International Women’s Day is celebrated on the 8th of March. It celebrates the achievements of women and accelerates women’s equality. This day has occurred for over 10 years and is supported globally by over a million people in and outside of businesses.
Women in business has been a commonplace discussion but only in the last few years. This is not just about equality but how women in business are perceived. It only occurred to me when I started writing this blog that I work for a company founded by a woman long before the conversation of women in business started.
In the 1960’s, Diana Chudley, a young entrepreneur and mother of 9, ran a guest house at her home, Highgate House in Northamptonshire. Fast forward a few years, Highgate House evolved to the UK’s first conference hotel, which then progressed into Sundial Group with other businesses being added to the portfolio but remaining within the Chudley family.
Mrs Chudley really did set the tone for what still is the company culture and ethos. We have so many inspiring women working around us that have set up new businesses, helped grow them and run the day to day of what is a truly inspiring environment to work in.
Diana was a mother, a CEO, an entrepreneur, a wife, an author and much more, who in 1959 published “The more the merrier”.
When we talk about what set us apart from others, our MD, Tim Chudley, told me he believes is the fact that we have such a high number of women working with us that add a more personal, less corporate, family feel.
Over the years we have had the pleasure of working with some of Diana’s daughters and granddaughters which carry the legacy of what it is to be a woman in business. This legacy has been passed on to all of us, women that work at Sundial Group. All of us strive to keep this legacy of being it all: women, wives, partners, mothers, entrepreneurs and more, inspired by who probably was the first female entrepreneur of our industry.
