Networking and the social aspect is a top motivator for members to join Women in Transport and our most popular event of the year is by far our Annual Mince Pies and Networking. A time to celebrate and enjoy the company of friends and colleagues across the transport industry.
Around 120 people attended this year’s event, generously hosted by Turner & Townsend (T&T), where Lucy Howard, their Head of UK Transport, warmly welcomed our members and guests.
Our President, Katie Hulland, who is an Associate Director at T&T, was delighted to be on home turf. She thanked all those involved from T&T in helping bring the evening together, including: Davina, Amy, Rys and the team of Women in Transport volunteers.
Before a quick annual roundup of 2019 for Women in Transport, Katie introduced the theme of the importance of friendship and its vital role in the workplace for discussion, citing Gallup research that has repeatedly shown a concrete link between having a best friend at work and the amount of effort employees expend in their job:
“women who strongly agree they have a best friend at work are more than twice as likely to be engaged (63%) compared with the women who say otherwise (29%).”
Look out for a blog on the theme of friendship in the New Year!
Here are some of the topics Katie covered in her review of an exciting year at Women in Transport:
We restructured our board in January, welcoming Sonya Byers as CEO. Our first regional hub in the North East was launched in Newcastle in January and we will be launching in the North West in early 2020.
Christine Hurley continues to work tirelessly, also taking on the role of events lead and running a record number of events.
Dorcas Ariyo-Francis joined the board as Volunteer Engagement Lead and has implemented a structured approach to our volunteer programme and expanded our volunteer base to over 20.
Julie Cartwright joins us this month as Regional Lead for the North West.
After what must be at least 10 years service as Treasurer, Hang Vu-McSweeney Is handing over her role and training our two new treasurers, Katie Abraham and Sarah O’Brien. We can’t thank Hang enough for all her hard work over the years.
Everyone on the team has played a huge part in the rapid membership and social media growth. We launched on Instagram in September and look forward to increasing our audience on this new channel.
We have welcomed eight new corporate partners this year and are so grateful for the continued support of our existing partners as we continue to grow.
The bus steering group we launched meets quarterly and involves senior leaders across the bus industry in leading change and improving perceptions of working in the sector.
We were delighted to join the Highways UK Advisory board this year and to have a presence at the event supported by WSP and the sub-national transport bodies.
The All Party Parliamentary Group is currently dissolved while we await the outcome of the general election, so more on that in the New Year.
Our December event is also an opportunity for our Advance mentoring pairs to meet informally ahead of their formal meetings throughout 2020.
Now in its third year, Advance, a programme co-designed by Sonya Byers and Angela Gainsford, is made possible by the support of our sponsors; TXM Recruit, Xanta Rail, Steer and Brighton & Hove Buses. TXM, and Xanta have supported the programme since the pilot and Steer have been involved since the first year, becoming a sponsor in 2019. We thank them for their continued support of women working in the transport industry.
This year, we welcomed 33 pairs to the programme. Advance is a structured programme with a commitment to six, one hour sessions between January and September. You can read more about it here.
It has been incredibly popular with a consistent level of applications each year. We are grateful to all our mentors for volunteering their time to support our members in their professional development and wish all of our pairs a happy and successful mentoring experience in the coming year.
Our thanks to all of our members, volunteers and supporters for contributing to a successful and incredibly exciting 2019. We have so much already planned for 2020 and can’t wait to see you all again.
From all of us to all of you, have a wonderful Christmas and New Year!
Annual membership of Women in Transport is £60 per year, providing access to monthly events, mentoring and professional development. A discounted rate applies for TfL employees. Find out more and join today by clicking on the button below.
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