(from left to right) Geetha Baskaran; Professor Christine Ennew, Professor Raha Abdul Rahim and Professor Dr Adeeba Kamarul Zaman
The Women in Science, Engineering and Technology (WinSET) Working Group of UNMC provides support by influencing policies, practices and culture of the University, and providing informed advice around career advancement to create equal opportunities for men and women in academia.
Two new career development initiatives, WinSET Mentoring Programme (WMP), and the WinSET Leadership Development Programme (WLDP) was launched by Yg. Bhg. Professor Dr Raha binti Abdul Rahim, Director of the Higher Education Excellence Planning Division, Department of Higher Education, Ministry of Education, Malaysia.
The launch event includes a conference which was well attended by Ivy Josiah, Executive Director of Women's Aid Organisation (WAO); Ho Yock Lin, President of All Women's Action Society (AWAM) and Dr June McCombie, Senior Research Officer, Faculty of Science, University of Nottingham, UK; Prof Dr Adeeba Kamarulzaman, Dean of Faculty of Medicine, Universiti Malaya; as well as representatives from public and private universities. This full-day event hosted a series of talks, a forum panel discussion and a poster competition.
“Mentoring enables both career development and leadership development to help employees develop new skills and feel engaged within the university. By connecting high potentials with leaders, top performers, and each other across the university, learning spreads throughout the university. This results in improved engagement while leveraging on internal resources, which keeps costs to a minimum. It creates an environment of trust, belonging, understanding, support, and encouragement for a diverse workforce. It gives staff an opportunity to voice their concerns, overcome hurdles, and find solutions. As a result, it inspires staff to perform to their highest ability” said Geetha Baskaran, Programme Champion and manager of WinSET.
“Alongside the moral case for gender equality, there is also a very real economic case. If an organisation wants to benefit from having the most talented individuals then it needs to ensure that it promotes equality of opportunity.” said Professor Christine Ennew, CEO and Provost of The University of Nottingham Malaysia Campus during the opening speech of the WinSET launch.
“Direct and explicit discrimination against women is increasingly rare; but we need to challenge the more complex forms of discrimination and bias that arise as a result of the impact of stereotypical views of women on organisational behaviour.” Professor Ennew said.
WinSET was officially launched by Professor Christine Ennew, Provost and CEO of UNMC on 3 July 2013, WinSET has since grown into a vast network spanning across academic, administrative and postgraduate professionals. Specific development programmes are designed to assist individuals to explore their leadership potentials. The scheme is expected to contribute on a larger scale, to cultural changes within the University.
