To mark International Women’s Day, Northern Ireland’s fastest growing broadband provider, Fibrus has announced some new additions to its workplace policies, in efforts to try and attract more women into the significantly male dominated sector. The full fibre specialists, which now have a workforce of over 250 people, have pledged that 50% of the company’s new recruits will be women by 2028.


As well as introducing extensive maternal and women specific support measures, Fibrus is accelerating its outreach programmes to educate more young women about careers in fibre engineering and proactively targeting female ‘returners’ who are looking to get back to the workplace.

Speaking on the importance of encouraging more women to take up roles in the full fibre sector, Gillian McCarter, Head of HR Operations at Fibrus said:

“Fibre is an exciting industry which is growing in size and scale, especially here in the UK and Ireland. There are so many benefits this sector can bring for local people, not just in terms of the services it provides but also the career prospects it creates. Engineering may have been seen as predominantly male in the past, but we want to break the bias and ensure women are given an equal chance – or better yet, a helping hand – to avail of these opportunities.

“Our efforts to recruit more women will start at a grassroots level, engaging with schools and colleges to promote the opportunities for girls to get involved in fibre engineering and other associated careers. We also want to reach women who are seeking a return to work, perhaps after a career break or time off to raise a young family. We have a supportive workplace culture here at Fibrus, so anyone with a position on our team can thrive and grow – just like many of our Senior female leaders have already.”

Fibrus has also rolled out detailed policies to support all of its colleagues through pregnancy loss, and its female colleagues through menopause.

Gillian explained “Our Menopause Support Policy encourages all colleagues to talk and understand more about the menopause and offers guidance for managers in how they can support their female colleagues.”

The Fibrus team is currently made up of almost 20% women, working across areas such as Finance, Construction, Sales and HR, and today’s announcement aims to increase this figure to at least 50%. A variety of live recruitment opportunities are available, so as many women as possible are encouraged to apply, with full training and support offered for a number of roles.

Gillian continued: “We’re delighted to be able to launch our new initiatives on International Women’s Day and look forward to welcoming more inspiring, intelligent and dedicated women to the Fibrus team.”

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Fibrus engineer Gabriella McNulty

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