Courses/Leadership & Management/Women in Leadership
Women in Leadership
A one-day course on leading visibly, winning sponsorship and negotiating the next role.
Overview
A full one-day course on women in leadership, built without deficit framing: nothing in it assumes women lack skills — it develops leaders and names the terrain honestly. Participants build a leadership identity backed by documented evidence, make their work deliberately visible, convert over-mentorship into sponsorship, negotiate stretch roles, scope and pay using approaches the research supports, and respond to recurring bias patterns without carrying them personally. The material draws on published work by Eagly and Carli, Ibarra, Hewlett, Babcock, Bowles and Williams, and includes the GCC reality where female workforce participation is a funded national priority and demand for prepared women leaders exceeds supply. The pack gives a trainer a complete scripted session — deck with speaker notes on every slide, participant workbook with nine exercises, five handouts and a capstone case study in international and Gulf editions — all editable.
Format. One day. Designed for classroom delivery and adaptable to live online sessions.
Who it is for. Written for trainers, consultancies and corporate L&D teams delivering women-in-leadership programmes; the course itself suits women from first leadership role through senior management, in single-company cohorts or open-enrolment groups. HR and talent teams also attend to understand what their systems must change. Open level; no prior leadership training assumed. Best run with 8 to 16 participants so every exercise gets working pairs and trios.
What delegates take away
- Build a leadership identity anchored in documented evidence of delivered results, not adjectives.
- Run a deliberate visibility routine and contribute so senior rooms register it.
- Distinguish sponsorship from mentorship and take named, dated steps to become sponsor-ready.
- Negotiate stretch roles, scope, support and pay using approaches the negotiation research supports.
- Name recurring bias patterns — prove-it-again, tightrope, office housework — and respond without absorbing them.
- Leave with a ninety-day plan: dated commitments, named people, and a peer follow-up booked.
Course outline
Establishes the evidence before the skills: Eagly and Carli's labyrinth replacing the glass-ceiling metaphor, the broken rung at first promotion to manager, the course's explicit no-deficit frame, and the GCC context where participation is funded national strategy and boards now require women directors.
Works on identity before technique, using Ibarra, Ely and Kolb's research on how leader identity is built through cycles of acting and affirmation — and how subtle bias interrupts that cycle. Participants rebuild their self-description from delivered outcomes and start a credibility file.
Treats visibility as scheduled work, not personality: reframing self-promotion as reporting information decision-makers need, and the mechanics of being heard in senior rooms — speaking early, headline first, reclaiming interrupted points, crediting specifically. Each participant drafts and rehearses a contribution for a real upcoming meeting.
Draws the line Hewlett's research draws: mentors talk with you, sponsors talk about you in rooms you are not in. Covers what sponsors look for, why women are over-mentored and under-sponsored, and the practical route to becoming sponsor-ready. Participants map their real network and choose one concrete move.
Applies negotiation research to advancement: applying before feeling fully ready, what Babcock and Bowles found about asking and backlash, and negotiating scope and support before pay. Participants rehearse a real upcoming ask in pairs using the preparation planner.
Names the documented patterns — prove-it-again, tightrope, maternal wall, office housework versus glamour work — using Williams and Dempsey's framework, then scripts responses that keep careers moving. Closes with what to ask of the organisation, because individual skill and system change are complements, not substitutes.
A capstone case study, supplied in international and Gulf editions, pulls every module together in a group diagnosis. Each participant then writes a ninety-day plan with dated commitments and exchanges follow-up dates with a peer before leaving.
What is in the kit
Slide deck
46 branded, fully editable PowerPoint slides with facilitator notes on every slide
Trainer notes
Complete facilitator guide: agenda, slide-by-slide delivery notes and guidance
Case studies — two editions
The same case material in international and Gulf settings; pick by audience
Participant workbook
9 in-session exercises with writing space
Handouts
5 complete standalone handouts: worksheets, checklists and scenario sets
Certificates
Attendance and completion certificate templates with the MIZAN seal
Course administration
Feedback form and sign-in sheet
Editions
The license in one sentence
Buy once, deliver the course as often as you like to as many delegates as you like, edit anything, add your own branding — you only may not resell or redistribute the materials themselves. Every download is stamped with your name, tier and order number. Full license terms
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