Angela Gadaev arrived in Australia in 1991 with one suitcase and one dollar. Born in Belarus, 100 kilometres from Chernobyl, she had degrees in mathematics and computer science from Francisk Skorina Gomel State University in her home country, a passion for technology and the performing arts, and not much English. She knew, though, she wanted to leave home and build a life elsewhere. “I realised that I needed to move, and Australia seemed far enough for me; the other side of the world,” she says. “But to succeed in another country, I needed to pick a profession that will actually sustain me.” She chose technology.
Now, more than three decades later, Gadaev is the Head of International Logistics Product Portfolio at international shipping logistics company WiseTech Global; in charge of 14 teams in 13 countries around the world, building software solutions for global logistics and trade.
On arrival in Australia, she found work in her chosen field. After short stints as a research assistant at the University of Technology, Sydney, and a time at the department of housing, Gadaev worked as a network administrator at a large taxi company, and then IT manager at a shipping company. She joined WiseTech Global in 2005, when it was a small freight-forwarding software company employing 40 people – the company is now a global leader in its field, employing 3,500.
“My portfolio is actually responsible for the international components of our product CargoWise,” she says. “So, for everything to do with international logistics and trade – we provide solutions for freight-forwarders globally and most industry players use our solutions.”
The winner of the Australian Financial Review’s Women in Leadership award in the Tech and Telco category, Gadaev says she learned English the hard way – on the job, surrounded by co-workers with Australian accents. “My first role was in a shipping agency; I was the IT manager at the age of just 27 so I had to push my way through with poor English,” she says.
WiseTech has been making headlines in recent months, with allegations of inappropriate behaviour levelled against its billionaire founder Richard White, and the subsequent resignation of four independent board members.
Gadaev says these upper-echelon ructions have not affected the way the WiseTech is running. “I look at it like, it’s (his) private life,” she says. “The culture within the company, it’s the same buzz, the same level of intelligence, encouragement, research experiments – it hasn’t changed. The culture is very, very strong.”
WiseTech Global’s software solutions help goods move around the world as quickly and efficiently as possible to make the supply chain faster, more productive, efficient, secure and reduce its impact on the environment., according to the company.
Gadaev says an ordinary Australian simply has to look around, and WiseTech Global will have been involved in the domestic and/or international shipping of most of the things in view, from laptops to refrigerators to clothing.
“We create software for supply chains,” she says. “It’s the full ERP (enterprise resource planning) package.” This includes financial components across the board, in multiple countries with multiple taxation laws, she says, adding that as well as the logistics component to move things around the world, it includes global data and full tracking of cargo end-to-end in real time.
“It has market intelligence and analytics tools, rates, quotations, tariffs compliance, geographical compliance, customs compliance, financial compliance in every country, and capacity planning and predictive tools that should help our customers to move products around the world,” she says.
WiseTech Global clients include 46 of the top 50 global third-party logistics providers and 24 of the 25 largest global freight forwarders worldwide, the company says.
Gadaev speaks Belarussian, Russian and, of course, English, which is also the international language of shipping, but she says WiseTech Global software has been translated to suit many different languages.
She says the years of the Covid-19 pandemic put a spotlight on the logistics industry worldwide, and the importance of supply chains began to be understood. “People started buying all things online, so it changed the paradigm,” she adds. “For us, it was also a time of growth, because our company acquired over 50 businesses in the last 10 years, and quite a bit of it came on in the pandemic.”
The company’s “collaborative, creative and challenging culture” shone during the pandemic, Gadaev adds. Productivity and visualisation tools developed by WiseTech provide full visibility of the company’s workflow, including work allocation, work distribution, revisions, reviews and automated testing.
Gadaev he has never felt hindered by her gender, she says. Studying mathematics at university in Belarus, she says, 70 per cent of her fellow students were women. “When I moved to WiseTech,” she adds, “I could actually join two skills that I’ve gained, and two that are thought to be dominated by men – logistics and technology.”