Tracey Morris, who works at DeBortoli Wines as a chartered practising accountant, said she could not believe it when she was originally selected for the program.

“I’m very fortunate, the Australian Grape and Wine Authority is my sponsor, they run a scholarship every two years so I was very lucky to have received it last year,” Ms Morris said.

“It’s a very interesting program, there’s 30 of us on it, and we’re from varying industries throughout Australia. 

“Thankfully I’m endorsed and supported by the DeBortoli family.”

The Australian Rural Leadership Foundation was formed in 1992 to be an organisation that could influence change across Australian rural industries as a whole, and rural communities in general.

The foundation found that what made a community successful was an individual, or group of individuals, standing up and taking on leadership roles.

“Industry and organisations were looking for people in rural, regional and remote areas of Australia to be more effective leaders and to foster and give them opportunities,” Ms Morris said.

“We’re already people who have leadership roles in communities but it just really put a network together and further enhances our skills and knowledge with opportunities to explore further.

“We’ve been exposed to a whole range of things over the past 12 months. The program begins with you understanding yourself, and then through exposure to other industries, to a whole range of people, to challenges, and case studies we explore within other industries, expanding and investing their time and energy into us.

“Next week we’re going off to Indonesia for 14 days, we’re going to Jakarta, and into the country into Yogyakarta and Bogor and places like that. We don’t sit in a lovely regional hotel somewhere, it’s very hands on which I think is so delightful because it’s a mixture of going to industry things.”

Ms Morris considered life to be a journey where you never stop learning, and knew that the skills learned through the program could be used at home.