Why Community Matters Now More Than Ever

This week WFTV launched its Four Nations Mentoring Scheme. It’s the sixteenth time this has happened. Over the past sixteen years, WFTV has connected hundreds of women with mentors, peers, and wider networks that help sustain and develop their careers in film and television. We’ve gently ushered women back into the industry after babies, slayed their imposter syndrome dragons, and emboldened them to step into boardrooms. But fundamentally, we’ve simply given them the confidence to keep going. It remains one of the most rewarding parts of my job. 

We’ve just launched this year’s scheme and have been reflecting on why mentoring remains so important. But this year, these conversations feel particularly urgent - and that’s because the workplace - and the world - is changing. 

Certain conversations have felt particularly loud. I’ve found myself drawn into conversations about hyper-masculinity and rising rates of online misogyny - prompted, in part, by Louis Theroux’s excellent Inside The Manosphere documentary and the wider questions it raised about the attitudes shaping the next generation of men. I’ve had conversations with colleagues in the States as they continue to navigate the fallout from the overturning of Roe v. Wade, bearing witness to reproductive rights being contested in courts across the country, threatening their freedoms. Closer to home, I’ve had far too many conversations with brilliant working mothers who are struggling to balance the careers that they love with childcare costs that continue to climb in the face of a cost-of-living crisis. I’ve personally become very invested in continuing conversations on the gender imbalance we’re seeing emerge in generative AI models. As part of my Clore Fellowship, I’ve dedicated time to understanding how these new technologies distinctly impact women - both for better and for worse. These are all very different issues, but they’re all connected by a common thread: the burden is still so often carried by women. 

Our mentoring scheme is - and always will be - rooted in giving women the tools, support, and confidence to progress further in their careers in film and television. It’s what we do best. But this year I felt compelled to write about one of the most transformative reasons that I feel our scheme, and others like it, are more important than ever; a reason that extends what could be articulated neatly on a CV.

To be a woman working in film and television right now requires resilience. A lot of resilience. In addition to the normal questions we often find ourselves asking about the direction of our careers, women are increasingly having to question whether their work will be sustainable in an industry that is defined by instability and short-term contracts, whether their caring responsibilities will be acknowledged, or whether their disabilities will be  accommodated by their employers. The list goes on. Women are, of course, used to spinning many plates, but it doesn’t make the load any lighter. 

One of the most transformative aspects of being a part of our mentee community is just that - the community. Community makes the load lighter. That’s the big secret. It’s in being paired with mentors who have navigated the same challenges that you’re facing and can offer a clear account of just how they did it. It’s sharing a drink in a bar with your cohort and realising that you’ve encountered the same problems at work. It’s building a network of professional contacts you can call to plug the gap in your production. Most importantly, it’s having a group of women who are all on a similar path to celebrate with, vent to, and lean on when things get tough. 

Something we often hear from mentees is how much they value this community. We encourage them to savour it and to recognise that this isn’t just a professional development programme, but a lasting network. The WhatsApp chat lasts for life, as we say. A ready-made sisterhood in your pocket. 

I won’t try and claim that community makes all of the problems we face at work go away. Bullying and harassment, particularly of Global Majority, disabled, working class, and LGBTQIA+ people, remain a persistent problem. Freelancers are still leaving the industry at an alarming rate due to unprecedented job insecurity. Caring responsibilities continue to fall disproportionately on women. These challenges remain deeply embedded within our industry. But during my time at WFTV, I have witnessed the power in coming together; the safety in numbers and creating a space where problems are surfaced, recognised, and named. Most pertinently, it’s our collective power to push back. 

The WFTV mentoring scheme isn’t about making women better at their jobs. It never has been. Women already know how to do their jobs very well. Confidence is the dividing line, and I see that every day. Nothing is more powerful than a woman’s confidence in herself. So often the question isn’t when did she become capable, but when did she start to doubt it? And how does she get that certainty back? That’s where community comes in. 

What mentoring offers isn’t just advice and introductions - it’s perspective. It’s the moment that someone reminds you that you’re already capable of more than you think. It’s the reassurance that what you’re experiencing isn’t individual failure, but a structural reality. It’s the permission to trust your own judgement in rooms where it is not always encouraged. Because when women feel supported and seen, they don’t just progress - they stay. And in this industry, staying is often the hardest part. The cohort, the conversations, and the community that forms within our mentoring programme may not be a cure-all, but they are often the difference between feeling alone and feeling able to keep going. 

If you’ve ever thought about applying for a mentoring scheme, I hope you take this as your sign to do it. For all of its challenges, I remain hugely optimistic. The film and television industry is unlike any other profession I know. It has given me once-in-a-lifetime experiences that I could never have dreamed of when I started out as a researcher all those years ago. It’s an industry built on creativity, collaboration, and extraordinary people. Every day I see women creating brilliant work, championing one another, and finding new ways to tell stories. The industry is richer, more relevant, and more joyful because of it. If women leave our industry, film and television will become infinitely more boring - and so would the stories we leave behind in the world. 

That is why WFTV exists. The act of mentoring and the communities we build remind us that nobody builds a sustainable career in this industry alone. Sixteen years into our programme, community feels less like a benefit of mentoring and more like its entire point.