Our Spirit Blog - Keynote Speaking - Aidan Grimes

The Diggers of Kokoda when interviewed about leadership, offered their well thought out views as to what are the key components of great Leadership. Having risked their all in so many theatres of war they offered some good old fashioned down to earth advice on how to be good leader.

Often people forget the reach of influence they have on others, and this story proves that point. When an isolated village in PNG can put a game of Rugby League on and rollout "Darren Lockyer" imagine the influence on Australian kids, who follow these icon types closest movements.

Aidan had the great opportunity of walking the Kokoda Track with a great group of Indigenous people, who shared their culture and learnings with him, as they followed in the footsteps of lesser known Indigenous soldiers who fought on the Kokoda Track. It was part of a Leadership course that has gone on to make a huge positive contribution to making this country great. One of the requests at the end was to see the Flag fly at arguably one of Australia's most important battle sites.

One of the greatest accomplishments is to learn what you can from the past and how to apply those lessons to the future which represents possibility. As part of this focus an understanding that a difficult past can make a successful future even more rewarding.

Learning to deal with and overcoming adversity is what builds character and resilience. Every challenge and every difficulty we successfully confront in life serves to strengthen our will, confidence and ability to conquer future obstacles.