WISE Cultivating Talent Award
The WISE Cultivating Talent Award recognises an individual whose commitment to developing talent has created meaningful opportunities, opened doors, and helped shape a more inclusive and representative STEM landscape for the future.
This award celebrates someone who consistently puts others first — a person who champions the skills, voices, and achievements of women and girls, ensuring they are seen, supported, and encouraged. They use their platform and influence to elevate others, build confidence, and inspire women at every stage of their STEM journey to pursue their ambitions.
The WISE Cultivating Talent Award honours a catalyst for change: a role model, advocate, mentor, and champion who dedicates time, expertise, and care to the growth of others. Their impact extends far beyond individual success stories, contributing to a stronger, more diverse pipeline of STEM talent for years to come.
Who can be nominated for the WISE Cultivating Talent Award?
A woman working in the UK STEM sector who:
- Always puts others first, promoting the skills and abilities of others, and amplifying their achievements
- Has had a significant impact on the career development of talented women within STEM
- Works tirelessly to nurture the next generation of women in STEM.
Who can enter or submit a nomination?
- Individuals nominating someone else
- Organisations nominating an employee
- Individuals submitting a self‑nomination
Key criteria
The nominee must have:
- Consistently puts others first and uses their platform to elevate women and girls in STEM by promoting the skills, strengths, and achievements of others
- Had a measurable and meaningful influence on women’s career progression within STEM
- Helped to build a stronger, more diverse pipeline of STEM talent.
Award nomination checklist
Before submitting an entry, please make sure you have the following information ready:
- For self-nominations: Your referee’s name, email address and telephone number, along with permission to share these with WISE.
- If you are nominating someone else: The nominee’s email address, telephone number, job title and organisation name, along with permission to share these with WISE.
- The nominee’s bio as a Word or PDF document.
- Evidence to support the nomination: As documents such as Word, PDF or PowerPoint, video files/links, testimonials, and supporting statistics. (Please submit in a Word document, outlining their relevance to the entry or nomination).
- Organisation’s profile as a Word or PDF document, plus organisation’s logo as a JPG or PNG file format.
Terms and conditions
How to write a great nomination: Ten top tips
Create impact by using examples, case studies, testimonials, evidence, facts and figures to demonstrate any statements.
Help the award judges understand your nominee’s attributes and contributions
Avoid sweeping statements and make every sentence count. Avoid too many pronouns and run-on sentences.
What makes the nominee shine? (more than just what a great or nice person this nominee is)
Choose the right category. It’s the quality not the quantity of nominations.
Describe how the nominee reflects WISE’s core value of Championing women in STEM.
Break down the question to ensure you answer every element.
Support with additional information to back-up the nomination.
Read through your statements carefully.
Ask another person to review your nomination and give comments before submitting.