About WE ACE
History of the course
This course has been run with great success with international cohorts of 60 women over three years. Following the WE ACE 2020, 2021 and 2022 programmes alumni have negotiated novel agreements with major global partners, venture capitalists, and co-founders. We tailor this course the needs of women founders at varying stages of their ventures to support them through their individual challenges.
The previous cohorts have been fully funded by the University of Oxford Medical Sciences Division and have featured female founders in the medical, health, and biosciences industries.
In 2018 Innovation Forum Oxford (IFO) created ACE (Awareness, Connectivity, Exchange) Saturdays–a series of workshops aimed at nurturing a culture of innovation and entrepreneurship amongst academic and clinical researchers in the sciences at the University of Oxford (as detailed in 2018 and 2019 programmes). Feedback from participants and experts highlighted a particular need for more women-focussed training and initiatives to address the unequal representation of women in the entrepreneurship ecosystem (very well-documented in various published reports). This coincided with a call from the University of Oxford to research, interrogate and create local support for women to address gender inequalities throughout the entrepreneurial ‘life cycle’. As a call to action, IFO conceived and organised WE ACE (Women Entrepreneurs ACE) in collaboration with experts in their fields of leadership and negotiation.
By the end of this programme founders will have:
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Had two coaching sessions with one of our expert trainers
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Reflected on their leadership journey so far, their unique skills, values and experience and clarified their ‘offer to the world?
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Developed their leadership skills to run an organisation
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Understood their negotiation style and approach to deal-making
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Identified key cognitive and behavioural biases that can impact negotiation and deal making
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Tried new approaches to negotiation and deal-making through simulations and role plays which can enhance their current abilities to handle complex negotiation situations.
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Gained a new awareness of approaches to negotiation and deal-making that may be used in effectively managing difficult situations.
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Practised a ‘live’ negotiation with an actor with feedback
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Creating a coherent, practical and SMART action plan to move forward with confidence.
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Clarifying their next steps and understood potential blocks and enablers.
Admission and Fees
Admission is FREE for WEACE cohort programme participants. Due to the highly interactive nature of the programme there are limited cohort seats which will be allocated on a competitive basis based on an application, essay, and interview. Participants must commit to attend all of the class sessions. Register your interest using the button below to apply for a potential spot in the next cohort.
Meet Our Team
Dr.Mira Kassouf
Co-Founder of Innovation Forum Oxford
WE ACE Founder and Facilitator
Mira is the co-founder of Innovation Forum Oxford (IFO). Acting on her belief in the research scientists’ untapped potential as innovative entrepreneurs, she created knowledge exchange platforms (ACE Saturdays series) that not only inspired and educated entrepreneurially inclined early career health and life sciences researchers but also connected them with like-minded peers and enablers.
With a focus on shining the light on women entrepreneurs, Mira introduced WE ACE 2020; the programme had a personalised approach to addressing the needs of women at various stages in their early entrepreneurial journey and aimed at nucleating a community of trailblazing women entrepreneurs in the health and life sciences.
Under her leadership, the IMAGINE IF! Oxford continues to mentor life sciences-focussed start-ups, propelling their venture to the next level. For her work in innovation at the University of Oxford, Mira was awarded Knowledge Exchange Seed Funds, various grants, and three independent nominations for the 2018 Vice-Chancellor Inaugural Innovation Award. Mira has been recently named by BioBeat as one of the ‘50 Movers and Shakers in BioBusiness’.
Mira continues her academic research at the Medical Sciences Division at the University of Oxford. Her interest lies in gene regulation and her current work unravels how non-coding sequences of DNA act as “on/off switches” for genes in different biological contexts. Mira strongly believes in measuring scientific contributions through impact that reaches beyond the purely academic.
Dr.Thomas Peach
Director of the Innovation Forum Oxford
WE ACE Founder and Facilitator
Tom co-leads the Oxford branch of Innovation Forum (IFO) with Mira Kassouf. Since 2016 the IFO team have run events and workshops to both inspire and equip attendees to explore the entrepreneurial possibilities of their academic research.
Tom is a Biomedical Engineering lecturer based at University College London. He holds a DPhil from the University of Oxford, and both Bachelors and Masters degrees from the University of Cambridge. Tom's current research focuses on medical device development and modelling, especially novel treatments for cardiovascular diseases.
He is a co-inventor of the UCL-Ventura CPAP breathing aid, which was developed in 2020 with University College Hospital and Mercedes-AMG HPP. This project saw 10,000 non-invasive ventilators supplied to the NHS and won the RAEng President’s Special Award for Pandemic Service, with the design also released open-source for non-profit use worldwide.
Milly Sinclair
Instructor
WEACE Instructor Venture Leadership
Milly Sinclair, from Milly Sinclair Associates, is a senior leadership training consultant with a global reach and over 25 years of experience. She has a theatre and psychotherapeutic background and combines creative, experiential learning with up to date organisational and psychological theory.
She has run whole system Leadership programmes for thousands of leaders, including Mitsubishi, UniCredit Bank and Lloyds Insurance. She has been working with scientists and entrepreneurs for many years and is particularly interested in supporting founders to become not only successful in their enterprise, but to become value led leaders full of integrity and compassion.
In this divisive and complex time, we need more than ever brilliant ethical people with innovative ideas who want to make a real difference in the world.
She is also a passionate advocate for brilliant women to find their voice and using it!
Milly Sinclair has been a founding partner of two consultancies, Creative Edge : 1997-2007 and Milly Sinclair Associates : 2007-Present.
All her interventions are highly interactive, practical and outcome focused.
Please see her website for more details:
EJ.K.
Instructor
WE ACE Instructor Entrepreneurial Dealmaking and Negotiations
​EJ.K. has taught negotiation to entrepreneurs through innovative programmes, classes, practicums, and workshops at the Innovation Forum Oxford, the Oxford Foundry, the former Oxford Launchpad at the University of Oxford Said Business School, Oxford University Innovation, Venturefest Oxford, University of Oxford Green Templeton College, WEACE, and OXFO L.E.V8.