We have news – we only went and won another award!!!
On Monday 20th March, we attended the wonderful Northern Power Women Awards at Manchester Central. These awards celebrate women and female leaders in the North driving gender and social equality. In 2023, the 8th year of the award, there had been over 1,500 nominations, 89 then shortlisted, 51 named in the Future List and 50 in Power List. We’d been shortlisted for two categories with Ability Consultancy’s name up in the list for the Inclusive Innovation category and our founder Claire Buckle’s name in the list for the 1 to Watch category.
We only went and won the Inclusive Innovation Award! It was such a shock and even more special because it’s so soon after winning the Federation of Small Business’s 2023 Award for Diversity & Inclusion. It really celebrates how far we’ve come as a team with our aim of supporting society to become fully accessible, inclusive and disability aware.
Inclusive Innovation Award
Last year’s Innovation Award winners were Women in Social Housing and they set the bar high with their work of four years, to create a gender equal social housing sector. Well similarly, four years into our work breaking down the barriers and stigma, we have been awarded the freshly renamed Inclusive Innovation Award.
The award centres around the secret of innovation being the drive to solve problems. Ability Consultancy exists as a non-profit organisation purely to solve problems relating to inclusion and to educate and support others to be more inclusive. Living with Cerebral Palsy, Claire Buckle our founder, understands the importance and benefits that full inclusion can have. Her character and determination means that she doesn’t just want inclusion for herself, she has now made it her career to ensure that as many people are included in every aspect of life as possible.
Ability Consultancy’s work
This award recognizes her tireless work “giving people with disabilities the chance to live, learn and earn, like the rest of society” to use one of her regular phrases. This work consists of:
- Training – offered in the forms of both in-person training and online courses for private companies, the public sector, voluntary organisations, and those in education (for CPD).
- Motivation talks – talks are delivered to all sectors and are age appropriate for the audience.
- Frame Running – This is an activity that involves a bicycle type frame that can support a person with mobility issues (often wheelchair users) and enable them to propel themselves forward and experience a sport and the feeling of running.
- An interactive App – this is the latest service that is being developed by Claire which offers the ability for everyone to experience some disability issues by using both virtual reality and augmented reality technology.
Simone Roche, the evenings host
Opening the award ceremony, Simone Roche MBE said, “Northern Power Women is about more than just these awards and most definitely not about one night. Don’t forget about that. We will be here tomorrow, and the day after…do you want to use your power for good?”
So we ask you too dear reader, “do you want to use your power for good?”
Take a look how Ability Consultancy can affordably help you to be more inclusive, starting today. Click here to find out more!
We must also congratulate @BioGradGroup on being commended for the #NPWAwards Inclusive Innovation Award too.
Find out more about the awards at: https://wearepower.net/awards/awards-2023
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#NPWAwards
#WomenInnovate
#inclusion