The Extraordinary Ordinary, the podcast from Women of the Year – Details, episodes & analysis

To mark the 70th anniversary of Women of the Year, in this series we’re talking to some of the extraordinary ordinary women whose exceptional achievements, courage and legacy (or, indeed, all three) have been recognised with special awards at the event over the decades. They talk about why they were chosen as award winners, recall their memories of the day and share what’s happened in their lives since then. 

Our first guest is also one of our earliest award winners. Pam Warren became known as The Woman in the Mask when, as the worst affected victim of the catastrophic Paddington train crash exactly 25 years ago, she had to wear a plastic mask to protect her badly burnt face as it slowly healed. In spite of the huge challenges she faced in recovering physically and mentally from her appalling injuries, Pam became an outspoken campaigner for improved passenger safety and we presented her with our Women of the Year Award in 2001 in recognition of her remarkable bravery and determination. 

Pam talks about learning to live with PTSD, how the crash changed her life for the better, why it’s important she doesn’t get bored, and the famous reporter she met at the lunch and how they became friends. 

Saying that this episode's guest holds the Guinness World Record for the fastest marathon run dressed as a nut, doesn’t even begin to do justice to the absurd number of ridiculously difficult physical challenges that former Major in the Royal Army Medical Core, Sally Orange, has undertaken in her on-going quest to raise awareness of mental health issues. 

This is a woman who has run the hardest land race in the world, the brutal Marathon de Sables, and the Siberian Ice Race in Russia. Who has skied 250km across the Artic Circle, and done the Arch to Arc triathlon - running from Marble Arch, swimming across the Channel, then cycling to the Arc de Triumph in Paris. Who has led the first ever all female wounded, injured and sick team to complete the word’s most challenging cycling event, the Race Across America, and is the only woman to have run seven marathons in seven continents in seven days.

Awarded an MBE in the King’s first Birthday Honours list this year for services to charity and mental health, Sally talks with powerful honesty about her own struggles with severe mental health problems and how her experiences, and her desire to help anybody else going through anything similar, have been the driving force behind all the astonishingly difficult challenges she has done and continues to do.

Learn more about Sally here
sallyorange.com
And find her on Instagram at sallyorangembe
and LinkedIn at Sally Orange MBE

Written and Presented by Diane Kenwood
Produced by Clare Lynch
This Podcast is brought to you in partnership with Coca-Cola Europacific Partners.

Julie Siddiqi is someone who finds it impossible to stay silent when she sees injustice happening. She's a Muslim convert, a campaigner and a women's rights activist, with a list of accomplishments so long it would take a whole episode just to go through them all. Among them are the Open My Mosque campaign, which fights inequality in UK mosques, and Together We Thrive, an organisation that connects Muslim women to people of all backgrounds. 
The Extraordinary Ordinary, from Women of the Year, shines a light on incredible achievements by women who you’ve probably never heard of (until now), but whose passion, dedication, and fierce determination has changed society, their communities and the world, in ways that will inspire and uplift you.

Written and hosted by:  Mojo Abidi
Produced by: Clare Lynch
Executive producer: Jo Baring
The Extraordinary Ordinary is brought to you in partnership with Silicon Valley Bank UK 

May Parsons moved to the UK from the Philippines 19 years ago to continue her career as a nurse. And on the 8th of December 2020, she made history when she administered the world's first Coronavirus vaccine outside of clinical trials. May was then chosen to represent the NHS to receive the historic George Cross award from Her Late Majesty the Queen, in recognition of the exceptional efforts of NHS staff across the country during the pandemic. She has become a fierce advocate for nurses, especially those from abroad, fighting for better treatment and respect. 
The Extraordinary Ordinary, from Women of the Year, shines a light on incredible achievements by
women who you’ve probably never heard of (until now), but whose passion,
dedication, and fierce determination has changed society, their communities and
the world, in ways that will inspire and uplift you. 

Written and hosted by:  Mojo Abidi 
Produced by: Clare Lynch 
Executive producer: Jo Baring
The Extraordinary Ordinary is brought to you in partnership with Silicon Valley Bank UK 

Kate Stanforth was on track to become a professional dancer until she became disabled as a teenager. She was diagnosed with a life-changing illness that means she often has to use a wheelchair. At some points, she thought she’d never dance again. But she’s used her passion to do some incredible things. Such as starting her own inclusive dance school, which is open to everyone - including people with disabilities. 
The Extraordinary Ordinary, from Women of the Year, shines a light on incredible achievements by women who you’ve probably never heard of (until now), but whose passion, dedication, and fierce determination has changed society, their communities and the world, in ways that will inspire and uplift you. 

Written and hosted by:  Mojo Abidi 
Produced by: Clare Lynch 
Executive producer: Jo Baring 
The Extraordinary Ordinary is brought to you in partnership with Silicon Valley Bank UK 

Katrin McMillian is the founder of Hello World, which offers a remarkable solution to the challenge of delivering accessible, affordable education to communities in the developing world, through innovative solar powered, internet-enabled education Hubs, each built by the community, for the community, giving them education materials and internet access.
In this inspiring episode Katrin describes how a TED talk changed her outlook on the world of education, and how she realised, and then witnessed, that children are capable of learning even in the absence of school rooms and teachers. She talks passionately about her frustrations with international development methods, and openly describes how she ended up in tears after some pitching meetings to potential funders. She admits she doesn’t always cope with the demands of the charity and the rest of her life with her diplomat husband and four children and calls on us all to stop praising dads for taking on their share of domestic and parenting duties.
In this episode we’re also joined by author and writer, the brilliantly witty Kathy Lette. When Kathy first came to the Women of the Year lunch she was worried it might be too posh, but she discovered that “the opposite was true. It confirmed what I’ve always believed, that women are each other’s human wonderbras. They make each other look bigger and better.” In her own inimitable style, Kathy describes the changes that have taken place at the lunch over the years, and the way life has moved on for women in society in general. 

A conversation with a homeless man about how he looked after his much loved dog, led Michelle, Southern, to launch a charity providing free veterinary care for the pets of homeless people. Street Paws looks after the animals and provides emergency housing for them if their owners have to go into hospital, it also supports hostels and trains their staff in the care of animals so that homeless people can access their services.
Michelle movingly describes the fiercely protective relationship homeless people have with their animals and how, in the early days of Street Paws, it took time to win their trust. She talks about how the pandemic helped to accelerate one of her key aims, and how she fought to help devoted pet owners not to be separated from their animals. She shares her dreams for the charity she started and runs, and the actions she’d like to see taken to help people out of the cycle of homelessness. Oh, and she reveals what her favourite breed of dog is.    In this episode we’re also joined by journalist, presenter and Labour Party peer, the magnificent Dame Joan Bakewell who recalls the early days of the Women of the Year Lunch, how, on her time at the event,  she was predominantly preoccupied by how the dress she was wearing would look, and how being there made, and makes, her conscious of being part of the onward tide of women’s progress.

Whilst she was teaching literacy in prisons Sharon Berry became increasingly dismayed by the damage their enforced separation caused the prisoners and their children. Her response was to create Storybook Dads, so that fathers could record themselves reading stories and sending messages to their children at home. From a small start in just one prison, her scheme is now in100 prisons across the country and includes mothers too. The model has been copied by the Army (where it’s called Storybook Soldiers), Navy (Storybook Waves) and Airforce (Storybook Wings) and around the world. 
Sharon talks about the pleasure it brings her to enable prisoners to have meaningful contact with their children, the broader ways the scheme helps them to be rehabilitated and the pivot she was forced to make during lockdown. In this candid and fascinating conversation she shares her own story of leaving school at 16 and the university lecturer she met whilst working in a bar who changed the course of her life.  
In this episode we’re also joined by the fabulous actress, Tamzin Outhwaite who talks about her memories and experiences of being at the Women of the Year Lunch, the special young guest who became her “sidekick” and the feeling of being surrounded by warrior women.

Her husband’s experience of being diagnosed with blood cancer is the driving force behind Sally Hurman’s determination to inform people about the illness and the need for them to sign up to the stem cell register. She uses her social media platform and a terrifying variety of death-defying stunts to raise both awareness and much need funds for research.
Sally movingly describes the terror she felt at her husband’s diagnosis and the struggle she had to accept the huge change it brought to their lives. She reflects on the power of social media for creating communities and helping others, and the need for authenticity and trust when you have a public platform. As for her crazy fund-raising stunts, well, she has a theory for those too.
In this episode we’re also joined by the magnificent actress Noma Dumezweni who admits that her expectations of the Women of the Year lunch weren’t exactly high, and how those expectations were blown out of the water by the enormous diversity of women she encountered at the event. She considers the value of an event celebrating women and reflects' on how our differences are our superpowers.

When Ayesha Aslam was studying psychology and counselling she was struck by the lack of inclusion of spirituality or culture in the training. After much research she devised her own model of counselling, combining mainstream approaches with Islamic perspective, and launched Sakoon, the first, and now leading, provider of Islamic counselling services in the UK. 
Ayesha reflects on what it was like to go from being one of the few Muslims in the community she grew up in, in County Durham, to moving to multi-cultural London as a young teenager. She talks about the shame that used to be attached to people from the South Asian community seeking help for their problems and how attitudes towards mental health have changed over the years. And she shares the reservations her family initially had about her career choice and path.  
In this episode we’re also joined by the wonderful actress, and long-time supporter of Women of the Year, Dame Maureen Lipman who reveals the yearly suggestion she makes to the Women of the Year team, but which is still to be taken up. And she discusses what she would like to see happening in the on-going challenge of establishing and maintaining true equality for women across the board.