself, I felt that I became better at de-escalating situations.
Once I became a negotiator, I became a negotiator. I became a negotiator. I became a negotiator. I became a
negotiator. I used options, like police tactical options, less because I was a negotiator than what
I ever did prior to being a negotiator. The skill sets that you actually develop in those areas are
just brilliant. They're brilliant. I've just been hearing a few conversations that a couple of the
staff have been having in relation to how important it is and the challenge of using a negotiation
skill set in your own family is always going to be hard because I try and use negotiation techniques
on my son and it never works.
Which is, I don't know whether he's got a better skill set than me or whether he's just learned
well. The job that they do essentially was created because of the stopgap between
uniformed police and SOG. That's where CERT was initially developed. The work that they're doing
has morphed quite substantially, especially since I've been there. It's a great environment. You've
got some really great people in there.
The skill sets that they develop in there, I found coming out of CERT and moving into uniformed
policing again, you've got a different mindset and it's definitely set on that safety aspect,
like how do I position my people to make sure that they're safe but get the desired result at
the end. It has got that enhanced level of thinking, critical thinking. I think it will be
really beneficial for anyone that's at CERT when they're ready to move on in their careers, being
able to use that skill set.
Use the skill sets that they've got there and how valuable it will be in educating our younger
members that have just come through the academy and on a divisional van. Realistically, it's a
role that I think is absolutely essential in Victoria Police. It's one that will continue
enhancing and the diversity that you get within the unit. Close personal protection is another
example where you work with dignitaries and VIPs that come to Victoria and protect them. You work
alongside their protection units. You work alongside their protection units. You work alongside their
secret services from America, those kinds of things and getting insights, networking and
developing ways of doing things that's best practice. It's a very exciting place and they've
got some really great members there that I think are leading us from the front. I'm really excited.
You touched on the special moment when you represented Australia.
Again, in softball and having your son by your side. I've heard you speak about your story of
returning from maternity leave, coming back to work. Can you give us a bit of insight about what
that was like and your first day back on the job? Yes. It was a bit of a challenge to be honest
because I only took five months off in maternity leave and I did have a cesarean. It was about how
do I set myself up to succeed again? How do I have that discipline?
To be able to get myself back into the shape that I was in prior to being pregnant and being
able to prove that this is not a hindrance or it's just a blip in my career and that I can come back
and I can still do the job that I was doing. Leading into the question you're asking, I was
fortunate at the time to have a really great trainer. He helped me through all that physical
side of things to build the strength and be able to do what I was doing prior to being
pregnant. I could do all of my qualifications and pass all my fitness quals without issue,
which was fantastic. The first day that I came back, I walk in the office and we've got a board
in the office where we tell you what role you're doing for the day because it could vary. On that
day, I saw that I was the lead negotiator. In my head, I thought, I've been off for a few months.
I probably should just warm myself into this. To be honest, looking back and reflecting on that,
it's probably me.
Sitting back going, I just want to take the easy road in. Nothing wrong with being thrown in the
deep end and this is probably an example of why. I remember wanting to actually be removed from the
lead negotiator role and wasn't able to do so. I took on the role, no worries.
Within half an hour of the shift, a job came up and it was a siege. We attended the siege. It went
for nine hours. It was one where when we first arrived, the male had a fight with the female.
He's basically scaled his fence, sitting on top of his fence, pointed the firearm at me.
Instead of me freaking out or anything, I obviously did what our normal tactics would be. You just
take cover and then you reposition yourself and you then start engaging again as a negotiator.
By the end of the job, I'd moved around to the front of the address and had been negotiating
face-to-face with him. We ended up getting him out of the address.
We made the safe arrest, nil injuries. It wasn't until I got in the car at the end of my shift to
go home that I actually reflected on it and realized, I've got a five-month-old at home
and I've just had an offended point of firearm at me. It probably took me back a little bit to
realize I'm in my mid-30s at this stage. Should I be starting to look at what career development I
have? It really did push me.
In the direction of going, okay, I actually want to start looking at promotion. There's a whole team
here of about 180 at the time that can do this job. There's a whole heap of people that can do
negotiation. I think it's time for me to step out of this role and start moving on to the next step,
which is my promotional pathway. Therefore, I became a sergeant, externally back in the uniform.
Yeah, wow. It's quite an incredible story.
I'd love to wrap up this chat that I have thoroughly enjoyed learning more about you
and what you've learned about yourself throughout this process. What do you think could be done
better for women across the board returning from pregnancy into those work roles, whether it's even
looking at as elite athletes or potentially into the workforce? Was there anything you think that
can be done better to support women? I think sometimes it's hard. It's funny,
I just had a conversation today.
One of our members who has gone off on maternity leave and she's still doing her
two or three days a week where she'll come back into the office to
probably invigorate her, but at the same time, keep her mind in the game, so to speak.
I think it probably identified to me because the experiences that she had during pregnancy were
the same experiences as me. I was probably fortunate. I say fortunate because
at the time, I had flexibility at home. My husband could look after my son when I was at work and
vice versa because he had more afternoon, evening work that he was doing, so we had flexibility at
home. I was fortunate in that situation, whereas the staff member that I spoke to today doesn't
have that flexibility. I think the awareness of understanding the flexible workplace arrangements,
the awareness of understanding how we can
integrate them back into the office, so it's not such a long period. I think it's always quite
daunting when you've been off for a period of time. Regardless of whether it's maternity or
whether it's a physical injury, a mental health injury, that return to the workplace is quite
challenging when it does become a longer period. I know that Victoria Police are working through
how we do our return to work with people and trying to get them to return sooner rather than
later, more for their own minds. I think it's a really important thing to do. I think it's a
mindset, but I think that engagement, the initial engagement, and it's really hard as a manager to
always be on top of your game with it, but I think what we do need to consider is how do we
implement processes where we've constantly got welfare people that can reach out to these people
to ensure that they don't feel they're on their own, to make sure that we've got meaningful work
when they return. It does depend on what type of return they do. If they're at full duties,
if they're at partial duties,
if they're requiring flexible workplace arrangements, but understanding what they need
and then demonstrating to them that it's not just said, but it's actually going to be
implemented and assisted through that process. I think the doing of it is essential. I know that
as a manager, it becomes a lot when you've got a number of people for different reasons being off
trying to manage all of that, but putting the person first, I think, is always going to set
the stage. I think that's a really important thing to do. I think that's a really important
thing to do. I think that's a really important thing to do. I think that's a really important thing to do.
Yeah, I love that. I think it's such great insight. Thank you so much for your time today,
Ilse. I've absolutely loved getting to know more about you and your story. I think it's really
quite amazing the way you've really been quite reflective, I think, throughout your career as
an athlete and with Victoria Police as well. It sounds like you're constantly learning and
growing and evolving. I've absolutely loved the chance to chat to you today. Thank you so much
for your time. Thank you for the opportunity, Chloe. I've enjoyed it. I did listen to a couple
of your podcasts. It was really great. Thank you.
It was really good. Thank you very much. I've enjoyed having a listen, putting it on. I find
myself that I listen to a lot of podcasts anyway, but at the same time, this one, because it hits
home, there's the sporting aspect of it, there's the policing aspect of it, and hearing people that
you don't actually know a lot of someone's background. This has been a great opportunity to
actually dive into someone's personal story that just inspires you, doesn't it?
Thank you for inspiring me.
Oh, I really appreciate that. Thank you so much.
No worries. Thanks, Chloe.
Thanks so much for listening. If you got something out of this episode, I would absolutely love it
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