One hundred women from twenty-four National Governing Bodies and four Local Sports Partnerships gathered together virtually last night to celebrate having completed a Women in Sport Leadership Programme with consultants Lisa Clancy and Sarah O’Shea.

Initiated and facilitated by Swim Ireland, and funded through Sport Ireland Women in Sport Funding, the course was designed by Clancy and O’Shea on a trip to Donegal pre-lockdown and then delivered through the past year over Zoom.

Originally planned to be delivered face to face, when Covid-19 hit, the programme was switched to online with the first course taking place for 8-weeks in September and October 2020.

The programme has proved extremely popular and already delivered results with four courses now completed and two more underway.

At last night’s event, the course ‘graduates’ heard from each other, from Joanne O’Riordan on the theme of Choose to Challenge and from Sport Ireland’s John Treacy and Nora Stapleton.

Representatives from clubs, National Governing Bodies and Local Sports Partnerships, volunteers, coaches, athletes and staff, joined from all over Ireland and tuned in from England, South Africa, Canada and France.

Enabling and Supporting

Modules were developed with the specific aim of enabling and supporting women to step into positions of authority in sport and included: Leadership and Values, Networking and Collaboration, which our own Rob Hartnett spoke about in the course, Handling Challenging Situations, Crisis Management, Governance Developing Resilience, Communications and Developing your Personal Brand, amongst others.

40 speakers from the coaching, sporting, media, commercial world and beyond provided valuable leadership insights to the group.

As well as the online element, participants also complete group work and a personal development plan with one-to-one sessions with Clancy or O’Shea.

“Following on from our work on the Women in Sport Policy I felt action was required to ensure women in Ireland had the confidence, skills and support to step into leadership positions in sport,” said Clancy.

“Developing the course and seeing 100 women grow their own potential has been a real privilege and a very proud outcome during a challenging period for us all.”

Giving Back

“I am delighted to be in a position to give back to women in sports leadership through running this course,” added O’Shea.

“A course of this kind would have been very beneficial to me during my time working in sport. The network and talent we have needs to be showcased and supported and I look forward to running more courses and continue to support women at all levels of Irish Sport.”

“Leadership and Governance is a key target area of Sport Ireland’s Policy on Women in Sport,” said Sport Ireland Women in Sport Lead Nora Stapleton.

“We always encourage collaboration in the sports sector and are delighted with the success of this programme coordinated through Swim Ireland but with 28 different sporting organisations involved.”

“We were delighted to be able to bring so many NGB’s and LSP’s together for this programme,” concluded Swim Ireland Head of Communication Trish Mayon.

“It has been extremely popular, and we have taken great pleasure in seeing the development plans and goals that participants finishing have come out with. We even had two Swim Ireland participants appointed to our Board since completing the course.”

 

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