“EVERY little boy wants to be a fighter pilot when he grows up, but most little girls don’t think about it – it doesn’t occur to them,” says Kate Matthews.

Kate, marketing manager for Air Force at Defence Force Recruiting, says she has a project going at the moment that’s trying to get to the bottom of why that is so.

One of her biggest challenges is attracting young women to the Air Force.

“We’re repositioning Air Force in the market at the moment,” she says.

“How to go about that is a really complex thing and there’s a lot of non-traditional roles in Air Force, but girls aren’t considering it.

“There are some amazing jobs and I have met these women who are so smart and skilled and confident doing these incredible blokey jobs in locations all over the world and that’s really inspiring for me as a woman.”

Kate has worked with DFR for three years and says marketing to the younger generation is always a challenge.

“We’re still figuring out how to use social media to our best advantage because there are inherent risks involved with it,” she says.

Kate believes she has one of the best marketing jobs in the country.

“I’ve got the opportunity to do amazing things in this job,” she says.

“If I had my time over again I’d go back and join the Air Force instead of doing comms at uni. I’d love to be an air combat officer or fighter pilot.”

The former Daramalan College student did an internship at a local advertising agency after she finished her advertising and PR degree at  UC. She went on to work in a marketing role for Rydges before moving interstate.

After spending time working in various roles in Melbourne, Sydney and Perth as well as having her two children, she decided to join the Navy as a public affairs specialist.

“I was in uniform. I spent five years bouncing around in Navy, worked in fleet headquarters… then came back to Canberra and worked for the Chief of Navy,” she says.

While in that job she met the head of marketing for DFR who asked her to fill a contract position as Navy marketing manager as a civilian.

She has discharged from the Navy and has a permanent position with DFR, but is now in the reserves and still serves time.
The 37-year-old has two children aged 10 and 12.

“Having children changed me in that I wanted to use my skills for something really meaningful and I wanted to leave the world a little bit better than how I found it.”