WISH South East - Autumn Newsletter

WISH South East has had some recent changes to the board in the last few months and we have sadly said goodbye to a few members, but we also welcome some very talented new members.

I know you will all join us in wishing Joanne Hiscock, Sarah Ferguson, Alma Shereen and Becky George all the luck in the future, and appreciate all the contributions they have made, having played a crucial part in building the South East region. We feel very lucky to have had the opportunity to work with them. Good luck ladies!

However, when one door closes another one opens, and we would like to welcome the following new members to our board:

Firstly, we would like to welcome Victoria Archer – Account Director – Cobb PR – Victoria will be WISH South East’s new Marketing Manager.

With Victoria’s background in marketing and talent for keeping an audience engaged we are sure she will keep us excited for the next BIG thing WISH SE is involved in.

Secondly, we would like to welcome Lauren Chivers – Business Development Manager – Ecolution Group – Lauren will be the New Events Manager.

Lauren comes from a background of main contracting and with her experience in networking and industry knowledge we know she will keep you excited for the up and coming events WISH SE will be hosting.

Last but certainly not least we have Felicity Reilly – Bid Manager – ENGIE Regeneration – Felicity will work alongside Lauren as they will both head up the events – New Events Manager.

Felicity comes from a procurement and bidding background, with over 15 years’ industry experience, and is passionate about ensuring inclusion and accessibility for women in the industry, whatever the stage of their career.

Recent Events

Ashford Borough Council  - The last WISH SE event took place on Wednesday 25^th September and looked at the role of PR in the social housing sector.  The event was hosted by the very welcoming Ashford Borough Council. Tracey Kerly, the council’s newly appointed CEO headed up this meeting for us and we would like to take this opportunity to say Congratulations! The room was mesmerised with Tracey’s story of how she worked her way to be a CEO and surmounting the challenges of being a woman in the industry. We would like to take this moment to say this promotion was well deserved and Ashford Borough Council is in very good hands.

A presentation was then provided by our very own Victoria Archer on Marketing and PR. With her exceptional examples and activities to keep the audience engaged the time flew by with laughter and an interest in learning something completely new.

Roundtable event - At the end of the last event in Ashford we asked our members to vote on what they would like our next discussion to be based on. The options were LEASEHOLDERS and MANAGING WORKING RELATIONSHIPS and as the vote was so tight we have decided to listen to our audience and move forward with both talks! These will be hosted as a roundtable events. The details of when and where will be updated on our website soon and we hope you can all make it.

Christmas event - One more event we are very much looking forward to is our Christmas networking event on Wednesday 13^th November which you can buy tickets for on our website here. This event will be held at the Golding Homes offices in Maidstone - a short walk from the station. This is chance to get all our members together and network, as well as a chance for you to talk to the board and put suggestions forward of what you would like to see more of in the future. We hope you can all make it!