The Secretariat of PNG alumni of the Global Women in Management (GWIM) program, the Advancing PNG: Women Leaders Network, which is supported by ExxonMobil PNG Limited in partnership with Plan USA’s Women Lead Institute (WLI), will be hosting a week-long women’s empowerment training from 3 to 7 September.
The theme for the workshop is personal and professional leadership and it will be held at the Women’s Business Resource Centre in Port Moresby. The workshop coincides with the APEC Women and the Economy Forum.
The training will be conducted by Plan’s WLI and GWIM alumnae trainers from Papua New Guinea (PNG). WLI brings together women from diverse cultures across the globe to network, learn, share, and adapt best practices around the world for expanding women’s economic and professional opportunities.
A total of 20 women who are strong leaders in their own communities, and are making a significant contribution in their role within the non-profit, entrepreneurial; private and public sectors will be attending the workshop.
The PNG Women’s Leadership Workshop is designed to foster women’s awareness of their own leadership styles and skills—both existing and desired; provide new leadership tools, knowledge, and skills to promote strong institutional systems, management practices, and programs; and engender greater self-confidence and clarity of professional goals and personal aspirations.
ExxonMobil PNG Public and Government Affairs Manager, Robert Aisi said women’s economic empowerment is one of ExxonMobil’s key focus areas for community investment because it recognises that women are strong drivers of social change in their communities. “Each investment in a woman is also an investment in her family and her community, so the impact is broad and multidimensional,” he said.
Plan’s Senior Director of the WLI, Sue Richiedei, noted that this is the first time that WLI and APNG:WLN will be jointly facilitating the leadership workshop in Papua New Guinea and she is looking forward to meeting the participants, sharing WLI’s skills and knowledge, and learning from the participants.
Since 2006, ExxonMobil has supported 67 Papua New Guinean women to participate in multiple GWIM training programs in Washington, D.C. and Jakarta, Indonesia.
In 2014, ExxonMobil PNG supported the Papua New Guinea GWIM Alumnae in establishing the secretariat, APNG-WLN.