I’m a woman who hasn’t been afraid to say she likes a pretty dress and a pedicure. And woe betide anyone who thought me less intelligent for saying so. But these days I feel like a woman’s visual power has become the whole story while the actual achievements are becoming less and less what people know and admire in our role models.
Last night was a fantastic antidote to such concerns. A few weeks ago I had been a judge in the Dods Scottish Widows Women in Public Life Awards. Sitting with powerhouses like Baroness Jo Valentine, Dame Barbara Stocking of Oxfam and Dame Suzi Leather from the Charity Commission, I read about the achievements of 30 different women from local and national government, the media, business and the voluntary sector.
Click here for the full results.
But these are my highlights of the women we honoured — and I was honoured to meet — at the awards evening on Thursday night.
Baroness Stern conducted a six month independent review into how rape complaints are handled by public authorities in England and Wales. Accepting her award (from me) she was beautifully humble, thanking the women who had bravely relived their rape experiences to talk to her and her committee.
Clare Algar (eight months pregnant, incidentally) left a six figure salary at a City law firm to take on the role of executive director of Reprieve, a legal action charity fighting torture and capital punishment around the world.
Ruby McGregor-Smith is one of a handful of women heading up a FTSE 250 company. MITIE, an outsourcing company that employs 56,000 people, has grown under her leadership — but, she told me, she manages to attend her children’s Nativity plays, and, as a British Asian woman, is determined to make diversity better understood and practised in business. “I’m not part of the old boys’ network — and at first I don’t think they knew what to make of me.” Well, they do now.
All of the winners — and every name on the shortlists, frankly — were women who were making a difference to the world we live in. It didn’t always involve big salaries and media bonanzas — but learning about them gave me a real glow of appreciation. As Sian Williams of BBC Breakfast, said: “I want everyone to know about these women — and our daughters especially.”
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