WDF and EY launch next season of meetings with key survey

The Women’s Development Forum (WDF) and EY have launched a survey to discover what women in the Channel Islands consider to be the key factors when planning their career paths.

The EY and WDF survey will be used as a launch pad for the first meetings of the new WDF season on 3 October in Jersey and 4 October in Guernsey.

These meetings will consider the results from the survey to stimulate a debate on career planning, having sponsors and mentors, career investment and aspirations.

Spearheaded by WDF founder Michelle Johansen and EY partner and Channel Islands Head of Tax Wendy Martin, the two lunch events will gauge views on whether specific career plans impact on the ability to unlock more of the potential in the female workforce in the islands.

“Women often think of the first half of their career as a period of accumulating and climbing and the second half as more meaningful and fulfilling.

“WDF’s aim is to support more women to strive to become directors and seek senior leadership positions and we want to find out why this isn’t happening and what might be lacking in the workplace or psyche which fails to support women to achieve their goals,” Mrs Johansen said.

Mrs Martin said: “The EY survey, developed with the WDF, is designed to see if this is in fact the case and what women are aspiring to achieve. We will consider the benefits of career planning with the audience and look at how others can assist women to reach their full career potential.”

“Evidence collated from Forbes suggests women do not invest in their careers in the same way as men; prioritising home, family and appearance before career investment.

“The aim of the WDF event is to help people come up with their next career step. After discussion and debate, they will be asked to put a ‘goal’ into a sealed envelope which will be collated by EY and returned to them during the last meeting of the WDF season in June to see how they have progressed.  

“Taking that next step might be all that’s needed to unlock more of an individual’s potential -  whether they are just starting out, climbing the career ladder, wanting to cement a leadership position or looking for a new direction,” Mrs Johansen said.

The Jersey WDF event takes place on Monday, 3 October from 12 to 2 pm at the Royal Yacht Hotel. 

The Guernsey WDF event takes place on Tuesday, 4 October from 12 to 2 pm at the Les Cotils.

Both events are open to members and WDF non-members.

The survey can be completed at http://ow.ly/JbeX304nx3h. Sign up to attend the event in Jersey here http://ow.ly/PsyE304nxoJ and Guernsey http://ow.ly/Hmsw304nxr5.