Nominations for the 2025 WiSAAs will be opening soon. Nominators of winning nominees will be advised at least one week ahead of International Women’s Day (8th March 2025) so that they may make arrangements for award presentation on the day!
— 2025 AWARD NOMINATIONS OPENING SOON! —
The Women in Security Awards Aotearoa (WiSAA) initiative was established in 2020 to promote the role of women in sectors where they are still significantly under-represented, and to recognise women who are advancing Aotearoa New Zealand’s security, risk and resilience sectors.
The Awards are organised by Defsec New Zealand, and their promotion is supported by partnering organisations New Zealand Security Association, ASIS International New Zealand Chapter, and RiskNZ.
Heather Jones, Director, Aegis Private Security, a 2021 WiSAA Recipient.
“What makes WiSAA uniquely special is the fact that it cuts across security domain boundaries and across the public, private, and community sectors in a way that no other awards programme in our sector does,” said NZSM and Line of Defence Magazine chief editor Nicholas Dynon. “The awards are also independent and are not resourced by sponsorships or event tickets, just the efforts of volunteers.”
“This year we’re retiring our old cohort of award categories in favour of what we believe to be a revolutionary new approach in which our nine categories correspond to the protection of New Zealanders from particular threats,” said Nicholas.
“Identifying the right categories was by no means an exact science, but the process did take into account the results of the 2023 National Security Public Survey Report, the 2023 National Security Intelligence Priorities, and the weight of recent public discourse.”
The awarded categories for 2023-24 are:
- Contributing to defence and international security
- Protecting borders, trade, and biosecurity
- Countering incivility and violent extremism
- Safeguarding networks and people online
- Securing organisations and infrastructure
- Combatting fraud and misrepresentation
- Responding to natural disaster events
- Building resilient communities
Nominees must be women, or identify as women, with more than three years of experience in any occupation within either the physical security, personnel security, information security, cybersecurity, investigations, intelligence, risk management, emergency management or resilience domains, and be actively practising in Aotearoa New Zealand.
Nominations are encouraged from across the private, public (including government, education, military, and law enforcement) and community sectors. It is important to note that these awards are open to the broader security sector, not just ‘industry’. Self-nominations are welcomed.
Andrew Thorburn, WiSAA co-founder.
“In our third year [2022] it was extremely encouraging to see continued recognition of inspirational professionals from across the broader security and resilience sector,” said WiSAA co-founder Andrew Thorburn. “It is becoming more evident that as the sector matures it is characterised by increasing levels of inclusiveness and diversity.”
“The awards have been anchored by some inspiring judges over the years, including the likes of Dr Bridgette Sullivan-Taylor, Ngaire Kelaher CPP PSP, Dr Carrine Teoh Chooi Shi CISSP CBCP, Jennie Vickers, and Bonnie Butlin,” said Andrew.
Nominations are assessed on the extent to which the nominee’s efforts over the previous 18 months reflect the values articulated in the category descriptions.
The deadline for nominations for 2023-24 was 4:00pm, Friday 08 March 2024, with nominations of no more than 1,000 words (including supporting material) sought.
Winners were announced via the Defsec New Zealand website on 05 June 2024. It is anticipated that a call for nominations for the 2024-25 round will be made in late 2024 with winners to be announced in time to be celebrated on International Women’s Day (08 March) 2025.
WiSAA Category Winners and Highly Commended Finalists receive a Certificate of Award and Citation in recognition of their achievement and are issued (via Certifier) with the coveted Category Winner or Highly Commended badge (pictured above). Individuals or organisations submitting an accepted nomination are entitled to use the Supporter Logo and are issued with the Supporter Certificate and badge to promote their support of Women in Security.
