Many senior female diplomats will have shared a similar experience: being the first woman to take over an Embassy, High Commission or Consulate General after a long line of male predecessors. I found myself in this position when I took over as head of mission at the British Deputy High Commission in Mumbai in 2006 and likewise when I took over as British High Commissioner here in New Zealand in 2010. I was also different because of my Asian ancestry. People are curious to meet you and to see how you do. One early interlocutor here in New Zealand said to me that “…having a woman as High Commissioner wasn’t quite cricket”. I had something similar happen when I first arrived in Mumbai. You just have to rise above comments like that.
With both Mumbai and Wellington there was a need to revamp our agenda—what I called my “modern relevance” agenda. With both countries, Britain has had long historical ties. There is a lot to our history and to some degree the image of Britain was tied more to our past rather than our future. So the challenge in each case was to re-calibrate our proposition and set it on a new trajectory.
In India the brief was very much an economic one. Yes, of course, to help British companies enter the India market, but equally to engage with corporate India and explore how Britain could be part of their global growth ambition whether through R&D collaborations or investment or strategic alliances. I was lucky in some sense to be in India at a time when many of the large corporate houses were at the start of an expansionist phase. But as they say, you can see the wave, but can you ride it? Our job was to ride it to secure trade and investment. The business highlight of my time there was the work I did in support of Tata Motors' acquisition of Jaguar Landrover. The investment that has flowed since has seen these great British car marques go from strength to strength, with thousands of new jobs created, new export success, and over £1 billion a year spent on R&D alone to bring new technology and exciting new models through to market.
Business apart, there were moments when we stood in solidarity in the face of terrorism. Two major incidents took place when I was in Mumbai: the July 2006 train bombs and the November 2008 commando style attack that saw the city in lock-down for three days. Ensuring and leading our consular response in both instances as well as offering and delivering appropriate support to the Indian authorities was a challenge, but the motivation was simple—not to cower to those that target cities like Mumbai because of what they stand for. These incidents between them saw over 300 dead and almost 1500 injured. Our job too was to ensure we gave our own people caught up in these dreadful events the best support possible. In the 2008 attack three British people died and we fielded over a hundred British people caught up in the incident.
My time in India was fascinating, fast, and furious. I loved it, but when the time comes to move on you have to find the next challenge; New Zealand was it for me. It was also something completely different, all my other postings having been in Asia (Pakistan, Malaysia, then India). That said, I arrived in New Zealand at a time when it was redefining itself very much part of Asia Pacific and no longer, in the words of one New Zealand Minister, “…a distant outpost of Europe”. So, I think my Asian credentials were perfect.
Where Britain had once been New Zealand’s largest trading partner, China now has overtaken Australia. So the metrics of our economic relationship have irreversibly changed. But that should not detract from what lies at the core of our relationship: a set of shared values that are as important and relevant today as they were in the past. The question was how to build a new activist relationship around these values.
You begin of course with where you are at. Britain remains New Zealand’s seventh largest trading partner and second largest foreign investor. Our task is to strengthen this position. But it is also to look at different business models of partnership and strategic alliances. In a globalised world the ways in which our respective businesses internationalise has evolved. It is not just about exports or foreign direct investment. We can and should explore new ways of working towards mutual economic benefit—for example, how our businesses can realise global opportunities together. British and New Zealand (and indeed Indian) companies can leverage off one another, where innovation on the one hand can be married with capacity and scalability on the other.
On the foreign policy front, we have sought to thicken our engagement and seek to collaborate where we have common purpose in a more structured and planned way. We held our first UK/NZ Strategic Dialogue last October. That is not to say we always agree. But where our approaches are different we understand why and respect that. We have also framed the relationship in the new global context and sought to understand the opportunities that exist today that are different to those of the past. This is about forging something new out of something old. We have also seen an un-precedented level of British Ministerial visits to New Zealand coinciding with my time here. For example, British Foreign Secretary William Hague has visited twice, the first British Foreign Secretary to have done so while in office.
And, as with Mumbai, there have been times when tragic events have played their part. The Pike River mining disaster was the first event in November 2010; two British miners were amongst the 29 lost and reminded us of our people's ties. The Christchurch earthquake in February 2011 further brought this home. In New Zealand’s most English of cities we saw the physical aspects of shared history rocked, heritage buildings ruined, and most sadly the loss of life. As with the Mumbai terrorist attacks, our response was swift. British Search and Rescue and Disaster Victim Identification teams were deployed. My team fielded over 400 British people displaced by the quake, mainly visitors, many with friends and relatives locally. We had 20 British dead.
There is of course a lot of day-to-day stuff, the routine of diplomacy. But, ending where I began, being a woman at the end of the day is irrelevant to what you deliver. The work is the work and, once you get beyond the initial perceptions of being the new woman, success is judged by what you achieve and the impact you have. Male or female, we all need the courage to face the challenges, the conviction to pursue our ambitions, and the confidence to believe in ourselves and what is possible. However, we do need to see more women at the top of professions, whether diplomats of engineers, and on senior boards. Here we have more work to do, but we can and should celebrate the progress our gender has made so far.
Vicki Treadell is a diplomat with over 30 years experience in policy and service delivery roles, with overseas assignments in Pakistan, Malaysia, India, and as British High Commissioner to New Zealand and Samoa and Governor of Pitcairn. During her career she has undertaken secondments outside the UK’s Foreign & Commonwealth Office, most notably between 2002-2005 when she was UK Trade & Investment’s Director for the North West of England.
This article was originally published in the Diplomatic Courier's March/April 2014 print edition.
Top Photo: UK in New Zealand on Facebook.
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Reflections on Diplomatic Women
March 10, 2014
Many senior female diplomats will have shared a similar experience: being the first woman to take over an Embassy, High Commission or Consulate General after a long line of male predecessors. I found myself in this position when I took over as head of mission at the British Deputy High Commission in Mumbai in 2006 and likewise when I took over as British High Commissioner here in New Zealand in 2010. I was also different because of my Asian ancestry. People are curious to meet you and to see how you do. One early interlocutor here in New Zealand said to me that “…having a woman as High Commissioner wasn’t quite cricket”. I had something similar happen when I first arrived in Mumbai. You just have to rise above comments like that.
With both Mumbai and Wellington there was a need to revamp our agenda—what I called my “modern relevance” agenda. With both countries, Britain has had long historical ties. There is a lot to our history and to some degree the image of Britain was tied more to our past rather than our future. So the challenge in each case was to re-calibrate our proposition and set it on a new trajectory.
In India the brief was very much an economic one. Yes, of course, to help British companies enter the India market, but equally to engage with corporate India and explore how Britain could be part of their global growth ambition whether through R&D collaborations or investment or strategic alliances. I was lucky in some sense to be in India at a time when many of the large corporate houses were at the start of an expansionist phase. But as they say, you can see the wave, but can you ride it? Our job was to ride it to secure trade and investment. The business highlight of my time there was the work I did in support of Tata Motors' acquisition of Jaguar Landrover. The investment that has flowed since has seen these great British car marques go from strength to strength, with thousands of new jobs created, new export success, and over £1 billion a year spent on R&D alone to bring new technology and exciting new models through to market.
Business apart, there were moments when we stood in solidarity in the face of terrorism. Two major incidents took place when I was in Mumbai: the July 2006 train bombs and the November 2008 commando style attack that saw the city in lock-down for three days. Ensuring and leading our consular response in both instances as well as offering and delivering appropriate support to the Indian authorities was a challenge, but the motivation was simple—not to cower to those that target cities like Mumbai because of what they stand for. These incidents between them saw over 300 dead and almost 1500 injured. Our job too was to ensure we gave our own people caught up in these dreadful events the best support possible. In the 2008 attack three British people died and we fielded over a hundred British people caught up in the incident.
My time in India was fascinating, fast, and furious. I loved it, but when the time comes to move on you have to find the next challenge; New Zealand was it for me. It was also something completely different, all my other postings having been in Asia (Pakistan, Malaysia, then India). That said, I arrived in New Zealand at a time when it was redefining itself very much part of Asia Pacific and no longer, in the words of one New Zealand Minister, “…a distant outpost of Europe”. So, I think my Asian credentials were perfect.
Where Britain had once been New Zealand’s largest trading partner, China now has overtaken Australia. So the metrics of our economic relationship have irreversibly changed. But that should not detract from what lies at the core of our relationship: a set of shared values that are as important and relevant today as they were in the past. The question was how to build a new activist relationship around these values.
You begin of course with where you are at. Britain remains New Zealand’s seventh largest trading partner and second largest foreign investor. Our task is to strengthen this position. But it is also to look at different business models of partnership and strategic alliances. In a globalised world the ways in which our respective businesses internationalise has evolved. It is not just about exports or foreign direct investment. We can and should explore new ways of working towards mutual economic benefit—for example, how our businesses can realise global opportunities together. British and New Zealand (and indeed Indian) companies can leverage off one another, where innovation on the one hand can be married with capacity and scalability on the other.
On the foreign policy front, we have sought to thicken our engagement and seek to collaborate where we have common purpose in a more structured and planned way. We held our first UK/NZ Strategic Dialogue last October. That is not to say we always agree. But where our approaches are different we understand why and respect that. We have also framed the relationship in the new global context and sought to understand the opportunities that exist today that are different to those of the past. This is about forging something new out of something old. We have also seen an un-precedented level of British Ministerial visits to New Zealand coinciding with my time here. For example, British Foreign Secretary William Hague has visited twice, the first British Foreign Secretary to have done so while in office.
And, as with Mumbai, there have been times when tragic events have played their part. The Pike River mining disaster was the first event in November 2010; two British miners were amongst the 29 lost and reminded us of our people's ties. The Christchurch earthquake in February 2011 further brought this home. In New Zealand’s most English of cities we saw the physical aspects of shared history rocked, heritage buildings ruined, and most sadly the loss of life. As with the Mumbai terrorist attacks, our response was swift. British Search and Rescue and Disaster Victim Identification teams were deployed. My team fielded over 400 British people displaced by the quake, mainly visitors, many with friends and relatives locally. We had 20 British dead.
There is of course a lot of day-to-day stuff, the routine of diplomacy. But, ending where I began, being a woman at the end of the day is irrelevant to what you deliver. The work is the work and, once you get beyond the initial perceptions of being the new woman, success is judged by what you achieve and the impact you have. Male or female, we all need the courage to face the challenges, the conviction to pursue our ambitions, and the confidence to believe in ourselves and what is possible. However, we do need to see more women at the top of professions, whether diplomats of engineers, and on senior boards. Here we have more work to do, but we can and should celebrate the progress our gender has made so far.
Vicki Treadell is a diplomat with over 30 years experience in policy and service delivery roles, with overseas assignments in Pakistan, Malaysia, India, and as British High Commissioner to New Zealand and Samoa and Governor of Pitcairn. During her career she has undertaken secondments outside the UK’s Foreign & Commonwealth Office, most notably between 2002-2005 when she was UK Trade & Investment’s Director for the North West of England.
This article was originally published in the Diplomatic Courier's March/April 2014 print edition.
Top Photo: UK in New Zealand on Facebook.
