Julia Steel Pty Ltd - Delivery Hero of the Year

Company: Julia Steel Pty Ltd
Company Description: Julia Steel Pty Ltd is an Australian based speaking, training and coaching business that helps organisations, teams and individuals lead change. Founded in 2017 by Julia Steel, her business focused on face-to-face events in Australia, this all changed as a result of COVID-19 and she now helps people worldwide.
Nomination Category: COVID-19 Response Categories
Nomination Sub Category: Delivery Hero of the Year

Nomination Title: Julia Steel

On Friday 13th March 2020, Julia Steel had one big, hairy and audacious idea. To bring the world's most forward-thinking experts together in 1 continuous, 19-day event to support people through COVID-19.

Think Leadership Live-Aid, only online (and without Bob Geldof), in just three days, Julia turned her face-to-face business into an online event, hosted live from her lounge room.

From her simple idea, 15,000 people from 32 countries joined her and 172 other speakers at what became the VID19 Conference. The mission of every session was to provide people with the knowledge and skills they needed to navigate lockdown and the unprecedented time we all found ourselves in.

From sessions on mental health and wellbeing, leading change, and how to be less sh*t on camera, Julia hosted all 172 live sessions herself. Not only was this a heroic effort on her part,but every session was alsofree.

As companies worldwide told their people to stay home or stand down completely, Julia stood up. To date, people have watched over half a million minutes of VID content worldwide, and attendees continue to support one another throughthe VID community too.

In the final session of the VID19 Conference, participants shared how much VID had meant to them during the lockdown. Praise for Julia included:

“You are a phenomenal woman Julia. We are all so grateful for what you have put together for the world to see.” - Tracey Soffe, New Zealand

“Thank you for keeping me sane and giving me the community platform. I’ve been travelling through tough times, my position was made redundant and I didn’t know what to do. VID19 was such a boost to my self-esteem. I’m so grateful to you, amazing is an understatement” - Nosh Darbari, Australia

“We’ve had family members pass away because COVID-19 and the grief has been tough. There were sessions that really helped me pull through. So many people are going to benefit from this, we are braver because of you” – Karen Meghrajani Sajwani, Philippines

"What an amazing achievement, you're a hero" - Lani Beer, Australia