Women of Cisco Hackathon 2025

The Women of Cisco Top Female Talent Program returned to Innovation Central Brisbane (ICB) for its second year, bringing together 27 emerging female leaders from across Australia and New Zealand for two high-energy days of creativity, collaboration, and design thinking.

Hosted in partnership with Cisco Australia and New Zealand, the hackathon marked the midpoint of the six-month leadership and innovation experience – combining professional growth with hands-on problem solving, prototype development, and mentoring from Cisco’s ANZ senior leadership team.

This year’s challenge asked participants to take on a bold provocation:

“How might we create a universal layer of trust that allows leaders, organisations and AI systems to move frictionlessly across networks – with identity, reputation, and compliance travelling with them?”

Over the course of the hackathon, participants drew on design thinking, problem exploration, and rapid ideation to develop innovative concepts addressing this complex challenge. Guided by ICB’s Design Thinking Facilitator, Vibhor Pandey, and supported by ICB Industry Fellow Nicole Hatherly, the teams navigated every stage of the creative process, from defining user needs to testing ideas that blend trust, technology, and leadership in the digital age.

The energy and ideas generated throughout the two-day experience showcased the depth of talent within Cisco’s workforce and the program’s growing impact in advancing women’s leadership in technology. Each team pitched its prototype concepts directly to Cisco’s ANZ senior leadership team, receiving feedback, encouragement, and the opportunity to refine and evolve their ideas during the program’s ongoing Build Phase.

Now in its second year at ICB, the Women of Cisco Top Female Talent Program continues to strengthen the partnership between Cisco and Queensland University of Technology (QUT) – uniting industry and academia to accelerate digital capability, empower emerging leaders, and build inclusive innovation ecosystems across Australia and New Zealand.

The hackathon experience is part of a broader leadership journey that began earlier this year with Nicole Hatherly’s Digital Skills for Impact and Influence Masterclass. This first phase equipped participants with digital confidence and leadership tools that set the foundation for the collaborative, high-impact work achieved at ICB.

As the program continues, participants will develop and refine their prototypes through the Build Phase, with outcomes to be showcased online later this year.

A heartfelt thank you to all facilitators, mentors, and supporters for contributing to another inspiring year of innovation, inclusion, and leadership at Innovation Central Brisbane. Together, we’re empowering the next generation of women leaders in technology – one idea, one collaboration, and one act of courage at a time.