Apply now for North America Leadership Journey 2024

The program imparts contextualized tools and frameworks to address the individual, organizational, and societal challenges that women leaders in global health face today.

The women leaders who would benefit most from this program are those who value diversity, equity, and inclusion; see the value of bringing diverse lived experiences to policy and practice; and are eager to not only expand their leadership presence and influence but also pay it forward to others in their organization and community.

Last year, they expanded the program to include both U.S.- and Canada-based mid-career women leaders from a variety of global health sectors. This year, they are excited to announce that they are launching two simultaneous North America Leadership Journeys, allowing them to support a total of 60 exceptional women leaders during the 2024-2025 program cycle. Each cohort will comprise of 30 women leaders, who will participate in both separate and joint events throughout the year.

Program Duration: March 2024 – February 2025

Elements of the Journey

• Virtual Learning
  • Learning Touchpoints are facilitated virtual group sessions. Together with your cohort, you’ll explore leadership frameworks, research, and tools in highly interactive workshop-style sessions focused on dynamic practice. The touchpoints focus on personal and professional growth, relevant topics and priorities for global health leadership, and your Leadership Projects. These sessions will allow you to share with and learn from each other.
• Virtual Mentorship
  • Effective women leaders are championed by a network of strong supports, including mentors. They identify senior-level leaders from different backgrounds, health sectors, and disciplines to serve as mentors for you and other members of your cohort. Mentoring groups, made up of several cohort members and one mentor, are formed based on complementary backgrounds and professional trajectories. You’ll be able to rely on your mentor as a technical and career resource during the Leadership Journey.
• Virtual Coaching
  • Having a personal leadership coach is critical in helping navigate change and adapting to new challenges. They’ll pair you with an executive coach who will work with you one on one to build on your strengths and address areas for growth. Leadership style assessments, including a “customized 360-degree evaluation,” will inform these conversations and enhance your understanding of your own leadership skills. With the gift of feedback and support from your coach, you can decide which leadership competencies to focus on, paving the road for you to be a more powerful and effective leader.
  • The combination of peers, mentors, and coaches is a unique and powerful support structure to prepare you for the next level in your career, providing both professional connections and transformational leadership guidance.
• In-Person Residencies*
  • The Leadership Immersion is a three-day experience that takes place a few months into the Leadership Journey. Through dynamic discussions and hands-on exercises, you and your cohort will enhance your skills, apply them to real-world examples, and reflect on lessons learned.
  • The two-day Leadership Lift-Off event at the end of the journey celebrates your the cohort’s growth as you lift off to a new phase of your leadership. Cohort members will reflect on their leadership evolution through the year and present their Leadership Projects to their peers and other global health leaders.
  • *COVID caveats: Please note that, due to the uncertainties caused by COVID-19, the program may need to be converted to an all-virtual format.

Leadership Project

• The Leadership Project is an opportunity for you to design and lead an effort that taps into your expertise, network, passion, and creativity.
• Participants enter the Leadership Journey with a project idea and develop a theory of change, stakeholder analysis, and implementation plan with the guidance of their mentor, coach, and global health experts. The implementation of the project begins in the latter half of the Leadership Journey. Finally, at the Leadership Lift-Off event, you’ll present a summary of your project’s development and early outcomes.
• Implementation of the project does not have to be complete by the end of the Leadership Journey and will likely continue beyond it.
• There are only four rules for the Leadership Project:
  • It should focus on improving outcomes at the intersection of health and gender equality or examine a global health issue with a gender lens
  • It should leverage your leadership skills
  • It should be within your scope of control or influence, but also stretch you beyond your day-to-day work requirements
  • You should be passionate about it
• Leadership Projects fit into one of four themes:
  • Centering women and girls in health
  • Catalyzing institutional change
  • Optimizing pathways to leadership
  • Building integrated and resilient health systems.

Eligibility Criteria

• You are eligible for consideration if you meet all the following criteria:
  • You identify as a woman
  • You work in a role that focuses on global health (your work and partnerships serve target populations in lower- and middle-income countries)
  • You have 10-25 years of experience in global health
  • You live in the United States or Canada (any nationality is welcome)
• They require participants to live in the United States or Canada during at least 75% of the program because they believe time zone compatibility is essential to your ability to participate in the touchpoints and to engage with your peers within and outside of the sessions.

For more information, visit North America Leadership Journey.