Our Awards

Although there were already awards for businesswomen in 2007 when we set up our Awards Programme, Women in the City wanted to celebrate the achievements of a particular group of women: those working within specific professions and within the male-dominated working environment London's business hubs.

Having organised 4 highly-successful Annual Lunches and following a discussion with Prof Susan Vinnicombe, OBE, Director of the Centre for Developing Women Leaders at Cranfield University, we were delighted that she shared our desire to to recognise the achievements of extraordinarly talented professional women, agreed to Chair our Panel of Judges and help us set the criteria and rigorous judging process for our Woman of Achievement Awards.

In 2008 we approached a number of professional bodies to Endorse the Woman of Achievement Category Awards, promote them to their membership and form a Panel of Judges to select the Category Award Winner. Their involvement has been invaluable in many ways. Not only have they afforded additional rigour to the judging process, they have also encouraged both more nominations and increased applications.

In 2010 we introduced our Future Leaders Award to recognise high potential females in the early years of their management careers.

The significant pay differentials between men and women, even at senior levels, are not due to women's lack of talent so much as their reluctance to put themselves forward and to network strategically within their organisations thereby unwittingly allowing their achievements to go un-noticed. By encouraging talent to come forward and rewarding the achievements of women in the professions we want to bring to reality the words of Margaret Heffernan, the Keynote Speaker at our 2007 Annual Celebration Lunch, who said "... awards give women clout."

As can be seen below, our Woman of Achievement Category Awards Winners and Future Leaders Award Finalists have benefitted from the increased visibility (both internally within their organisations) and externally (in the press).

When Mandy Mannix found herself a victim of the credit crunch, she believes that the increased profile afforded to her by being our 2007 Woman of Achievement Award winner put her name forefront in the minds of those responsible for making recruitment decisions and played a part in her being offered a new role with Nomura.

And Amanda Blanc, our 2008 Insurance Category winner and our Woman of Achievement Award winner has been able to broaden her already high profile beyond the insurance sector and in 2011 became CEO of AXA's commercial division.

Kathryn Britten, the 2008 Accountancy Category Winner was overwhelmed by the number of letters of congratulations she received from clients, colleagues and former colleagues and went on to be head-hunted by KPMG where she is Chair of Forensic.

And our 2008 Property Category Winner, Carol Bell believes that the enhanced profile afforded to her by winning the Award has helped cushion her from the some of the worst effects of the downturn in her sector.

The co-Winner of our 2009 Financial Services Category Winner, Janet Thomas saw her name in the FT, received congratulations from her employer's Leadership Board in the USA, thereby significantly raising her profile internally whilst the Winner of our Lifetime Achievement Award, Estelle Clark, Group Business Assurance Director with Lloyd's Register was rewarded for a career spent entirely in male-dominated sectors.

Our Future Leaders Award Finalists also recognised the significant benefits of being part of the award process which included an opportunity to be heard at what Rebecca Scott of Mazars described "a critical time in my career". Following her being named as a Finalist she was made partner.  Similarly, our 2010 Award Winner, Felicia Trewin was promoted to Director within 12 months of receiving the award.

Our 2011 Future Leaders Award Finalists have also achieved promotions within the first 6 months of winning the Award and one year after winning the Award, Leire Jimenez was promoted by her company to be Managing Director of their China operation, Road China Assistance, and flew out to Shanghai immediately after speaking at the 2012 Award Ceremony.

We're delighted to be supporting the talent pipeline.

Our Woman of Achievement Award criteria include a requirement for women to show evidence of supporting the progress of women on their teams and within their organisation whilst our new Future Talent Award aims to discover and recognise tomorrow's female leaders.

Ruth Sealy, who works at the International Centre for Women Leaders at Cranfield University, wrote in our 2007 Lunch & Awards Programme that "The lack of senior female role models continues to be cited as a key barrier to women's career success. ... Having access to role models ... has value at both a Behavioural and Symbolic level ... with senior role models providing evidence of possiblity [for career progression]."

The structure of our Woman of Achievement Awards means that we aim to have an Endorser and a  Sponsor for each of our Category Awards. 

Our 2013 Categories include

Accountancy
Built Environment
Facilities Management
Financial Services
Healthcare/Medicine
Insurance
Legal
Technology

The Sponsor

• has a place on the Category Judging Panel
• is able to meet and form relationships with short-listed candidates
• attends the Category Award Celebration when we announce the Category Winners
• presents a personal memento to the Category Winner at our Annual Celebration Lunch and is promoted in all our communications relating to the Category Award.

The founding sponsor of our Future Leaders Award was Barclays Wealth who sponsored this award for the first two years. In 2012 our sponsor was Eureka Training. We are now seeking up to 5 sponsors for this award in 2013.

We are delighted that The University of Chicago Booth School of Business sponsor the acadmic prize for the Woman of Achievement Award.

The Academic Sponsor for the Future Leaders Award is Cranfield University School of Management.

Our Award Endorsors are professional associations and organisations and play a vital role in our Awards Programme by promoting the awards to their membership and actively encouraging nominations and applications.

They provide an additional and important role in the Judging Process for the Woman of Achievement Award where the Category Award Endorser brings together a Judging Panel which selects the Category Winner.

Our current Endorsers are:

British Bankers' Association	Chartered Institute of Insurers (CII)
Institute of Chartered Accountants for England and Wales (ICAEW)	Facilities Management Association (FMA)
The Bar Council	Medical Women's Federation
The Worshipful Company of Information Technologists	The Worshipful Company of Insurers
	The City HR Association

Our Awards Programme is recognised for its rigorous judging process which combines third-party nomination, completion of an Application Form and Panel interviews.  In the case of the Woman of Achievement Award, Category Award Winners go through a futher interview stage with a member of the main Judging Panel to select the overall winner - the Woman of Achievement.