In November 2019, a couple of girls sat down in Hamburg, Germany, dreaming about investing into younger female leaders more purposefully. Out of this, a survey was created in which more than 117 girls up to 35 years of age ranked their top needs in leadership. Various needs were highlighted: A space to develop the leadership gifting, like minded other women, training and mentoring.
After some research to find out what is available, Evi from LeadNow explored a different kind of training not yet on the market. What if we could journey with some young female leaders for 10-12 months, offer some weekends of training, a mentoring cohort of likeminded buddies and a senior leader to mentor each of them individually? When the idea was shared, some other senior women got interested and out of this, “She leads” was born. Heike, a lady pastor from Berlin and leader of a women’s ministry called Beyond e.V., joined the core team and together a curriculum was created, invitations sent out and mentors invited.
Because this would be a piloting project, we thought having 10-15 women would be fantastic. 10 would be great. 15 would be the overflow. God surprised us. This past weekend we started with 19 young female leaders from all across Germany. We had to turn people down now and have asked them to explore applying next year. Leaders from various organizations and pastors recommended their young leaders to us. Through Evi´s work over the past few years, several of her young friends and mentees also joined this programme. And next to Evi and Heike, Susanne and Annette also joined. We even started a cooperation with Campus for Christ/CRU. To top it, Campus Switzerland is also pursuing a similar project and will start in September 2021.
Sadly, the first weekend due to Covid-19 was held online but the interaction, starting of friendship, small groups, the teachings etc. were fantastic. The topic of the first weekend was all around the leader as a person. What are my important values, developing the character, how to say no gracefully, the art of managing yourself, discerning your inner compass etc. were some of the elements covered. The feedback was immensely positive and we are totally blessed and blown away by how God showed up.
It is fantastic to see what can come out of dreaming and creating together! This training will finish in January 2022. If you are interested in this kind of training, do get in touch!