In most cases, going from a coordinator role to CEO in four years would be remarkable. In Shamini Rajarethnam’s case, it’s just the tip of the iceberg. We meet the RATIONALE Skincare CEO, who has defied the odds at just about every turn.

Shamini Rajarethnam is not only a female CEO (despite the number of female CEOs in Australia being at its since the count began four years ago), she’s one of the youngest CEOs in the country. She’s also a working mother, and a woman of colour, and while none of these factors should be a barrier to success at all, the statistics tell a different story. So how did she do it? If our interview is anything to go by, her attitude is unshakeably positive, and her ability to roll her sleeves up and get to work unparalleled. When we ask her about her meteoric career trajectory, she’s pragmatic: “I never leaned into a new opportunity with a grand masterplan to take over the company. I did it because I was curious to learn, I knew I could help in some way and I could be a part of moving things positively in the right direction.”

Let’s talk work ethic, motherhood, and why Shamini believes in no bad news on Fridays...

Can you tell me a bit about how you were raised, and what sort of values your family instilled in you? Did you grow up thinking that you could do and be anything you wanted to?

I was born and bred in Singapore and was raised by the self-proclaimed village around us. My Dad was the second eldest of a family of eleven, and that meant we had an abundance of aunts and uncles around us. All I can remember is a very happy childhood surrounded by family. 

My parents instilled in my siblings and I a strong work ethic, focused on determination, kindness, and love as important values. I don’t think they ever explicitly taught us those things, I think they just embodied those values and it showed through their actions and interactions. I did honestly grow up thinking I could be anything I wanted to be – our parents were so supportive of each of us as individuals and allowed us to pursue our own pathways and learnings.

You were appointed CEO of RATIONALE in 2016 and not only was that barely 4 years after you started as Marketing & Digital Coordinator, it was only about 8 years after your graduation from business school. What do you put your light-speed success down to?

When I look back at it, there was a series of opportunities that came at the right time – as RATIONALE was a smaller company on the cusp of exponential trajectory, I leaned into the various opportunities that arose and worked really hard to become a valuable team player as the company went through its different growth phases. I know my positive attitude, rolling my sleeves up and doing whatever it took to deliver these common goals, was part of the success. I believe that my genuine interest in understanding every part of the business, as well as my deep belief in the brand and its vision, played a role in this. 

Did you campaign and advocate for yourself when it comes to promotions? We recently surveyed the women in the AllBright community and overwhelmingly they were uncomfortable asking for raises and promotions, so can you share your approach to this?

Thinking about it, I never leaned into a new opportunity with a grand masterplan to take over the company. I did it because I was curious to learn, I knew I could help in some way and I could be a part of moving things positively in the right direction. 

I never directly had to advocate for myself as Richard always championed me and encouraged me to think about my career – one that I never really confronted myself. 

With more experience under my belt and the benefit of hindsight, I give different advice now. 

Firstly, it is nobody else’s responsibility to take care of your development pathway but you, and that starts with checking in regularly with yourself. 

Secondly, you must build genuine and strong relationships with the people that you work with – position and influence are two very different things. You can be very influential without a position, and that is so much more important than having a glossy position with no influence. 

Thirdly, be open during the discussions that you have with your Manager – there are always two sides to every viewpoint. You need to be open minded about constructive feedback, and have a commitment to continuously learn and improve. Your leaders are there to help facilitate, champion and navigate these conversations. Be honest with them and yourself; it can take time and hard work to achieve your big hairy audacious goal, but that investment will be worth it. Remember, the grass is not always greener on the other side, the grass is greener where you water it. 

Women are not always necessarily encouraged to be ambitious, or to display ambition in the way that men typically are. What’s your relationship with ambition, and do you set yourself measurable goals and targets when it comes to your career?

Similar to everyone, I have short, medium, and long-term ambitions for myself to achieve at RATIONALE. Although the near future tends to take up a fair portion of time, I’ve learnt to be disciplined with having an eye to the medium and long term. Some of the goals I set are big and audacious, but I ground them with realistic timeframes and make sure they are measurable, and have clear milestones. I like to take stock of the year that was, to identify what goals were achieved and how far we have moved on these longer-term goals. I also have some ambitions that are very long term, but I am optimistic about setting myself up right for them to be achievable in ten years! 

I know you’ve said that you and your husband made the joint decision to start a family and yet you get asked about how you juggle work and family far more often than he does. So how have you navigated the work/life juggle as a family?

We are both so fortunate to have such supportive parents, and an incredible nanny who has become a part of our family. This support structure at home helps us navigate work and life with a sense of confidence. Athan and I are both realistic about our work and home commitments and we communicate often about our schedules. We realise that responsibilities shift fairly seamlessly between the two of us depending on the priorities at work and at home. If we are ever in doubt, or hitting a roadblock, we chat honestly about the support we need from each other. 

The main challenge I faced returning to work was coming to terms with the reality that this was my new normal and I would never have the same luxury of time, and that my mental load was made up of drastically different things, unlike before. My other challenge was to identify the most valuable way for me to contribute to the team, and how to work smarter and not just harder.

I love how passionately you speak about creating healthy boundaries with your time outside of work, and that you encourage your team to do the same. How do you model this?

I try to lead by example with this – I’m not in the office all hours of the day nor am I on emails 24/7. I know having a sense of autonomy of how you live and work is important, and I have learnt to share that with my team. I encourage these conversations and usually instigate them. I am open about speaking about my life 0utside of work, my role as a mother, wife and friend, as it’s important that the team know that they can share their life outside of work if they feel comfortable doing so. Richard and Greg, our founders, have also set this rule which is no bad news on a Friday (in most cases!) – I live by that as nothing productive can happen over the weekend and it’s best for us to pick it up on Monday and work through it together! 

Can you tell me about your leadership style? Women are the minority in C-suite positions, so is this something that consciously impacts your leadership style?

I don’t think I’m consciously thinking about the way I lead, but I understand the enormity of having this level of influence, and I take that responsibility very seriously. Usually, depending on the scenario, I adopt different ways of leading, but my main style is to empower the others in my team to lead us forward or make decisions. I guide by asking questions or understanding what I can do to remove roadblocks, or assist with being a catalyst to move a concept forward. I believe in listening, asking questions, collaborating, and encouraging them to put themselves in one another’s shoes.

Sisterhood is one of the core values here at AllBright. Despite the stereotypes of bitchy, competitive female relationships, in our experience the opposite is true. How have the women in your life supported you?

I am lucky to have such incredible women and men in my life. Living away from my immediate family, my husbands’ family, my friends and colleagues have taken on that support role – be it championing me, lifting me up or balancing me with a reality check. I think the most important part is knowing that they are there for me when I need them. This is why I make a conscious effort to make time for them, check in with them, and try to always be there for them. However, I’ve also recently realised that sometimes your friendships shift during the course and phase of your life, or, you simply aren’t a high priority to some of your friends – and learning to be ok with that and letting go is just as important. 

RATIONALE is about to launch into Singapore which is a huge achievement, let alone considering the challenges of the last 12 months. How did the pandemic impact RATIONALE and did you have to make any major shifts as a business?

2020 was a strange and unsettling year, especially for RATIONALE, based in Victoria. For us, we focused on the gift of time – we were able to reflect, challenge the status quo, and refocus on projects that were never urgent enough to rank high enough, but very important in the bigger scheme of things. Slowing down meant we could review and discuss all our strategies, and bring ideas that had always been on the back burner back to life. The pandemic also helped us accelerate some decisions while validating our overall endeavours.  

Introducing RATIONALE globally later this year is extremely exciting, but it hasn’t been without its challenges. We are so lucky to have a tenacious and incredibly powerful - albeit small - team who have navigated us through the changing landscape so successfully. I can’t believe how much we’ve been able to achieve and drive forward without physically being in the country, and having the goalposts change so often. 

As a young woman of colour facing up to overwhelmingly white, male dominated board rooms and pitch days, have you ever experienced discrimination or confronting comments? And if so, how do you respectfully assert yourself in those situations?

I have fortunately not been in any of those situations. I’ve had an incident where they thought I was the assistant taking everybody’s coffee order at the start of a pitch; however, it didn’t faze me. I knew what I was there to speak about, and I commanded the respect I needed in that scenario. At the end of the day, I take a sense of confidence from knowing who I am, staying true to who I am, and giving someone the benefit of the doubt.

More and more we’re seeing the beauty category heralded as a form of self-care. However, the beauty industry can be notoriously ageist, colourist, sizeist. As CEO what role do you want RATIONALE to play in women’s empowerment and how do you approach that?

We see RATIONALE as a powerhouse to make you feel beautiful and confident in your own skin – in your own healthy skin. Richard Parker’s vision has never been about making people look younger – he’s always held that women and men need to feel beautiful and confident at any age, and RATIONALE can do that. I’ve merely upheld that sentiment and goal and we apply that to all the decisions we make.

Having made it to CEO so incredibly fast, I want to finish by asking you how you stay engaged and challenged in your role - and where to from here?

There are always so many new and exciting ventures and projects that we are working on at RATIONALE – it’s hard not to be challenged and engaged. I am committed to the RATIONALE vision and I love working with the team and what I do. There is such a sense of validation and joy, and I feel like I’m still constantly learning from my team and colleagues every day. RATIONALE is on the cusp of our international debut and that’s going to be our continued focus for the foreseeable future… and of course the constant innovation in research!