Our 2022 Awards were a huge success!

Nominations for the 2022 Awards are now closed.

The Women Of Achievement Awards (WOAA) is one of the region’s most popular, prestigious and well attended business events in the East Riding calendar!

Our bi-annual Women of Achievement Awards celebrates the achievements of inspirational women who are setting the standards in business, blazing a trail for other women to follow or making an outstanding contribution to the community. The awards recognise and reward the best of the best.

Women In Business Hull (WIB) is a not for profit organisation and networking group that has run for over 25 years. In 1998 WIB created the WOAA awards to show support and connect local business women and to celebrate, acknowledge and reward their achievements. This has continued bi-annually ever since. The awards are a hugely inspirational event for those attending and future generations to follow, they touch the heart strings and it is an amazing emotional and uplifting afternoon! #WOAA2022  Having celebrated the success of local women for over a decade, we are delighted to see just how many talented, committed and passionate women we have in our business community.

We are very grateful to our long-standing panel of judges, who had the enormous task of deciding what makes one amazing woman stand out above all the other deserving women who have been nominated!  A thorough process is carried out to ensure that only the most deserving are selected as short-listed candidates.

In addition to being an incredibly inspiring event, to hear the short-listed candidates stories, the event helps to raise money for chosen local charities. People who attended in 2022 tell us that this is the best event in their calendar and then book a table for the following awards year!

The WOAA 2022 charity is the fantastic local charity HER Breast Friends, at the Awards we raised an amazing £5,818.25 plus gift aid for them! The WOA Awards now host 400 guests, shortlisted candidates, judges, sponsors, charity, compare, WIB chair and committee plus we had Gloria Hunniford as our guest speaker!

As one of Britain’s best known TV and radio personalities, Gloria Hunniford requires little introduction. From chat show and current affairs host to presenter of religious and lifestyle programmes, Gloria is one of the few broadcasters who can genuinely claim to embrace the spectrum of popular culture. Her elusive ability to communicate with people from all walks and backgrounds has earned her a rare iconic status in the hearts and minds of the British public. But it was with her moving and unsentimental account of her daughter’s battle with cancer – in the best-selling books Next To You and Always With You. 

The 2022 award categories were our biggest ever, encompassed new sectors and have a larger outreach. We now have 10 award categories, see the worthy winners below!

Women in Business Hull are proud to be affiliated with such a strong network of local businesses supporting them and gratefully thank them all! The Awards could not happen without you.

The Women Of Achievement Awards main sponsor for 2022 was Smailes Goldie Group sponsoring the ‘Overall Women of Achievement Award’. The winner of this award was Carol Ideson from Charity Funding & Advice.

The Category Award sponsors and great winners are:-

Award	Sponsor	Winner	Runner Up
Women Breaking Boundaries	MKM	Helen Villamuera	Jill Phillips
Employee of the Year	Pace Communications	Tracy Watson	Heather Nixon
Lifetime of Achievement	The One Point	Carol Ideson	Kate Tinsley
Apprentice/Trainee	Bishop Burton College	Nina Weldrick	Ellie Brennan, Leah Archibald
Established Business	Victory Leisure Homes	Katie Taylor	Alice Maltby
New Business	Harrison Solway	Harriet Dunn	Kate Nicholson
Women in STEM	Ansell	Maria Gillum	Jodie Derbyshire
Voluntary	Jadan Press	Sian Broughton	Dawn Sullivan
Female Entrepreneur	Lexus	Jo Leigh-Thompson	Carol Davy

Additional Sponsors were:-

Who can enter our next WOAA in 2024?

Entries are invited from women entrepreneurs and achievers who are running their own business or hold a leading role in the professions, industry, local authority and organisations, including charitable, in the public or private sector.

You are welcome to enter as many categories as you wish.

Awards Categories

New Business Award	This award is to recognise the spirit and courage of women in a new business, which has been trading successfully for more than 12 months and less than three years as of 1st January in the year of the awards.
Established Business Award	This award is presented to reward the commitment and achievement of a woman working in an established business that has been trading for more than three years as of 1st January in the year of the awards.
Voluntary Award	This award is to acknowledge a woman who is working unpaid in the voluntary sector. This is to recognise the dedication and selfless commitment given to benefit the needs of others.
Apprentice / Trainee Award	This award recognises those who have done the most to seize the training and development opportunities presented to them so far. The apprentice will have shown significant contribution to support the business activities of their employer and will show great potential for the remainder of their programme. This award is open to government funded programmes as well as individual company training schemes.
STEM or Woman in Tech Award	This award recognises the outstanding contribution of a woman in the field of science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM). The recipient will be a role model for other women in STEM, and has demonstrated how she made a real difference by contributing to the enhancement of STEM knowledge, towards progressing the STEM-related activities of a public institution or private company and/or as an influential advocate for women in STEM.
Female Entrepreneur Award	Traditionally, an entrepreneur is commonly seen as an innovator of new ideas and/or business processes, usually with considerable initiative and risk. This award is for an entrepreneur who has the dedication and who has aspired to reach a goal in her chosen field – and having successfully achieved that goal is an inspiration to others
Women Breaking Boundaries Award	This award is to recognise women who excel in their chosen career. This encompasses private and public industries where women are making huge strides in their career environment.
Employee of the Year Award	This award is to mark the hard work and achievement of a woman leading in her field within an employed role in any sector. This woman will show exceptional leadership or team work skills, helping and supporting others, or be an individual with a particular stand-out performance that merits this award – the ‘extra mile’ factor. The position or job role is irrelevant, what is important is their innovative thinking, dedication and the ability to demonstrate how, specifically, they have made a difference.
Lifetime of Achievement Award	This award is given to a woman who has made a major impact in her working environment during her lifetime and to recognize contributions over the whole of her career. This Lifetime Achievement Award recognizes a visionary individual who has exhibited outstanding, creative, and innovative growth and advancement in her lifetime.

Overall Woman of Achievement Award This award has no entry. The independent judges will consider candidates from all categories – and this award will go to the woman who has achieved outstanding excellence.