Nicole Pedersen-McKinnon is on a mission to get Aussies savvy, solvent then financially secure.
You may have caught her talking jargon-free, ‘smart’ money on Channels 7, 9, 10, the ABC or Sky Business… indeed she’s been interviewed by David Koch, Natalie Barr, Samantha Armytage, Ross Greenwood, Lisa Wilkinson, Michael Rowland, Carrie Bickmore and Sarah Harris, to name a few!
Or perhaps you’ve read her ‘Nicole Helps’ or ‘Money Mentor’ columns in The Sydney Morning Herald, The Age, Brisbane Times or WA Today, where she’s been an award-winning consumer writer – appearing alongside Noel Whittaker and George Cochrane – for the past 15 years.
Maybe you’ve even attended an event featuring Nicole – she’s given keynotes as far afield as the United Kingdom and United States, including at the mass-audience ‘World Money Shows’.
Here in Australia, she’s delivered speeches to associations, charities and corporates alike. And the Australian Government routinely asks Nicole to MC events for MPs and Senators at Canberra’s Parliament House, where she’s introduced such heavyweights as the governor of the Reserve Bank and the chairman of ASIC.
Meanwhile, in the almost-decade she was an editor with the Australian Financial Review, Nicole was MC or facilitator for dozens of its events around the country.
You might have heard Nicole called “Australia’s first lady of personal finance”, named as one of Canstar’s 23 finance experts you should follow on Twitter or listed among finder.com.au’s ‘Wonder Women of Wealth’. Maybe you’ve seen her in the Who’s Who of Australian Women for the past 15 years.
Or possibly you’ve watched Nicole’s videos. She is a presenter and ambassador for ASIC’s financial literacy initiatives at moneysmart.gov.au, with Scott Pape and Paul Clitheroe. She also produces her own ‘Flash Briefings’ to keep followers informed and has donated a 5-week S.M.A.R.T. Money Makeover to the world.
Or perhaps she’s visited your child’s school. Nicole’s dearest love is travelling the country delivering the Smart Money Start financial literacy presentation she was prompted to develop five years ago, to graduating students. She has a special presentation just for young women.
Or maybe you’ve heard the episode of the ABC podcast The Pineapple Project, presented by comedian Claire Hooper, or one of the many other podcasts that have featured Nicole’s personal experience of paying off her mortgage by age 36.
She’s now written the book – literally – on how to do it, which features the real-life stories of more than a hundred other debt-free and focused Aussies: How to get mortgage-free like me. Because she wants everyone to be able to do the same.
Nicole has met and mixed with many of Australia’s movers, shakers and money policy makers. And she knows how to cut through it all… to speak in dollars and sense.