At 81, outgoing ABC chief Ita Buttrose boasts a CV for the ages
Ita Buttrose’s career is a case study for melding talent and tenacity to mix it with the patriarchy.
Any way you care to cut it, Ita Clare Buttrose has had a terrific career.
Think longevity, think variety, think influence, think challenge; on all of these measures the outgoing chair of the ABC has had a hell of a ride in her working life.
At 81 she looks back at great years, at years when she had to gather herself and push on, and at years when she found herself in high demand while her peers slipped into retirement.
Which is to say that while it has not always been plain sailing for Buttrose, whose CV includes creator of the then-radical magazine Cleo, more than 50 years ago; editor and editor-in-chief of the then-women’s bible The Australian Women’s Weekly in the 1970s, and first female editor-in chief of The Daily Telegraph and The Sunday Telegraph in the 1980s. She is a case study in how to meld talent and tenacity when negotiating the highs and lows of the workplace.
Men, as well as women, have much to learn from the woman who joined the workforce at 15 and was still relevant enough to land one of the most influential posts in Australia at the age of 77. Buttrose is a survivor, whose age has in some ways been a plus inside and outside the ABC as she steadfastly defended its independence, defying those who feared she would be Scott Morrison’s “girl” when he appointed her chair in 2019.
Some say Buttrose is too old to go around again, yet she will be remembered for her public commitment to the broadcaster, even as management struggled to keep programs and staff on track. Buttrose’s ability, evident throughout her career, to get across an issue, simplify the message and deliver it to a broad audience has been a hallmark of her ABC time. Hers has been gutsy public leadership. That a more nuanced approach is now needed is not to diminish her legacy, but to suggest the time is right for a new chair. Her timing is good and there’s no reason to think she won’t be offered more gigs.
That’s in part because Buttrose, who began as a cadet journalist at 15, has intuition as well as doggedness. You don’t build a brand like Ita, with its huge reach into middle Australia and across demographics, without reading the play and understanding your audience.
Buttrose is a deft marketer and communicator: the ABC chair has given many speeches, none particularly incisive on the page, but impressive if you were in the room, according to those who were.
Buttrose hit gold in her 30s when the Australian Consolidated Press titles Cleo and the Weekly – though very different in their approach to women’s lives – made her a household name. Kerry Packer saw her talent and so did Rupert Murdoch, but she spent just four years at the Telegraphs before leaving in 1984 to set up her own publishing company and a magazine called Ita.
It closed in 1994, and for a while there Buttrose was known more for what she’d done rather than what she was doing. She still had pulling power – publishing her second autobiography in 1998 (the first was in 1985), and as an advocate for AIDS and Alzheimer’s awareness – but it was the television miniseries about her life, Paper Giants: The Birth of Cleo, screened in 2011, that brought her recognition from a fresh, younger audience.
Buttrose was in demand, including as a morning panellist on Network Ten, a role in which as a 60-something she managed to sound both wise and frisky. In 2013, she was named Australian of the Year; two years later, as editor of this paper’s The Deal magazine I put her on the coverfor a special issue celebrating the 30th anniversary of the advocacy body Chief Executive Women.
Pictured alongside her was Melanie Perkins, co-founder of the hi-tech company Canva. It was an image designed to show the role of older women in carving a path for women in business.
Buttrose had not been seen as a feminist back in the day – even if Cleo hosted naked men and encouraged women to sexual and economic freedom – but over the years, almost without our noticing it, she had become something of a role model for how to mix it with the patriarchy.
The Deal story was premised on Perkins, the youngster, asking advice from the oldster.
Buttrose instead used the interview to seek the digital wisdom of her 20-something interrogator, stressing the need to keep up in a rapidly changing world, and asking Perkins to be her mentor.
Now, that is how to read the Zeitgeist.
