Monika Maciuszek and Laura Menke attend the Springboard Women in Development Programme
Monika and Laura have been taking part in the Springboard Women’s Development Programme and have attended a series of workshops which aim to get women to enhance their own skills and abilities, challenge power and equality, while building confidence, assertiveness and a positive image.
Over the last four months Laura and I have participated in The Springboard Women’s Development Programme, which took place at Queen Mary University of London. This workshop shows us how to give and receive more out of our personal and professional lives and has been running for over 28 years in more then 45 countries. The workshops were divided into 4 one-day sessions, and between each session we met with our coach partners and discussed the programme, the progress in our personal development, but also to just simply talk and drink nice coffee:).
I decided to attend this programme because I wanted to invest more time and energy in my personal and career development. During the workshops I learnt how to a identify my strengths, communicate more assertively and also got the opportunity meet other STEM women. In my opinion if we can start to build a network now when we are students, it will be really fruitful and important in the future when we become the researchers, managers, team leaders and directors working in the public, private or academic sectors. On a personal level I think that it was amazing to be part of a workshop with women from different backgrounds (PhD students, postdocs, lawyers and medical doctors), ages, countries and stages of their lives.
Nowadays only around 30% of the world’s scientists are women. I think that this kind of initiative will help to reduce the gender gap, because women can learn how to identify their strong points, skills assessments and not be afraid of the pursuing careers in STEM.
Article by Monika Maciuszek
