Employee Resource Group
One of our most prominent and active ERGS at Ford is called the “Women of Ford - WoF”, it is a global network of people who work towards accelerating gender-balanced leadership in business and society, through professional development and in-person networking. It offers a one-stop platform to connect with like-minded professionals from across the Ford world; to develop skills and competencies, and to share your experience and knowledge. The strategic imperative for “Women of Ford” in the year 2021 has been to strengthen the gender ratio throughout the organization, engage men as allies and to become the employer of choice for women.
Employees become members of the WoF Global community to:
- Access and built global professional network that will help them to achieve their career aspirations
- Learn from diverse sources (local events, mentoring, forums, webinars and dynamic content)
The WoF community hosts a variety of workshops, Talks, panel discussions around various topics like Networking, Parenting, Self-Branding and so many other themes, creating a platform for the women in the organization to work on themselves and learn how one can advance their career and make a difference to gender balance globally.
Development and Learning Programs
We have designed two targeted women development programs – InSight & Top Right. Insight program which was launched in 2016 aims to aid identified high- potential women employees to acquire skills to overcome few of their internal barriers and give women a cutting edge at an executive level. This program includes workshops conducted by subject matter experts around the themes of personal branding, the masculinity and Femininity lenses of leadership, emotional intelligence, Influencing skills etc. One of the niche elements of InSight was the component called the “Significant Other” where the participants brought there significant other to work and got an opportunity to show them their workspace and interact with their leaders, mentors and their team as an effort to show appreciate for all the support that they have been providing to the employee.
While the InSight program helped identified high potential women to challenge their own inhibitions and become ready for leadership roles, The Top Right Program which was launched in the year 2019, provided a platform to the identified women mangers to further harness their capability and leadership styles and move up the ladder. The top right program is structured in a way that each candidate gets assigned an advocate in their respective vertical who would personally ensure that right opportunities are made available to the identified talent and they act as an ally internal for the woman manager at the respective skill team level. Apart from the advocacy element, the participants are also paired with certified external coaches for their overall development. Both InSight & Top Right program also provide the participants with the opportunity to networking with successful women leaders, Entrepreneurs from various fields outside the ford world – giving the participants a chance to build their network externally and also learn from their experiences. We constantly do an environmental and keep ourselves apprised of all the best practices in the external market and keep enriching our program elements and creating interventions that would cater to strengthen the women talent within the organization.
Few other targeted initiatives that cater to women development
- Mentoring & Coaching from Leadership team to Key Talents
- Focused session on Unconscious bias for People Leaders
ReImagine Program- Relaunch of Career
In our efforts of hiring the right talent for the organization, we have ensured that all our open positions do not have any gender restrictions associated with them and hiring second career women has been inducted into the normal hiring process. With our Reimagine program we provide paid job opportunities for people who have taken time away from their careers and are interested in re-entering the workforce that acts as a launch pad for relaunching the career with structured learning pathways and leadership mentoring.
Employee Resource Group
One of our most prominent and active ERGS at Ford is called the “Women of Ford - WoF”, it is a global network of people who work towards accelerating gender-balanced leadership in business and society, through professional development and in-person networking. It offers a one-stop platform to connect with like-minded professionals from across the Ford world; to develop skills and competencies, and to share your experience and knowledge. The strategic imperative for “Women of Ford” in the year 2021 has been to strengthen the gender ratio throughout the organization, engage men as allies and to become the employer of choice for women.
Employees become members of the WoF Global community to:
- Access and built global professional network that will help them to achieve their career aspirations
- Learn from diverse sources (local events, mentoring, forums, webinars and dynamic content)
The WoF community hosts a variety of workshops, Talks, panel discussions around various topics like Networking, Parenting, Self-Branding and so many other themes, creating a platform for the women in the organization to work on themselves and learn how one can advance their career and make a difference to gender balance globally.
Development and Learning Programs
We have designed two targeted women development programs – InSight & Top Right. Insight program which was launched in 2016 aims to aid identified high- potential women employees to acquire skills to overcome few of their internal barriers and give women a cutting edge at an executive level. This program includes workshops conducted by subject matter experts around the themes of personal branding, the masculinity and Femininity lenses of leadership, emotional intelligence, Influencing skills etc. One of the niche elements of InSight was the component called the “Significant Other” where the participants brought there significant other to work and got an opportunity to show them their workspace and interact with their leaders, mentors and their team as an effort to show appreciate for all the support that they have been providing to the employee.
While the InSight program helped identified high potential women to challenge their own inhibitions and become ready for leadership roles, The Top Right Program which was launched in the year 2019, provided a platform to the identified women mangers to further harness their capability and leadership styles and move up the ladder. The top right program is structured in a way that each candidate gets assigned an advocate in their respective vertical who would personally ensure that right opportunities are made available to the identified talent and they act as an ally internal for the woman manager at the respective skill team level. Apart from the advocacy element, the participants are also paired with certified external coaches for their overall development. Both InSight & Top Right program also provide the participants with the opportunity to networking with successful women leaders, Entrepreneurs from various fields outside the ford world – giving the participants a chance to build their network externally and also learn from their experiences. We constantly do an environmental and keep ourselves apprised of all the best practices in the external market and keep enriching our program elements and creating interventions that would cater to strengthen the women talent within the organization.
Few other targeted initiatives that cater to women development
- Mentoring & Coaching from Leadership team to Key Talents
- Focused session on Unconscious bias for People Leaders
ReImagine Program- Relaunch of Career
In our efforts of hiring the right talent for the organization, we have ensured that all our open positions do not have any gender restrictions associated with them and hiring second career women has been inducted into the normal hiring process. With our Reimagine program we provide paid job opportunities for people who have taken time away from their careers and are interested in re-entering the workforce that acts as a launch pad for relaunching the career with structured learning pathways and leadership mentoring.
