Esther Althaus

Esther Althaus is a financial adviser of some fifteen years standing, and the principle of her own business, Perspective Financial Services. She has a particular interest in working with women who have come out of a relationship, whether that be through bereavement or divorce, to develop their financial literacy and secure their financial future. Many of the women she works with were not engaged in financial decision making when they were in a relationship; her aim is to help empower them through better understanding their needs and resources, so that they feel they can make informed decisions. She partners with women to give them the confidence to financially secure their future. ‘Public sphere gender inequity seems obvious in equal pay, work life balance and so forth,’ she says. ‘Private finances are also subject to this inequity.’

Given the extent to which personal finances affect relationships and mental health she is concerned at how little time is dedicated to learning how to manage them, by both men and women. Life takes over, and women, in particular, find that family and work commitments stop them from learning about finances and getting involved. ‘We often put our needs second and if someone else is prepared to take care of it then we let them do it until we are forced to do it.’ The times when they are forced to do it are often times of stress, so she works with women to help them feel empowered as they move forward out of the stress.

She loves her job, because she loves people and hearing their stories. She spends a lot of time getting to know her clients. ‘‘Know your client’ doesn’t mean finding out how much do you earn and what are your assets?’ she says. It means:

What makes you tick? What is important to you? We have to take on an array of skills. I’ve had days when I don’t know what profession I am! Was I a teacher, was I a psychologist, was I a mother, a daughter, a counsellor, a policeman? But I wasn’t a financial planner!’

Whatever it is she does, she does it well! She was recognised with an adviser of the year award in 2016.

Esther has occasionally been asked to write articles about how women can be more successful with their finances. One of the pieces of advice she offers women is to ‘be a part of the community’. It is a fundamental part of what Jewish women are taught. ‘We are responsible for each other. Charity has a huge place in our community. It’s a way of life.’ And it isn’t always about money. ‘Acknowledge someone’s humanity,’ she says. ‘If that is what you can give, give. The impact of money is obvious but there are other ways to give.’

One of the ways she chooses to give is through her involvement with Unchain My Heart; a coalition of Jewish women’s organisations within the community who have come together to support the rights of agunot in Australia; Jewish women who cannot remarry because their husbands have not granted them a gett (a religious bill of divorce). In some contexts, the with-holding of the gett is regarded as a form of domestic violence; in all cases it leads to uncertainty and periods of living life in limbo. The committee has met to resolve some sticky cases and has achieved a great deal in the three years it has been together. ‘The power of the sisterhood!’ says Esther. ‘The more people involved in something, the more you have a voice, the more relevant you become.’

Family and background

I was born in Prahran, Melbourne in 1969. Apart from spending a gap year in Israel when I finished school, I’ve lived in Melbourne all my life. I’m the oldest of four siblings; a sister who is seventeen months younger, a brother four years younger and then another seven years younger. They all live in Melbourne.

My mother was a caterer when she was in her late 20s and retired at around 41. My father had two careers. The first which he did until his early 40s, was running a business doing window furnishing. The second one happened when my mother’s catering business grew significantly. He had an opportunity to transition into the corporate world and he became a director of a number of mining companies. He then established his own company and listed it on the stock exchange. It was taken over and he is now retired, keeping busy with various interests.

My mother’s family are Hungarian. She was born in Hungary and came to Australia when she was thirteen, the only child of elderly parents who survived the holocaust. They came to Melbourne because they had family here already. She is very Hungarian, she still speaks Hungarian every day. One of the regrets I have, however, is that we were never spoken to in Hungarian. My grandfather died when I was 19 and grandmother died when I was in my thirties but I could never really have a proper conversation with her because I didn’t have Hungarian language. My mother would have to translate.

I was surrounded by Hungarians all my life but I never really learned how to speak it. As a kid you don’t think about it, but it makes a difference to how much we know about our family’s life. Holocaust survivors were very protective about sharing their experience with their own children, but they have been better doing so with their grandchildren, because they are one step removed. What my mother wanted to ask but didn’t, didn’t think to ask or wasn’t allowed to ask, I could have asked. As grandchildren we could have extracted so much more information.

My father’s family came from Russia and they were very involved and close with the Chabad Hasidic community in Russia. My grandparents escaped from Leningrad after the war. My father was a six-week-old baby and had two older siblings. Unfortunately a drunk driver in Melbourne killed the oldest brother, Shimon, when he was 15. The family escaped from Russia on a Polish amnesty. If you were Polish you could leave Russia. They had fake passports and papers and literally escaped for their lives travelling across Europe to Paris and, after two and a half years, migrated to Australia. My father has been here since he was about two and a half and has pretty much grown up an Aussie. His parents had to work really hard and he spent a lot of time on his own. He considers himself to be the classic latch-key kid. His parents worked for their livelihood and then his father spent much of his spare time raising funds to assist in building the Chabad community in Melbourne.

My parents’ marriage was a merging of worlds. A Russian Chassidic dynasty on one side and my mother’s Hungarian background on the other side. I think this contributed to our not speaking Hungarian or Yiddish, my father’s mother tongue. My parents had to establish an independent relationship that connected their worlds. When your belief is your way of life, any relationship that has distinct cultural lifestyles, when merged, will have its challenges. My father was quite modern in the way he conducted his lifestyle; however, he came from a certain background and his belief system is very much aligned with that. My mother came from a non-observant background though her father tried to stay traditional and as religious as possible. When my parents married, there was an expectation that my mother would take on a more observant life, and she did. She had her moments but she did take that on, as did her parents. There were times when she struggled to adjust but has come to appreciate it over the years.

Growing up Jewish in Melbourne

I was the first generation of that family enmeshment. I was kind of oblivious to it growing up. I knew I was first generation Australian and whenever I met a Jewish person who could say their parents were born here, or that they were sixth generation Australian, I thought that was mind-blowing. My whole exposure to the Jewish community was very much based on refugees. People who escaped or migrated from the Holocaust. Or who escaped from Russia. And the Melbourne Jewish community as I understand is the largest post-Holocaust, survivor community outside of Israel.

At the school that I went to (Beth Rivkah Ladies College) everyone’s parents or grandparents were Holocaust survivors. We had first hand stories of their experiences. But we didn’t think about it. We did not live with the same persecution that they lived with. Our parents and grandparents wanted to shelter us from that. They came here in search of a better life, they worked hard to give us a better life, and so we were oblivious to it. We were just happy little kids, getting into trouble at school, knowing we were Jewish, having a very Jewish identity. I went to a Jewish school, had a Jewish lifestyle, going to the synagogue on the Sabbath. My life was based on that Jewish way of life, and that was the norm. All my friends were Jewish, we live in an area where everyone was Jewish. Life was uncomplicated.

I went to Beth Rivkah Ladies College from kinder to year 12, and so did my children (three girls). That was my revenge on my teachers – ‘I’m back, three times me’. Because some of them are still there, waiting for the third generation to come through!

My education experience was pretty sad, and I never expected to go to Uni! I had a great time at school, I was very social, but I wasn’t particularly good at school, a story that was reinforced externally and which I started to believe. However, I did have a natural aptitude for maths and when I was streamed into a lower group I did very, very well. At the end of year nine, I showed confidence in myself. I didn’t want to be in the dummy class anymore, so I showed some initiative and told my principal that I wanted to go up into another, higher group. I was behind by half the text book and managed to teach it to myself during the school holidays to catch up. I was one of only two girls to do higher maths. I did not expect to go to Uni after school.

Life after school and the getting of responsibility

I came out of school and went to Israel for a gap year. Following that year, I returned to Australia, worked for a few months then went to New York to look for a husband. Ironically, when I was returning to Australia several months later, I met my ex-husband in Melbourne when he had come for a wedding of a good friend of his marrying a good friend of mine. We had all been in New York together but I only met my husband when he came to Australia. I was 20 years old at the time.

As it turned out, I was married to someone who wasn’t able to provide for our family. By the time I was pregnant with our third child I figured that if I didn’t do something I was going to have to live on my family’s handouts.

That’s when the responsible part of me kicked in and I realised that my reality was not what I thought it would be. I was worried for my daughters; what am I teaching my children if I don’t do something myself?

I had always worked for my father in various different roles. A month after I had my third child at 26, I returned to work part-time and decided that it was time to explore my study options. I put my baby into a stroller, took a train to the City and wheeled her into the Stock Exchange. I had always liked the idea of being a stockbroker as I was always interested in finance, but never pursued it.

Anyway I went into the Stock Exchange education office and was told about a Certificate course in Financial Markets. I decided to do one subject to see how good I was at studying and juggling all my other responsibilities. I surprised myself and did OK so I decided to increase my subject load then said to myself – OK, by thirty this course has to be done. And it was.

Then I saw that everyone was doing MBAs but I couldn’t directly enrol because I had no undergrad degree. Thank goodness for distance education! I did all my studies that way. I started with a Graduate Certificate in Management with the intent of continuing on the pathway to an MBA. I loved the subjects, particularly the ones that dealt with gender and management issues. This was the first time that I became consciously aware of gender issues in the work place. I had never felt gender was an issue growing up and that subject opened my eyes and made me think – oh really?

I did management subjects – Change and Behavioural Management; subjects that brought an aspect of psychology into it. I really loved that the subjects had a way of enabling me to personally apply it. I’d been considering change because I knew things were going to happen in my marriage and these subjects gave me a realistic insight into how I could best go about it. I also realised the importance of working well with other professionals and being part of a strong work team.

So, I completed the graduate certificate in management and then decided I didn’t want to do an MBA! I loved the idea of financial planning which was introduced to me in my original course and decided that I wanted to focus on those studies.

My own experience with higher education, and meeting women who have taken a similar route to me along the way, has taught me that I didn’t actually start my studies all that late. It’s also taught me what to look for in graduates coming out. Will a University degree open doors for you necessarily? As an employer, I look at life skills, what they have accomplished in their lives. The things that people participate in beyond their degrees are far more appealing to me. The degree is necessary – it is a milestone – but it isn’t the be all and end all.

An enmeshed adult – Judaism, identity and community

We all struggle sometimes with different things, questioning life in general; it isn’t even reconciling secular with Jewish life. It’s wondering why I am doing things, what is my purpose. I think I’m a regular normal person who wants to experience different things, who has weakness and ambitions and wants to explore things.

I was married, divorced and now I’m single again. When you are single, you have to have single friends. You can’t just socialise with married people. When I got divorced there weren’t many divorced or single people who were orthodox. I have met many different people and really enjoy the diversity of my social group. I have been single for close to 20 years so my life has evolved socially and I have met people I would never have met and experienced a variety of things that would never have occurred to me if I had remained married.

However, with all the new options I have become aware of I fundamentally believe in the core of what I was brought up with. And that makes it sometimes more difficult for me. Because if I believe in it, why aren’t I doing a better job observing it?

I believe in God. I believe in a certain way that God expects us to behave. I believe in some of the more orthodox observances and rituals, and I think that most orthodox people go through a questioning and there is a lot of learning and insights and books written to deal with this. I haven’t learnt enough and I think you can go through your whole life and not learn it all.

One thing about myself that I think I’m lucky to be, or rather not to be, is that I’m not a big searcher. I accept a lot of things. I don’t want to bog myself down needing to know the answers to questions which can’t be answered by anyone. I choose to believe that these answers will be found after I die and if they’re not there at that point, then I’ll be mad. This attitude helps me to get on with life and be happy.

Having that Jewish core is an anchor that helps me to navigate through life. You see it in difficult times and happy times. When it comes to significant life milestones, I will come back to do it ‘the Jewish way’.

Leadership, voice and the responsibility that comes with knowledge

My younger sister says that being the oldest child was wasted on me, because I never did anything to break in my parents. I was a floater. My sense of responsibility has come out of my wanting and needing to be independent and the example I wanted to give to my daughters. Through the knowledge I’ve acquired, I’ve become a business owner and a role model. Some things happened by accident, some on purpose. But now that I have some certain skills, there is a responsibility that comes with knowledge. It places you on the path to more responsible leadership roles.

There is a lot of responsibility that comes with having a lot of money. People who have it understand that expectation that comes with it. It’s the same with knowledge. If you have knowledge, there is responsibility and expectation that comes with that. People expect you to step up.

I pick and choose the places where I will step up. Through my work as a financial adviser and various other extensions of my practical application, I have an insight into family law. Within the Jewish community, I have spent a long time involved in individual cases and a committee that I am on, Unchain My Heart, working with people, women mainly, who have not been able to get a Jewish divorce. So people know me in that space. I shared my personal story many years ago, at a time that people weren’t talking so much about personal things. I’ve shared my story, I’ve established myself as a professional and I’ve been able to re-educate my community that I am not only someone's daughter or mother. I am now seen as a professional in my own right. They see me speaking publicly and actively about the issue of women not being able to get Jewish divorces. And because I have the financial technical skills, meshed together – I have a unique set of skills and insights. Also, I am at an age now where I can assert myself with people – even if it is sometimes uninvited. And that’s where the responsibility of knowledge kicks in.

I will step up, but not if I’m required to massage egos and play politics. At those times I’ll excuse myself. I like to focus on the cause, otherwise I am out. I find women tend towards this anyway. The ‘Unchain my Heart’ committee is a group of doers, women of a variety of backgrounds and ages who want to support agunot in Melbourne. We have put this issue on the radar and it can’t be ignored. This issue affects women from a cross section of the Jewish community and the women on the committee represent that cross section. We hold events, we engage with the Beth Din – the Jewish Court. The Jewish Court is made up by a number of rabbis and my preferred approach is a collaborative process. How do we work together? They are a key players, they have to be involved! We are making ourselves key players so we have to work with them and we have established some good relationships. I’m very proud of these open relationships, the dialogue and engagement. We’ve worked with them now and they see us as an ally. They will contact us, and refer women to us, which is great. When we resolve difficult cases this is done by a win-with approach not a win-win. Working with the rabbis achieves more successful outcomes. Our leadership in this area is getting results.

Leadership can also happen at a micro level. I want to put on record that there are a lot of men who work with women and they do a very good job. But do women bring something different? Absolutely. For example, if someone has come out of a relationship and they feel that they were controlled, or it was a very patriarchal situation, they don’t want another man in their life telling them what to do. They want to be inspired by another woman showing them that they can do it. There is that indirect leadership or mentoring that happens, through working with another woman.

Women have a maternal element to them and see things differently. Men like to solve problems, women like to explore problems, typically. We are different. Our different experiences, perspectives, etc. are going to influence the way we interact with people. The way we approach decision making, the way we communicate and how we go about it makes a difference. We need diversity of viewpoints and insights, because the world is a diverse place and the people in it make it even more so.

Esther Althaus was interviewed by Dr Nikki Henningham on 11 January 2018 for the She Speaks project. PHOTO: Supplied