NOVA Women in Tech Leadership Programme Launched

• NOVA Women in Tech Leadership Programme launched
• It targets emerging women leaders in technology
• It focuses on leadership skills

Technology Ireland Digital Skillnet and Connecting Women in Tech have announced the development of NOVA Women in Tech Leadership Programme, designed to support emerging female leaders in the technology sector.

It integrates human-centred leadership development with state-of-the-art strategic, technology, and AI-related capabilities that are increasingly expected by senior technology leaders.

For Technology Ireland Digital Skillnet, NOVA leverages more than a decade of initiatives on women in technology, including returner programmes that have supported more than 900 women to re-enter the tech workforce, thereby improving the gender balance across the sector.

The first cohort of the programme will start in January and it will comprise of over 20 professionals from 25 CWIT member companies. In the words of Máire Hunt, director Technology Ireland Digital Skillnet: "This programme responds to the needs of new approaches to attract, retain and progress women in technology so that as AI reshapes the industry, girls and women participate fully.

This is a programme designed to support women leaders to develop the skills to influence and shape the future of technology".

Una Fitzpatrick, director of Technology Ireland Digital Skillnet, stated the fact that though women in technology often bring strong technical capabilities with them, they are usually quite underrepresented at the level of senior management.

She is of the view that the program responds to the industry need for a structured and sector-led development pathway to support women in leadership roles within an AI-driven environment.

The first cohort comprises 25 female leaders across cloud computing, cybersecurity, fintech, AI services, semiconductors and enterprise technology. Participants come from Ergo, ADM, HPE, Workday, Kerry Group, ESB, Mastercard, Salesforce, BT, Accenture and Microsoft.

Commenting on the initiative, Sabrina Staunton of Mastercard and CWIT said the programme reflects CWIT's focus on leveraging networks and partnerships to support the attraction, retention and progression of women in Ireland's technology sector.

The six-month programme covers such modules as strategic thinking, future technologies, emotional intelligence, AI-enabled decision-making, communication, and leadership identity.

These are combined in face-to-face and virtual workshops, one-to-one coaching, and a leadership impact project-tailored to the development of new skills in a progressive way, building on new leadership practices. The programme can also be delivered in-house by individual companies for groups of female leaders.

Today, Ireland's technology sector employs in excess of 170,000 people across multinational companies, high-growth domestic firms, and start-ups.