TO remain in the same industry for five decades you have to love it.
This year marks 50 years that Sue Quinn has been in the Western Australian agri-finance sector.
In what is still a very male dominated scene, Sue was one of the first women to forge a career in the sector and has arguably remained in it for the longest.
Now the rural finance manager for Nutrien Ag Solutions, she services northern WA, Northern Territory and some of the Esperance regions.
She looks after a range of client portfolios, including corporate and family operations and works with the Nutrien network of branches and staff.
"I like the diversity of my role - it is flexible and I get the best of both worlds in that I work from the office and go out on-farm," Sue said.
"I love working with clients and they are all different."
Having a knack for numbers and passion for communicating, coupled with her agricultural background, a career in agri-finance seemed like the right fit for Sue, though she knew when starting out that there was a very limited presence of women in the sector.
Rather than seeing this as a burden, she turned it into motivation and as an opportunity to mentor other women entering the industry after her.
"My aspiration was always to become a finance manager and break down barriers for other women going forward," she said.
"I did a lot of relief work in country towns to prove that I was capable of the work."
Fortunately, Sue hasn't encountered much prejudice because of her gender in the sector, which perhaps is due to her abilities that rivalled her male counterparts.
"The only remark I remember was when someone asked how I was going to climb into a header with a skirt on and I said that I'd wear pants or shorts just like the men," she said.
Businesses have come a long way in how they support women while having children, but most of the current policies and measures that are offered to women nowadays were not an option to Sue.
"I went back to work when my first child was 18-months-old, but I had a very supportive network, particularly my husband and parents," she said.
Upon returning to work after having two children, Sue recalled the mother's guilt she experienced, but she wasn't alone as the men around her endured the same heartache, including her husband and colleagues.
"It can be hard finding that balance between family and work, but ultimately we work to make a career and provide a good life for our family," she said.
"I love what I do, I love the people that I work with although my work has always played an important part of my life, my family has always come first."
