On Saturday 29th March Women in Logistics UK held its first ever netwalk in Northern Ireland. Ten hardy souls turned out in torrential rain to complete the three mile circular route around Barnetts Demesne near Belfast. 

The route took in a beautiful (if soggy) park and woodland, and we also visited the Mary Peters running track on the route. This was built following Mary's gold medal triumph in the 1972 Munich Olympics Pentathlon, and fitting to be following in her footsteps as a female pioneer from Northern Ireland. 

We took in the front of Malone House before wending our way back to the Crowne Plaza Hotel where we had a wonderful networking lunch. 

With women from all walks of logistics life in NI, the chat never stopped and everyone agreed it was great craic. It might have been our first NI event, but it won't be our last!

On 11th March, Women in Logistics UK visited Wincanton's interactive W² innovation centre in Corby for an evening of networking, nibbles and knowledge sharing presentations. On arrival, the centre was still decorated from the International Women’s Day (IWD) events from the week before.

Guests received a warm welcome from Hannah Tuck, Wincanton’s D&I Advisor and enjoyed some lovely nibbles, also receiving a wildflower grow tube to take home. After some networking the guests enjoyed presentations on Operational Excellence, Innovation and Al. 

First up Natalie Davidson, Operational Excellence Director. She shared Wincanton’s journey of embedding the 8 principles of Operational Excellence across the group. She particularly focused on the use of inclusive language, likening the process to a rowing team with everyone working together in sync with one clear goal. She also talked about creating the Continuous Improvement ‘Buzz’ across operations, aiming to remove the jargon traditionally associated with CI and Lean, therefore involving everyone in the ‘Buzz’. Finally, she covered how the Launch team provides development opportunities for colleagues and embeds excellence from the offset in new operations.

After this insightful session, Head of Innovation, Claire Charlton  was next up. She explained the concept of Open Innovation and how this model of co-development and practical test beds works within Wincanton. Claire likened the W² Innovation programme to a speedboat able to explore new waters in an agile way, before reporting back to the Wincanton mothership. Finally, at the moment, you can’t mention Innovation without mentioning AI. Claire talked about Wincanton’s approach to implementing and evaluating AI technologies, also discussing how Wincanton is segmenting AI technology by outcomes and use cases. Finally she shared some practical applications of AI stemming from the W² Labs programmes.

There was a very interesting and engaging Q&A session following the presentation, with plenty of discussions around inclusion which Wincanton attendees Karen Govier, Head of ED&I, and Gaynor Wilkinson, Head of Talent Management and Acquisition, supported. Finally, guests also had a tour of the adjacent automated eFulfilment warehouse from Shift Manager, Alistair Lower. The evening then ended with some more nibbles, networking and exploring of the Innovation Centre.

A great evening had by all which Wincanton were delighted to host!

On Tuesday 4th March WIL held its first networking event as a Community Interest Company; this was a members' only exclusive gathering at Fortnum and Mason on Piccadilly, London. The event totally sold out.

Sophie Damaglou, head of Digital Transformation at Fortnums was the host and purple cocktails were sipped on arrival. Ruth Waring, WIL's co-founder, gave the audience an insight into her own 35 year career in logistics as well as telling the story of this group's evolution over the past 16 years. Cree Joseph, Warehouse Office Manager at Fortnums also spoke about the complex supply chain and how they work with the extremely limited storage space in central London.

Then the chairs were moved into "networking mode" and speed networking ensued, with Ruth providing guidance for new participants. The evening concluded in the cocktail bar and six hardy souls went on to have a networking dinner!