An emergency engineer is encouraging women to feel empowered to take the next step in their career to celebrate International Women’s Day.
Sarah Marsden, lives in Durham, is an Emergency Planning Engineer and has worked at Northern Powergrid for over 10 years.
She’s worked across the business, including spells in Connections and Network Revenue after completing Northern Powergrid’s two-year Graduate apprenticeship when she first joined.
With a degree in engineering, Sarah found the programme incredibly useful and a practical application of her skills.
The 34-year-old transferred over to the non-operational side after returning from maternity leave, and decided it was time to push herself in her role and take on some more responsibility.
That’s when she discussed putting herself forward for Northern Powergrid’s CORE Aspirations programme.
Through the programme, Sarah will develop her career into a people leadership role, to assist her in developing her core leadership skills before moving into any future roles.
Whilst it doesn’t guarantee participants a people leadership role at the end of the development programme, it puts them in pole position to get roles that may come up in future.
Starting the programme back in January, Sarah has found the sessions incredibly helpful and insightful, pushing her to think about her role in a new way.
Sarah said “Taking part in CORE Aspirations means I get to meet lots of people that maybe I wouldn't have met from across the business, but also, I get to spend time away with people who I’ve known for years because we are at similar points in careers.
“It's interesting to see everyone’s views on things because even when I’ve worked with somebody, you don't necessarily know their thoughts on how the team works
“In my 10 years, Northern Powergrid has become a very different place and there are significantly more women in roles all around the business.
“When I did my degree, only 25% were women. It was good, and we never felt like it was on purpose it was just one of those things.
“And when I first joined on the graduate programme, I was the only woman on the course, engineering was always seen as a male dominated role, but I do think it’s changing.
“There are far more opportunities now then there was 10 years ago, and similarly there are more women in higher up roles across the organisation, so you can see the growth and change.
“Doing this programme is important to me because I have the chance to be a leader and be a role model for other women across the organisation.
Saturday 8 March is International Women’s Day and the theme for this year is ‘Accelerate Action’.
Accelerate Action is a worldwide call to acknowledge strategies, resources, and activity that positively impact women's advancement, and to support and elevate their implementation.
Chris Nowland, Head of Learning and Development at Northern Powergrid, said “Our CORE Aspirations programme is a chance for people in our organisation to get some theoretical knowledge of leadership.
“They can then apply this to their roles and get the best out of themselves and their teams, whilst encouraging others to get involved in development opportunities.
“Hearing Sarah talk so positively about her experience on the course is fantastic, I hope that her experience empowers others to get involved in opportunities they might not have thought of before.
“It’s great to see the number of female participants on the CORE Aspirations programme exceeds the current gender split in the business, further demonstrating our support for female talent.
“It’s important that women across our organisation feel they can put themselves forward for development and whilst going through the programme they feel supported.
“In the CORE aspirations sessions, we often share personal stories about how the subject matter can be applied to real life scenarios, so when we are discussing around the room you are learning different points of view.
“This means often people adapt their way of thinking and work style after reflecting on the experiences of others in the room, it can be incredibly powerful.”
You can find out more about the work Northern Powergrid do on their website.
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