Client Spotlight: FutureWomenX
Have we told you lately how much we love our clients? Well, we can’t ever say it enough if you ask us! Today, we are spotlighting one of the warmest clients we’ve had the pleasure of knowing: Victoria Foster, co-founder of FutureWomenX.
Victoria and Patricia Becker, the other co-founder of FutureWomenX, saw an opportunity to help women all over the world unleash their limitless potential and power, in an effort to create a more gender-equal world where women drive the future.
We chatted with Victoria to share more about their vision, the challenges they’ve faced, and why this work is so meaningful now in a post-COVID world.
Q. Tell us about FutureWomenX and your mission.
“FutureWomenX is a global platform for courageous female leaders who dare to be what we call FutureMakers. We built it based on our own needs and experience as women who rose to the top, but reached a level where we sensed that there was more of us to be lived – our unlived potential – and knew that what got us here would not take us forward.
We needed the space to design a new way of being, leading and working in the world that would enable us to be our fullest and whole selves, and use this as the basis for getting to our next level and to design our own future. We needed the sisterhood and peership support of fellow travelers on the journey to be mirrors to us and hold us accountable. And, we craved using who we were and all of our resources, expertise, experience in order to make a greater impact in the world.
So as we say, FutureWomenX is a platform for courageous women leaders to power themselves, power the collective and, ultimately, to power the future and create ripples in their communities and organizations and broader society.”
Q: Who is the ideal FutureWomenX client?
“It’s less about one particular external qualification, and more about who she is. Current FWX active tribe members range in age from mid-20s to their 70s. They are women in, or quickly rising to, leadership positions, or – for those on the other side of their career – have previously been in leadership positions across the corporate, nonprofit and public sectors.
Whether she’s a senior executive, entrepreneur, thought leader, or a rising star, FWX tribe members are all ambitious women with the capacity, courage and drive to take the next step and to transform ‘business as usual.’ They want to use that power to create a bigger impact in their lives and in the world.
This goes beyond problem-solving or transactional networking. FWX tribe members value the whole person and are committed to understanding and living into their fullness; to bring out who they are at their core and to be role models for our future.
We help create those spaces and opportunities for them to ‘do the work’ to connect and thrive.”
Q. How long have you been in business?
“We’ve been doing this work since 2014.”
Q: Did you see a spike in one particular area of your work due to the pandemic?
“We’ve seen a couple of shifts since the pandemic hit.
For one, our business doubled across the board since COVID! We were seeing several women who were asking ‘what’s next’ amidst the uncertainty that the pandemic brought as well as the deeper questions of ‘what are my values,’ ‘who am I at this stage of my life and career,’ ‘what’s most important to me now’, ‘what role do I want to play in this new world,’ and ‘what does this mean for me professionally and personally’?’ We were there to help them extrapolate that.
Also, we were essentially an in-person business prior to COVID. Our work was grounded in coaching, intensive expeditions, and retreats. So, another shift we made was to take our programs virtual, and now we offer a hybrid. As part of that pivot, we innovated several of our programs and expanded our portfolio of offerings to be relevant to needs and aspirations of our tribe members in this time and with these questions, and to expand the depth and reach of our work.”
Q: You have a global presence. How has that changed or been impacted as a result of the pandemic?
“Patricia, my co-founder is in Amsterdam. Once COVID hit, travel was obviously impacted. We’re now running a hybrid model of in-person and virtual programming, but at the onset of the pandemic, we were all virtual.
While we missed the in-person dynamic, this shift to virtual enabled us to work with new amazing women we may not have otherwise, given time, geographic or financial constraints. It also allowed our global FWX team to really strengthen our connections and foundations, as we weren’t passing on airplanes or constantly on the run to clients.”
Q: How many people have you reached through FutureWomenX?
“We’re so proud to say that we have 500 FWX Alumna -- a majority of whom remain active tribe members. These aren’t just transactional relationships, either; these are lifelong relationships that we’ve formed and continue to work with to support throughout each step in their careers and lives.”
Q: What are you most proud of as the co-founder of FutureWomenX?
“I’m most proud of the deep relationships among the tribe and of the collective willingness to learn, to challenge ourselves and to have this shared vulnerability. Our courage is contagious. The people and dedication to personal, professional, and societal transformation are what keeps us doing this every day.”
Q: What’s next for FutureWomenX?
“We’ve spent a lot of time focused on Powering the Individual and Powering the Collective. We’re continuing to deepen our work to tap into the core of each individual, to explore and channel that ‘whole individual and build the community to support it’ belief.
Simultaneously, what’s next for us is to really lean into the Power the Future. We’re focused on expanding the capacity and platform for our FWX Alumna to be true ripple-makers. We are partnering with Alumna to offer opportunities that elevate and amplify their courageous leadership and wisdom in the world to bring about transformation.”
Q: What have you enjoyed most about working with Concannon Insurance Agency?
“It’s the personal relationship. I met Jim years ago, while I was working with another business. The relationship I’ve built with him is authentic, it goes beyond geography (I live in Brooklyn) and there’s a deep, caring connection at the core.”
FutureWomenX is always open to receiving referrals for women to join their tribe. Take a look at their manifesto which explains more about their impactful work, and their website here.
