The Quebec auto industry, along with The Scotiabank Women Initiative, is proud to celebrate the success of the Women in Automotive Accelerator, which is welcoming the second cohort of participants for 2023. On January 19, the names of the six young women of the 2023 cohort of mentees were announced at the Montreal International Auto Show, along with the exciting news that this successful program will also be going national.
Details for the national launch will be coming soon, so watch this space for more information as it becomes available. In an interview with Canadian auto dealer, Senior Manager of The Scotiabank Women Initiative in the Quebec region, Ana Marinescu said “So we’d love for the national teams to get an opportunity to speak once they’re ready for their launch. But we can definitely reveal that it’s coming across Canada, and that we’re very excited about it.”
The Women in the Automobile Accelerator is a growing community and will soon grow to include women from outside of Quebec, as the program goes national this year. The 2022 participants will also have the chance to take part in a second year of this unique acceleration program in which various experts are invited to share their experiences, and which combines mentoring, coaching and group co-development sessions. Marinescu said that she heard from the mentors from the first year that they all felt like they had also benefited professionally from the connections they made, and the conversations that they were part of over the course of the year, with the visiting speakers as well as the mentees.
One of the goals of the Women in Automotive Accelerator is to attract and retain more women in the automotive industry by helping them access and excel in leadership positions. In Quebec, women represent only 18 per cent of the workforce in automotive services and only 6.4% in skilled trades. According to a Deloitte study, nearly half of women working in the automotive industry in North America said they would choose another career because of the lack of diversity and inclusion in the industry.
The program came to be as a result of a crossroads between the popular The Scotiabank Women Initiative, and the Scotiabank auto financing division, which worked with some very successful and inspiring women auto leaders. “It was really through a conversation amongst women that it started,” said Marinescu. “The auto finance division already had several women clients that were very inspiring. So we knew them, and their paths. And with The Scotiabank Women Initiative, we’re a program that’s committed to support women leaders and women entrepreneurs across all sectors. So it was a great fit.”
