Every organization has leaders it hasn't met yet. They have the experience, the technical credibility and the trust of their teams. What they don't have is the belief that the next step is theirs to take.
This is not a talent shortage. It is a visibility problem, and it is often invisible to the person living it.
What it looks like in practice
April Belecque is an alumni of our Women’s Leadership Intensive program. In July 2025, she became Ontario's first female mine rescue officer, serving the Kirkland Lake district. Ontario Mine Rescue has overseen the province's mine rescue operations since 1929. No woman had held this role before her.
She had volunteered in mine rescue for a decade and had the respect of her colleagues. Still, she nearly didn't apply.
Women make up about 15% of the mining workforce, and many of them work in HR, administration and finance. Far fewer work underground, in operations or in safety-critical roles. Most organizations in this sector are working to close that gap. Recruiting is only part of it. The rest depends on whether women can see a path and believe they belong on it.
What changed
April was direct about what WLI gave her. It began with awareness.
"I gained a lot of awareness about how much I was limiting my own growth and options for what I could do with my career."
That barrier is internal. More technical training does not remove it.
She also names two other outcomes that matter to any organization investing in leadership:
Her people benefited first. She came home from the first retreat with tools to develop her team and to buy back her own time. Leadership development doesn't stay with the individual. It moves outward, to the people she leads.
She came to belong. She describes walking into her new role with "a sense of, I belong here." Belonging is what keeps capable people in an organization and lets them lead without performing.
There is a third effect, and it is less measurable. April expects the women on mine rescue teams to feel better represented at the leadership level. She is raising a son and a daughter, and she wants a woman in this role to be ordinary to them.
"I like that it's going to seem normal for them... to see a woman in an emergency services role like this, because I didn't see that."
Representation at the leadership level tells the people coming next what is possible.
What the pattern shows
April's story is one example of something we see across WLI's mining partnerships:
93% retention across all WLI mining partnerships
90% cumulative retention with one mining partner across five consecutive cohorts since 2021
98% of participants felt better equipped to promote an inclusive culture after the program
The question
The question for HR and L&D leaders is simple. Who in your organization is one decision away from stepping forward, and what would help them make it?
April's answer, in her own words: "100% just go for it. You come out as a better leader, 100% guaranteed."
