Celebrating women in STEM

POSTED 19.06.20

Celebrating 1MILLION women in STEM

Although we have come a long way in terms of equality in the workplace, there is still so much that can be done and the potential outcome should benefit everyone in the sector. We all share a responsibility to do better and by joining forces, aligning objectives and working collaboratively we can make things happen.

According to the latest figures released by the government, there are now more than one million women working in STEM roles across the UK. This goal was originally set by Women in Science and Engineering (WISE) and they have been championing the initiative for the past five years.

This great achievement has been celebrated as the 1MILLION women in STEM campaign and thousands of messages praising all of the women working in the sector are being shared across the globe. A great cause that we all need to continue building and nurturing to consolidate diverse and balanced workforces.

Over the past, at EASL, we have been truly fortunate to have secured some excellent women engineers to join our technical team. Some of them are amongst the best professionals in the industry and continue learning, inspiring and mentoring others at our company. We feel very proud to have created the right environment for our employees regardless of their sex or background to continue growing and flourishing.

This hasn’t happened by chance; a focussed strategy promoting diversity at work was implemented by our founder, with a vision to create a sustainable and diverse employee pipeline. Ensuring that we attract a wide variety of engineers was paramount and providing the tools to be able to train and mentor them throughout their careers to fulfil more senior roles within the company has been pivotal to the success of the scheme, with some specific initiatives promoted at EASL to attract and retain women in our workforce by:

1. Offering flexible working hours. This is not only related to female employees; according to the Harvard Business Review, employees who are given the autonomy to work flexibly are happier, more productive and less likely to quit, so that employees can adjust their schedules around other needs in their life. We have noticed that by introducing this measure, employees feel valued, are happier at work and in control, and ultimately, are more productive.

2. Building up a robust mentoring scheme that attracts and nurtures a pool of employees from all backgrounds, helping them to develop their skills.

3. Encouraging female role models within the company: actively encourage, nurture and foster women in leadership roles also encourage more women into their workforce. Actively promoting our employee successes, shouting about their achievements, enabling opportunities for more training, support and mentor-mentee relationships encourages our employees to thrive and to reach senior roles within the company.

Our approach has helped us in delivering a balanced team, contributing towards the one million target. Today we feel like celebrating this achievement by congratulating everyone within the sector who has made this momentous milestone possible.

Let’s keep up the good work!