Leadership for Women Programme Celebrates 21st Cohort

A unique leadership for women programme, which creates a ‘safe’ environment for women to explore key areas and challenges, is celebrating the launch of the 21^st cohort of female middle managers.

The STRIDE programme is the creation of Manchester based learning and development company The Oakridge Centre. Launched in 2013 the programme is aimed at female middle managers looking to take their next steps into organisational leadership.

“We have welcomed woman from a range of industry sectors and different sizes of companies”, says Deborah Larder-Shaw, Account Director with The Oakridge Centre. “Over 200 future female leaders have benefitted from the STRIDE programme and we often welcome attendees joining from across the UK and overseas, as well as the North West.

STRIDE is a six-month leadership programme which includes three full day workshops; webinars, an emotional intelligence report and webinar; personal reflection; one-to-one sessions with a qualified performance coach and STRIDE Alumni events throughout the year. The programme can be run in-house while ‘open’ programmes include a range of women from different organisations.

“The opportunity to work within a group of women and have discussions around the issues we all face, was fantastic.  Having the programme facilitated by 3 very knowledgeable, motivated and enthusiastic women made for an excellent experience,” reports Claire Hubbard, Global Category Manager at AstraZeneca  “. A real light bulb moment for me was the recognition that the focus should be on how I am and how I react.  The course content was evidenced with some highly useful tools & techniques.”

To celebrate the 21^st cohort of STRIDE a special event for the STRIDE Alumni and future programme attendees is being held online on 17 December 2020. The panel discussion event will include women who will share their experiences of living and working in prison and the outcomes for female ex-offenders. Panel members include:

• Vicky Pryce, Chief Economic Adviser at the Centre for Economics and Business Research (CEBR) and author of ‘Prisonomics’ which assesses Britain’s failing Prison system and
• Clare McGregor, founder of social enterprise Coaching Inside and Out (CIAO) and author of ‘Coaching Behind Bars’ which claimed that there is more potential in any one of our prisons than in any Oxbridge college and discovers. how coaching can unlock clients, whatever their context.
• Olivia Dehnavi, Policy and Research Officer at Working Chance, advocating for changes to policy and practice to improve rehabilitation and employment outcomes for women with convictions.

The event will include fundraising opportunities to support the amazing work of Working Chance.