Naval spell launches voyage of discovery

In an article in the April 2016 issue of HEJ, we highlighted the current UK shortage of female engineers, focused on some of the reasons for the difficulty in recruiting young women, and considered some of the key steps bodies including professional institutes need to take to address the 'gender gap'. Here, in the first of a series of planned follow-up articles on successful women engineers' careers, HEJ editor, Jonathan Baillie, talks to Claire Hennessy FIHEEM, who, as head of Operational Estates and Facilities at Oxford University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, is responsible for the smooth day-to-day running of the buildings and plant at four busy hospitals. As she explained, she gained her first engineering experience looking after weaponry in the Royal Navy.