Having worked in mining for almost three decades, Betsy Merry has many entertaining stories about what it's like to be the only woman working in a crew of burly blokes in some far-flung location.
She recalls being sent to supervise construction at a remote gold project in Western Australia's Pilbara region around 20 years ago, in an era when the sight of a female engineer on an Australian mine site was still met with genuine surprise.
As there were only shared male facilities, it was decided (not by her) that she would take over the residence manager's digs for three months.
"So I was this very junior engineer who ended up displacing the most senior person on this entire mine site so I could stay in his bedroom with an ensuite because they actually didn't have any set-up whatsoever females," Ms Merry said
"They also weren't used to having a female engineer there to oversee stuff."
How times are changing
Over the last two decades, the number of women employed full time in the mining industry nationally has jumped from 8,700 in August 2002 to 45,000 in August 2022, according to Australian Bureau of Statistics data.
The future looks particularly bright in Western Australia, where the McGowan government's decision to slash course fees to plug the skills shortage has driven a spike in the number of women studying and undertaking apprenticeships in mining over the last three years.
Across the publicly funded vocational education and training sector, there were 1,689 enrolments by women in engineering and mining reported to the end of August 2022, up 50 per cent from 1,130 reported in the same period before the pandemic hit in 2019.
In the 12 months to July 31, there were 831 female apprentices and trainees commencing in the metals, mining, manufacturing and services industries, up more than 91 per cent from 434 in 2019.
And while there is still a long way to go to achieve gender parity at the boardroom level, there has also been a positive shift in the number of women stepping into senior roles at some of Australia's biggest mining companies.
Ms Merry is now the Principal Project Manager at global miner WSP, and she is among a growing number of women working at the top levels of mining in Australia.
Ms Merry, South 32 chief financial officer Katie Tovich and Gold Fields executive Kelly Carter have shared their advice for future generations, and on what needs to happen to get more women working in the male-dominated profession.
Quotas 'work against women'
Ms Merry said increasing the number of women working in the industry will certainly help to reduce incidents of sexual harassment, assault and other appalling behaviours that were uncovered in a scathing review of the state's fly-in, fly-out sector.
"My view is that when a woman gets promoted, you hear people say 'Oh, well, she's in that position because she's female' and no one talks about whether she actually has the right skills for the job.