World Rowing presents on advancing Gender Equality in Coaching at the 2025 IF Forum

World Rowing’s work on driving Gender Equality in Coaching was highlighted by the IOC in their review after the Paris Olympic Games.  The IOC good practices to encourage women coaches in International Federations features the World Rowing Coach Development Programme, which advances gender equality.  

Daniela Gomes, Head of Development and Sustainability participated in the panel discussion “ Women Coaches – Pathways, Leadership and Empowerment” at the 2025 IF Forum – sustainability session. 

She first highlighted that World Rowing’s leadership requested at the 2013 Congress the creation of a women’s development strategy. She continued explaining why our sport needs more female coaches by sharing some simple ideas, such as how having more female coaches will help reaching more athletes, creating more inclusive training environments and lead to collective buy in and engagement. 

She outlined the dual approach World Rowing adopted since 2013 to create clear entry points for women in coaching, namely gender mainstreaming across the development programme, ensuring equality is embedded in all activities together with targeted gender equality projects. 

As an example, the High-Performance Capacity Building initiatives, such as the WSLA pilot (2019), which evolved into the WISH programme in 2022, are instrumental to build confidence and competence in leadership and sport-specific skills which are crucial to succeed in High performance contexts. 

The response from the Rowing community has been very positive. From 2013 to 2025 , data review allowed for systematic monitoring of participation showed: a female coach at club level increased from 26% to 34% (+8%); a female national team coach increased from 13% to 27% (+14%); and a rise in female coaches across all World Championships of 9%, now at 21%. 

Beyond programmes, cultural change is key and World Rowing works to promote environments where women feel recognised and supported across all its cross functional development areas, providing practical tools and guidance to break barriers and foster diversity, and applying a gender equality lens systematically across all programmes and delivery methods. 

World Rowing strongly supports the actions implemented by the IOC and other IFs, as it is only together that we can create a stronger, more inclusive future for sport.