Four future women ambassadors?

‘So,’ I say, ‘what do you think you might to do for a career?’

‘Diplomat,’ says the first young woman.

‘Yeah, diplomat,’ the second says.

‘Us, too,’ say the third and fourth members of the group.

As part of #girlsday, or #toechtertag, the British Embassy in Vienna this year invited young women to apply to shadow me, as Ambassador, for a typical day at work.  The goal was to encourage young women to consider career options in predominantly male-dominated fields.

We also hoped to give our visitors, and the wider public, a better idea of what ambassadors actually do.

So far as we know, we were the only embassy to take part, alongside 168 Viennese businesses.

The applicants for our British Embassy #girlsday were so good that we had to take on four participants, one more than planned:  Paula (16), Eva (17), Joyce (16) and Nicole (17).  Their programme on the day included joining a weekly team meeting at the embassy; attending the opening of a regional conference on the Western Balkans; coming to a meeting with Martin Engelberg, head of the Austria-UK friendship group in the Austrian Parliament; and a visit to the OSCE at the Hofburg.  I also talked to them about my own career, and answered their questions.

I was hugely grateful to the young women for visiting the embassy and to all the participants in all three British missions who met them.  I was delighted that they said they found it interesting; that it had firmed up their interest in diplomacy; and that they were interested in a career in diplomacy themselves.

As for the Foreign Office, we not only have recently appointed a special envoy for gender-related issues world-wide, but are committed to promoting a balanced gender ratio within our own organisation.  We aim to have 50% women among staff by 2020 and 39% women among leadership by 2019.

This stuff really matters.  I hope Joyce, Paula, Eva and Nicole thrive in their future studies and careers, and I will see some or all of them as diplomats – or maybe even ambassadors – before too long.