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UK Council for Psychotherapy seeks Lay Committee Member with interest in wellbeing and mental health

7 July, 2021 By WiC

Education, Training & Practice Committee

Lay Committee Member

The UK Council for Psychotherapy (UKCP) is recognised as the leading professional body for the education, training and accreditation of psychotherapists and psychotherapeutic counsellors.

We represent 75 training organisations and over 11,000 members – working privately and in the NHS and voluntary sector to offer a wide variety of psychotherapeutic approaches or modalities. As part of our commitment to protecting the public, we work to improve access to psychotherapy and psychotherapeutic counselling, to support and disseminate research, to improve standards and to respond effectively to complaints against our members.

We are seeking a lay person to join our Education, Training & Practice Committee (ETPC). By ‘lay’ we mean applicants who are not UKCP members or employees, nor from other psychological professions. Ideally, they will have experience of education & training work within the charity sector and have an awareness of diversity issues. This is a voluntary, unpaid position.

As part of our aim of improving equality and diversity practice within the profession, UKCP welcomes applications from under-represented groups.

Main Duties and Responsibilities

To attend the ETPC Committee, which meets for a minimum of 5 meetings per annum.
To provide an external perspective on setting, reviewing, and maintaining professional standards relating to the education, training and practice of practising UKCP members.
To liaise and, where necessary, work closely with UKCP’s other Regulatory Committees including the Professional Regulatory Committee for Colleges and Faculties (PRCCF), the Quality Assurance Committee (QAC), and the organisation’s Registrar.
To liaise and, where necessary, work closely with UKCP’s Executive Committee, the Higher Education Special Interest Group, and the Ethics Committee.
To assist the ETPC in assessing and approving models of education, training and practice of psychotherapists & psychotherapeutic counsellors working with adults and with children & young people. These functions are carried out within a framework informed by best practice in relation to diversity, equality, inclusion and social responsibility.
To ensure that the UKCP’s Diversity and Equalities Statement is upheld in the exercise of its functions.

Essential Experience

A positive interest in Mental Health & Wellbeing.
Experience in the training / education or continual development of professionals, or setting professional standards. This may include: the development of training modules and programmes; and or the enhancement of trainee experience; and or, experience in the enhancement and continual development of professionals.

Desirable Experience

Experience of working within charitable organisations at committee and policy level.
A familiarity of mental health professions, education, and health sectors.
A familiarity with regulatory and accreditation processes.
Awareness of Equality Diversity and Inclusion.
Awareness of safeguarding.

Why join us?

Working alongside committee members, and UKCP staff, you will have the opportunity to:

Get involved in the work of an important UKCP committee.
Gain experience of working within a well-established professional body.
Develop your professional networks.
Enhance your own professional development.
Make a difference to the psychotherapy profession.

How to Apply

You can find out more about the role by reading the ETPC Lay Member Role Description.

Please send your CV and a covering letter that outlines how you meet the above person specification to hr@ukcp.org.uk by 29th July2021.

Interviews will be held remotely via Zoom on either the 6th or 7th September 2021.

Stroke Association seeks Two Trustees and an Independent Advisor

18 June, 2021 By WiC

The Stroke Association is the UK’s biggest stroke charity, working across the UK. We’re here to support people to rebuild their lives after stroke. We provide specialist support, fund critical research and campaign to make sure people affected by stroke get the very best care and support to rebuild their lives.

Our work is urgent, and it is vital. Stroke is one of the leading causes of death and adult disability in the UK. It can also have a huge impact on the carers, family and friends of stroke survivors. There are over 1.3 million people living with the effects of stroke in the UK, with 100,000 strokes happening each year. That’s one stroke every five minutes.

We give life-changing support to over 65,000 stroke survivors and carers across all four countries of the UK each year.

As the population ages, the number of strokes is projected to double over the next 20 years. We know that it is crucial that we act to ensure that stroke is better understood and stroke survivors and carers get the support they need, both now and in the future.

As part of our succession planning, we are seeking two new trustees and an independent advisor to join us in bringing wise governance and strategic guidance to our work:

Customer Experience and Product Specialist (Trustee), who will help us to continue developing and embedding a customer-first culture. You will have a strong track record in large-scale strategic consumer experience planning, implementation and measurement, ideally within the commercial B2C services or health sector.
Investment Committee Chair (Trustee), who will bring strong investment oversight, management or governance experience, to help us make astute use of our reserves to generate investment returns, while helping us manage financial risk.
Audit and Risk Committee Member (Independent Advisor), who will bring expertise in business, accountancy, audit or charity finance, and experience in identifying and managing risk across a number of key areas including finance and reputation risk.

Please consider whether these opportunities might exercise your expertise and your commitment to dramatically improve outcomes and quality of life for stroke survivors and their carers.

CLICK HERE to download our recruitment pack and for further information.

The roles of Trustees and Independent Advisors are not accompanied by any financial remuneration; however, we willingly cover expenses within the Stroke Association’s expenses policy.

Stroke Association is working with Macaulay Search on this appointment process.

Application is by submission of CV and cover letter to laura.bagley@macaulaysearch.com

Closing date: 5pm on Wednesday 14th July 2021.

Thank you for your interest in the work of Stroke Association. Please do not hesitate to get in touch with Laura Bagley on the email address above if you have any questions about this opportunity.

We want to reduce barriers to inclusion. Help us understand who’s applying for and getting roles with us by completing our equal opportunities form. This helps us continue to identify anything that’s getting in the way for people looking to join us. This information does not form part of your application.

We are working to build a more diverse organisation. One where we recognise and promote everyone’s individuality with kindness, and where we harness the value and diversity that everyone brings to help deliver our goals. We encourage applications from anyone who wants to be part of that future. And in particular, we would encourage anyone with lived experience of stroke to apply.

Interested in supporting the standards of psychotherapy? UKCP Membership Committee – Lay Members

29 April, 2021 By WiC

The UKCP Membership Committee is looking for lay members (i.e. who are not psychotherapists or psychotherapeutic counsellors) to join our well-established committee on a voluntary basis.

We would love to hear from you if you:

Are interested in the promotion of the psychotherapy profession, improving standards and ensuring the protection of the public
Have a keenness to get involved with the assessment of applications received from organisations wishing to join UKCP
Have some experience in undertaking quality assessments

Please share this volunteering opportunity with anyone you think would be interested and encourage them to apply.

Lay members must not be practising psychotherapy or psychotherapeutic counselling.

The deadline to submit applications is 5pm on Wednesday, 12 May 2021.

Interviews will be held online on Friday, 28 May 2021.

For a list of key competencies, responsibilities and information on how to apply, please click here

For more information about UKCP, visit the website.

This role is promoted on behalf of UKCP by Women in the City.

Gender parity will not be attained this century says WEF

13 January, 2020 By WiC

None of us will see gender parity in our lifetimes, and nor likely will many of our children. That’s the sobering finding of the Global Gender Gap Report 2020, which reveals that gender parity will not be attained for 99.5 years.

Why gender parity matters

Gender parity has a fundamental bearing on whether or not economies and societies thrive. Developing and deploying one-half of the world’s available talent has a huge bearing on the growth, competitiveness and future-readiness of economies and businesses worldwide.

The index’s rankings offer an effective means to benchmark progress. They are designed to create global awareness of the challenges that gender gaps pose, as well as the opportunities that emerge when action is taken to reduce them.

Political representation on the rise, but is it enough?

Now in its 14th year, the Global Gender Gap Report 2020 benchmarks 153 countries on their progress towards gender parity in four dimensions: Economic Participation and Opportunity, Educational Attainment, Health and Survival and Political Empowerment. In addition, this year’s report examines gender gap prospects in the professions of the future.

The report presents a decidedly mixed picture. Overall, the quest towards gender parity has improved, ducking back under a century and registering a marked improvement on the 108 years in the 2018 index. Greater political representation for women has contributed to this, but overall the political arena remains the worst-performing dimension.

At the other end of the scale, it is forecast to take just 12 years to attain gender parity in education, and in fact, overall, gender parity has been fully achieved in 40 of the 153 countries ranked.

The “role model effect” reaps dividends at the top …

Drilling down into the facts and figures, it will take 95 years to close the gender gap in political representation, with women in 2019 holding 25.2% of parliamentary (lower-house) seats and 21.2% of ministerial positions.

Positively, the so-called “role model effect” may be reaping dividends in terms of leadership and wages. Improving political empowerment for women has, as a general rule, corresponded with increased numbers of women in senior roles in the labour market.

… but not lower down

In contrast to this positive progress in the lofty world of leadership, women’s participation in the wider labour market has stalled and financial disparities are increasing. Globally, the trend is towards a deteriorating picture in emerging and developing economies, which is offsetting the gains made in OECD countries.

Although education attainment as well as health and survival enjoy much closer to parity (96.1% and 95.7% respectively), one important area of concern is that of economic participation and opportunity. This is the only dimension where progress has regressed. Here, the figures are sobering, with a deteriorating situation forcing gender parity to a lowly 57.8%, which in time represents a massive 257 years before gender parity can be achieved.

The report highlights three primary reasons for this: women have greater representation in roles that are being automated; not enough women are entering professions where wage growth is the most pronounced (most obviously, but not exclusively, technology), and women face the perennial problem of insufficient care infrastructure and access to capital.

Working towards a better outlook for future jobs

Looking to the future, the report reveals that the greatest challenge preventing the economic gender gap from closing is women’s under-representation in emerging roles. In cloud computing, just 12% of professionals are women. Similarly, in engineering and Data and AI, the numbers are 15% and 26% respectively.

Gender Parity in Professions

To address these deficiencies, workforce strategies must ensure that women are better equipped (in terms of improved skills or reskilling) to deal with the challenges and take advantage of the opportunities of the Fourth Industrial Revolution. Diverse hiring is another area for improvement (reflecting the current situation that sees gender parity in an in-demand skillset but not equal representation), along with creating inclusive work cultures.

Best in class

The top country for gender parity remained Iceland (for the 11th year running).
The most-improved countries were Albania, Ethiopia, Mali, Mexico and Spain.
Of the 149 countries ranked, 101 improved their scores on the 2019 index (this excludes the five new countries that have joined the ranking this year).
A further 48 saw their performance unchanged, while the top 10th percentile saw their scores improve more than 3.3% year-on-year.
A total of 35 countries have achieved gender parity in education.
In healthcare, 48 countries have achieved near-parity and 71 have closed at least 97% of the gap.

Could do better

Globally, gender parity stands at 68.6% and the bottom 10 countries have closed just 40% of the gender gap.
Political empowerment scores are poor. In terms of parliamentary representation, globally women have secured just 25% of available positions, a figure that slips to 21% at a ministerial level. At this level, there are nine where they have no representation.
In the past 50 years, 85 states have had no female head of state.
In terms of economic participation, the gender gap will take 257 years to close (compared to 202 years in the 2019 report).
Globally, only 55% of women (aged 15-64) are engaged in the labour market as opposed to 78% of men.
There are 72 countries where women are barred from opening bank accounts or obtaining credit.

There is no country where men spend the same amount of time on unpaid work as women. In countries where the ratio is lowest, it is still 2:1.

Trends

By region, Western Europe has made the most progress on gender parity (standing at 76.7%), followed by North America (72.9%), Latin America and the Caribbean (72.2%), Eastern Europe and Central Asia (71.3%), Sub-Saharan Africa (68.2%), South Asia (66.1%) and the Middle East and North Africa (60.5%).

These figures, however, mask several key trends, which have a significant impact on the time to gender parity. In North America progress stalled during 2019, while further south in Latin America and the Caribbean, several countries performed strongly over the course of the year.

How to get ahead

This year’s index highlights areas where policy-makers need to focus greater attention. At the federal level, greater political representation – and in some nations, any representation at all – for women is a pressing need.

Looking ahead, policy-makers need to take action to better equip younger generations – particularly in developing nations – with the skills to succeed in the world of future jobs. Increasing formal education attainment is necessary – and the strong gender parity in this area to be applauded – but it is insufficient to provide young men and women graduating from every level of education with the types of skills needed for the Fourth Industrial Revolution’s job market. In this respect, gender gaps remain and are likely to become exacerbated unless addressed now.

Download Report

Visit our searchable Knowledge Bank for a range of reports and studies on gender diversity, leadership and related topics.

Step-change needed for women in senior leadership roles

13 November, 2019 By WiC

This year’s Hampton Alexander Review, published today shows the strongest year of progress since targets were first set in 2011:

FTSE 100 on track to reach the 33% target for women on boards ahead of the 2020 deadline o FTSE 250 made strong gains during the year and with sustained effort, will also meet the 2020 deadline
Last year’s challenge to “One & Done” boards is having an impact: there are 39 “this year, down from 74 with only 2 All-Male boards remaining

However, a step-change is needed for senior leadership roles below board level

50% of all appointments next year need to go to women, or the 2020 target will not be met.

The report shows that women now hold 32.4% of all FTSE 100 board positions, up from 30.2% last year and up from only 12.5% in 2011. The FTSE 100 is very close to meeting the 33% target for Women on Boards and will do so ahead of the 2020 deadline.

The report also shows that women hold 29.6% of all FTSE 250 board positions, up from 24.9% last year and only 7.8% in 2011. The FTSE 250 has had its strongest year yet and if the same rate of progress continues next year, the FTSE 350 will be on track to meet the 33% target by the end of 2020 deadline.

Not all companies are making the same efforts, and the gap between those working hard to improve gender balance and those doing little, is each year more obvious.

Only two All-Male Boards remain

Following successful campaigning and pressure from investors in the year, “One & Done” boards have reduced from 74 to 39 this year. This includes 11 new entrants to the index but 28 companies feature for the second year running. Only two All-Male boards remain, down from 5 this time last year and 152 in 2011.

Sir Philip Hampton, Chair of the Review said:

This is the penultimate Hampton-Alexander Report and we enter our final year with great momentum behind us, but we are still a long way from reaching the target for women in senior leadership roles below board level.

Denise Wilson, Chief Executive of the Review said:

There are over 900 women now serving on FTSE 350 boards, providing an ever-increasing pool of women with substantial board experience, yet only 25 women have been appointed into the Chair role, even fewer as women CEOs and showing little sign of change.

The very senior jobs were always going to be the hardest of challenges, however a stronger focus is now required at every stage of the appointment process to address the reasons why top jobs aren’t going to women”

Chris Cummings, Chief Executive of the Investment Association said:

Investors have been consistent in their demands for greater diversity. It’s not just a nice to have. The research is clear: firms with diverse boards and management teams make better decisions, drive innovation and outperform their less diverse peers.”

Melanie Richards, Deputy Chair at KPMG UK said:

Behind the numbers and trends are hundreds of individual stories. Women who have overcome barriers that they should not have had to overcome, with leaders and boards who have worked hard to remove those barriers for current and future generations.”

Carolyn Fairbairn, CBI director general, said:

If all male boards are to become a thing of the past, firms must not take their foot off the pedal.”

She added that firms were “making less progress on the executive pipeline”.

We are still seeing too few women in senior leadership positions, whether as chief executive or running divisions.”