With less than a week to go for ADM's Women in Defence Awards 2025, we take a look back at the previous years of the awards, where ADM has recognised women in Defence and defence industry for their tremendous efforts in making defence a better industry to work in.
The inaugural WIDA took place in July 2018, with seven categories:
- Communications
- Legal/contracting
- Project Management
- Engineering
- Technical Trade
- Rising Star award (under the age of 30)
- Hall of Fame Lifetime Achievement award
There were a total of 18 finalists and seven winners. 2019 saw the inclusion of People and Culture as a category. 2020 added onto this with Operations becoming a category whilst the Covid Pandemic ensured the awards were held online.
Quite a few years seemed to add a new category as 2021 gave us the Research and Development category plus another virtual event due to the Pandemic. 2022 saw Indigenous added and 2023 added Executive Management. 2024 saw no changes to the category roster and 2025 swapped the old (Research and Development) out for the new, ICT & Cyber.
Overall, since 2018, through this wondrous journey, close to 300 women have been WIDA finalists and 75 of those have been winners of WIDA. Today, there are 12 categories and 49 finalists, with two of the finalists having been nominated twice in separate categories.
All that is left to do is announce the winners and the Hall of Fame inductee on 15 October 2025. So join us for a spectacular gala dinner at The National Arboretum, Canberra.
Help us honour your daughters, your granddaughters, your sisters, your mothers, your wives, your girlfriends, your aunties, your nieces, your friends and your work colleagues for their contributions and dedication to keeping Australia safe.
Book your tickets here – we hope to see you there!
ADM would also like to extend a big thank you to our sponsors:
- Headline Sponsor: Downer
- Gold Sponsors: Hanwha Defence Australia, Synergy and Thales
- Silver Sponsors: Babcock Australia & New Zealand and Smartgroup
- Bronze Sponsors: Aspen Medical and Navy Health
Your support makes these events possible!
In the meantime, relive the magic of ADM's Women In Defence Awards 2023!