On forging your own path and ignoring the naysayers

I come from a Jewish background and I’m proud to be Jewish. My parents were both deeply generous people and well known for their philanthropy. On my mother’s side, my grandfather went to synagogue every Friday, and every Friday night he would bring a stranger home for dinner. It was always someone new to the community, or without friends and family. So, from a young age, my mother was taught that welcoming someone into your home for a meal is the highest form of philanthropy. That idea has strongly shaped my own giving. From my father, I inherited a different but equally powerful belief: that everyone is your customer — and that you should treat people generously, whether financially or emotionally. Growing up, I watched my father give generously, both financially and emotionally, and my mother constantly open our home to others, so I learned the importance of giving by osmosis.

Australia has been a wonderful country to us. It gave my family the opportunity to build a successful business, so giving back has always been very important. That said, my parents’ giving was shaped by a different generation and different priorities. For me, it’s been about balancing what they did and what we learned from them with what feels appropriate now. But for a long time, I struggled to connect with the opportunities that came through my family’s giving. 

Fortunately, I had some good mentors who encouraged me to search for what I was passionate about. When I was 37, I went back to study law and completed a legal aid course, and that completely pivoted my giving. I felt deeply connected to the work — particularly around women’s issues and domestic violence — and it struck a profound chord. Once that connection was there, the giving flowed quite naturally. When you’re excited, passionate, and genuinely engaged, involvement stops feeling forced. It becomes something you want to be part of.

The Pratt Foundation is the vehicle through which our family gives. Whilst both of my siblings have their own interests, , I decided to focus on the areas that mattered to me.  I structure my giving across four themes. The first supports the underprivileged and disaffected, the second medical causes, the third is Jewish causes — supporting core community organisations and services in the Jewish community and the fourth is legal aid, which is my real burning passion. It’s incredibly important for people who are underprivileged and can’t represent themselves to have access to justice. 

I often think of it like watching different shows on TV. One moment you’re deeply interested in a medical issue, then you flip to legal aid, then to marriage equality, then to Jewish causes. It’s not binary. There’s overlap — you might support a homeless kitchen for Jewish people, which then connects to broader food banks. 

I think of giving a bit like learning to dance. You need someone to teach you — you can’t just decide you’re going to dance and suddenly end up on Dancing with the Stars. You have to build that muscle. I was lucky to learn from the best — Sam Lipski AO, who founded the Pratt Foundation, had an extraordinary intuitive and intellectual understanding of how to give, what to support, and how to do it well. My background is business — working at Visy — so philanthropy didn’t come intuitively to me. I’ve had to learn it deliberately, and Sam always said that learning how to give properly takes time.

One of the biggest lessons is learning to ignore the naysayers. There are always people who will try to put you off — who say, don’t do that, it’s too hard. You hear it a lot with medical research: it will never work; you’ll never cure cancer or HIV. But that’s neither fair nor true. You might not “fix” the world, but you can help. You can support research. You can fund organisations and you can help pay for the people who run these places and make the work possible. Ultimately, you build a contribution. And yes, maybe there’s a bit of selfishness in it too — because you do get a good buzz out of it. You get an altruistic return on your investment.

I think it’s really needed. And what has struck me is how many impressive women are out there doing incredible work — people who you don’t necessarily see on the front page of the paper. It’s been genuinely refreshing to realise there are so many people quietly getting on with it and doing important work in the background. And I think it’s important because underneath it all, a lot of women carry around this persistent fear of failing. So often the messaging is: it won’t be enough, you’re wasting money or why are you doing this? And I think a lot of that comes back to how we were brought up.

I’m 61 now, and like many women, I grew up surrounded by strong men who often controlled the money. I was quite lucky that my father was a bit of a unicorn and philanthropy was one of his core values. But even in generous cultures like the Jewish community, there are unspoken rules about what to do and not to do. But eventually you start asking yourself — why not? Because the truth is, most of the barriers are internal. Even when you’re clear on what drives you, there’s still this subliminal voice saying, that’s too much, don’t do that. But I’d encourage women to trust their instincts and go with what you believe. Also, I think it’s important to bear in mind that you don’t need to give vast sums to make an impact. It’s the act of giving that matters. It’s a mindset. And it creates a ripple effect.

I want to continue to refine the theme through which giving is structured. Right now, I’m enjoying it and I want to keep going, without pretending I’m going to save the world, cure poverty, or single-handedly fix legal aid. Giving should be fun. It is fun. And I want people to know that you should find joy in it.