The Spark Series
Leadership Development Designed for Women
Five one-hour sessions, each one a taster of the leadership work behind our Women in Leadership programme.
Whether you're an HR team building out your leadership development offer or an employee network looking for content that will actually get people in the room, The Spark Series gives you a low-commitment way to test the waters. Each session stands alone, so you're not asking anyone to sign up to a programme, or commit, before they've seen what the work looks like.
The Double Bind
Naming the contradictory standards women leaders are held to, and why they're not your fault.
Confidence Is a Verb, Not a Feeling
Confidence as something you do, not something you wait to feel.
Networking Isn't Enough
Why networking alone doesn't build the support you need, and what does
Bouncing Forward, Not Back
Resilience reframed as forward motion, not recovery.
Conflict Without Losing Yourself
One framework and one technique for conflict that doesn't cost you yourself.
For HR teams, it's a practical entry point into a broader women in leadership offer, one you can point to as evidence of investment without committing budget to a full cohort programme upfront. It can also lead to further, deeper workshops, or a pilot programme.
For ERG and network leads, it's content with enough substance to hold a room, programmed as part of your group’s value-add offerings, not an optional lunchtime slot people skip because it's "nice to have" rather than useful. Give your network some helpful concepts, useful language, and practical tools.
No breakout rooms, no homework, just an hour that gives your team something real to think about and one thing to try before they're back at their desk. Delivered remotely, we recommend that these are ideally scheduled in the working day but not in a lunch break, not another ‘lunch and learn’ where you are asking people to sacrifice lunch, or their break. Although these sessions are grounded in the double bind experience, everyone, regardless of gender, will find concepts and tools that resonate.
Book one as a standalone or run all five as a season. We recommend starting with The Double Bind. This introduces foundational concepts that serve as the ‘why’.
Learn more about the session content…
The Double Bind
Women in leadership are routinely held to standards that contradict each other: be confident but not too much, be warm but not soft, be heard but never “too aggressive.” This session names that bind, shows why it's structural rather than personal, and gives your team a language for something most of them have felt but never quite articulated.
Participants will gain:
Language for the specific double standards they're navigating, not just a vague sense that leadership feels harder for them
Clarity that these binds are structural, not a personal shortfall
One reframe to use the next time they catch themselves caught in one
Confidence Is a Verb, Not a Feeling
Most confidence advice assumes you have to feel sure before you act. This session flips that: confidence as something you do, not something you wait for. Participants leave with a working definition they can use the same afternoon, and one pattern of self-doubt they can catch and swap out.
Participants will gain:
A working definition of confidence that doesn't require feeling ready first
Recognition of their own most common self-doubt pattern
One substitute action to practise before their next stretch moment
Networking isn’t enough
Networking is often treated as an end in itself, but having contacts isn't the same as having people who'll actually back you. This session looks at the difference between transactional networking and building real, reciprocal support, and gives participants a way to see where their own network is thin.
articipants will gain:
A clear distinction between networking and building genuine support
A way to map their existing network and spot where support is thin
One relationship to strengthen or build in the next month
Bouncing Forward, Not Back
Resilience is usually framed as recovery, getting back to where you were. This session reframes it as forward motion instead, alongside a practical look at flexing leadership style under pressure without losing what makes you effective in the first place.
Participants will gain:
A resilience model built on forward motion, not just recovering to where they were
A practical way to flex leadership style under pressure without losing themselves
One phrase or practice to use in their next high-pressure moment
Conflict Without Losing Yourself
Conflict carries different risks for women leaders, and avoiding it altogether has its own cost. This session covers one framework for spotting where a disagreement has gone off track, plus a single technique, the pause, that changes how the next hard conversation goes..
Participants will gain:
A framework for spotting when a disagreement has gone off track
Insight into why conflict carries different risks for women leaders
One pause-based technique to use before their next reactive moment
Ready to bring The Spark Series to your team?
Get in touch to book a session, or talk through which ones would land best with your team.
The Spark Series is a starting point. If it lands with your team, our full Women in Leadership programme goes further, built around your organisation as a cohort-based, white-label offer.