Women in Rail (WR) is delighted to launch its “repowered” Women in Rail Mentoring Programme.

WR is collaborating with Moving Ahead, the specialist company behind the design and management of the mentoring algorithm which supports the matching of mentors and mentees for the hugely successful 30% Club.

The repowered WR Mentoring Programme (Programme) retains its unique feature as a cross-industry mentoring programme. As in previous years, mentors will be men and women working in UK rail. This year, mentees will only be women. Next year, we intend the Programme to be open to both men and women in UK rail.

The Programme will be intranet based with the matching of mentors and mentees enabled via an algorithm specifically tailored for WR. In addition, mentors and mentees will receive professional training and be invited to attend networking events where they will have an opportunity to expand their network within the UK railway industry.

The Programme will be funded by companies from the UK railway industry who, for a fee of £5,000 (c.£250 per individual), will be able to put forward up to 10 mentoring pairs (10 mentors and 10 mentees) from their own organisation. The fee includes matching, training, three networking events and ongoing support throughout the 9 months of the Programme.

This year, WR is also creating a Pro-bono Fund to enable women associated with the UK railway industry to take part in the Programme as a mentee free of charge. The Pro-Bono Fund will be funded by Participating Companies and strict eligibility criteria will apply.

As always, we are very grateful to our sponsors, The Rail Delivery Group, Morson and Network Rail, who through their continued support, have made this new Programme possible.

We are very excited about the potential of the Programme and would love you to help us make this an industry leading initiative with the potential to make a real difference to the careers of women in our industry. If you or your company are interested in attending this event, please register below.

Many thanks and best wishes,

The WR Mentoring Team.

wr@womeninrail.org