Abstract
Introducing our 2023 Gender Diversity Ambassador Award winner Adrienne Houston.
In 2012, Adrienne established her company, Eurovacuum Products Ltd, following gender discrimination she experienced after becoming a mother. She swore to not take this approach forward into her own business and committed instead to welcoming a diverse workforce and creating an inclusive culture.
Adrienne is a passionate supporter of building gender diversity within engineering. She was the Midlands Cluster Coordinator for the Women’s Engineering Society (WES) between 2005 to 2015. During these ten years, she increased membership across the region, organised and held the first regional WES conference, and increased outreach to primary schools, secondary schools and scout groups.
Alongside this, Adrienne is a mentor at Women in Business Engineering Computing, a mentoring scheme at Brunel University, where she was awarded Mentor of the Year in 2023. As if she wasn’t busy enough, she is also a business mentor at the Association for Black and Minority Ethnic Engineers (AFBE-UK).
The IET’S Gender Diversity Ambassador Award recognises the tremendous work being carried out by passionate individuals to change the perception of women in STEM. This award is presented to a person of any gender, working in the UK and of any age who has spent a large proportion of their career committed to addressing the gender imbalance within the engineering profession.
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