LEADING an AFLW program while living on the other side of the country to her wife, Claire Heffernan has spent the last four years working out how to keep all those plates spinning.

For Heffernan and wife Liza, six weeks is the threshold. That's as long as they will go without seeing one another in person.

"Around four to five weeks we start to get a bit irritable. You just don't know why. You say, 'I don't want to FaceTime you'. You just need to see each other," Heffernan told AFL.com.au.

Liza lives in Melbourne with her eight-year-old son, a four-hour flight from Heffernan and her home at the Dockers, but it was an arrangement they both leapt into willingly, understanding the challenges they would face, but also that it was a career opportunity that couldn't be passed up.

"Liza and I met in our 40s, and 'Lize' was an independent theatre producer," Heffernan said.

"So when I met her, I was a PDM [player development manager]. We had these different industries that we worked in, but there were so many similarities between them, and both of us being really dedicated to what we were doing as well. Essentially, in her role, she's helping co-ordinate everything, helping people grow their careers.

"And so, when this role came up in Fremantle, she was the first person to say, 'you have to go and do this role'. She's the No.1 supporter."

In fact, Liza is the producer who brought comedian Rosie O'Donnell to Australia for her show Common Knowledge and is the reason O'Donnell is heading along to the Dockers' clash with Greater Western Sydney on Saturday as part of the AFLW's Pride Round.

Both are impressive, career-driven women who are willing to make the necessary sacrifices to reach personal goals.

But Heffernan never had her sights set on leading an AFLW program. Becoming a player development manager was her dream job for a long time. Then, following several years in the role across both the Western Bulldogs and Fremantle, Heffernan took over the Dockers' program ahead of the 2024 season.

Balancing the hard-nosed edge required to run a whole program, with the empathetic side of her player development roots has been a challenge, but the combination has allowed Heffernan to understand the different sides of a footy club.

"It was an opportunity to really influence the program, and you suddenly go 'Oh, I've been in women's footy for years, now I get to make bigger picture decisions'," Heffernan explained.

As with many women across male-dominated industries such as footy, self-belief has often presented as a challenge, but it's one she's able to work through with a support system in place.

Throughout her life, Heffernan has cobbled together a fascinating path of experiences. From time as a chef, to becoming a paramedic, social work, and now footy, it has helped craft her.

All of that came with the sprinkling of footy, playing throughout her 20s and 30s for the St Kilda Sharks, then one final year with the Darebin Falcons.

Heffernan had always been a footy fan. A Richmond supporter growing up, it was the stylings of Dale Weightman and Kevin Bartlett that caught the eye. Players who could run, and run, and run.

That's just what Heffernan was – "a scrappy player who could run" – someone who tried her guts out and her determination overshadowed any deficiencies in skill.

Footy was the first real home for Heffernan to comfortably be herself as a queer woman, heading along to training and games after long shifts at work, always finding the energy for it because that was the safe spot.

"I nominated for the (2016) draft, there was no way I was ever going to get taken," she said pragmatically.

"I was working as a paramedic at the time, and then shifted into social work, working in homelessness and went into coaching as well. So it kind of melded into this job where I thought 'I think the players could do with this sort of welfare', and then so when W started and I didn't get drafted – shock, horror – I emailed about 10 AFL clubs saying I'd be really interested in this (PDM) role, I don't know if you have it."

Only one responded, and not positively, but Heffernan was patient, continuing her paramedic shifts while coaching at Aberfeldie.

Her first chance to work at a footy club was as a development coach at the Western Bulldogs, a volunteer role at the time, but it was a foot in the door to progress to her "dream job" of player development manager, and ultimately led to where she is today.

Working with young people across the playing list, the environment is totally different to Heffernan's experience running around for the Sharks at the Peanut Farm. What she and her teammates had to fight and scrap for is now the minimum standard for AFLW players, and her job is to advocate for the next wave of growth.

Claire Heffernan might be one of the lesser-known pioneers of the women's game, but she is working hard to raise the bar for each generation to follow her, and despite missing out on the chance to run out in a guernsey, she's having just as much influence off the field.