While on a flight, the Wonnarua woman read about the rising number of executive women in top companies.

She wondered what would happen if she replaced women with "Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people."

"Aboriginal executives in c-suite ASX 500, they don't exist," she said.

"Only 50 per cent of Indigenous organisations are run by Indigenous people."

Despite never having worked in recruitment before, the career public servant decided in that moment to start placing Indigenous people in executive roles.

Pipeline Talent works with businesses to find Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people with the right skills to fit specialist CEO, government agency and top corporate roles.

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This NAIDOC week, non-Indigenous Canberrans are being asked to move beyond "tokenistic" displays of respect.

Four months after launching her business, she got news that would change her life.

"I received a call from my mum saying: 'You need to come and get your brother's baby'," she said.

"And I said, 'what baby?'" she said.

Ms Towart became a kinship carer, first to a four-month-old boy and a year later, his newborn brother.

"[I went] from driving a black three-door turbo sportscar to needing the soccer mum van," Ms Towart laughed.

She said it showed why organisations needed to understand possible familial and cultural commitments of workers within their organisations.

"Having a culturally safe place to work, knowing that there are policies and procedures in place, knowing that there are other Aboriginal people in the building [is important]," she said.

Ms Towart said sometimes Indigenous people just needed a confidence boost to take on top jobs.

"People go, 'oh no I can't do that job'," she said.

"And that's to do with confidence, it's to do with the mental health piece and it's to do with people's trauma.

"I love seeing Aboriginal people within this region succeed.

"I want to get them into meaningful jobs in salaries that they absolutely deserve."

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