One afternoon last week, a few of us went down to one of our favourite places in London, the Southbank Centre, to check out the annual WOW (Women of the World) festival. In its fifth year, WOW is a festival of talks, debates, music, film and comedy celebrating women and girls, held around International Women's Day. 

One afternoon each year is dedicated to women working in the creative industries. Women from all corners of the creative world – from TV commissioners and theatre directors to journalists and musicians – gathered to discuss the challenges facing women in creative roles and inspire us to create more, and better, opportunities.

Led by Jude Kelly, the Southbank Centre's own Artistic Director (read here for a great interview with her), the afternoon started with a panel of some of Britain's most accomplished women working in the arts, sharing stories of their journeys to the top and what they've learned along the way.

The rest of the day was spent in "think ins," smaller, hour-long sessions run concurrently in various sites within the Royal Festival Hall. Highlights this year included talks from women (and men!) 

We heard a thought-provoking panel on 'Changing Minds and Systems' from artist Sara Shamsavari and Science Grrl founder Anna Zecharia. We were also especially fired up by a panel on support and mentoring with Diana Osagie, head teacher of Islington Art and Music School, who told us that it was our responsibility to ensure we 'hold the door open' and create opportunities for scholars in the arts. In her own words, IAM is 'the best school in the Universe' and after her rousing talk about the school's philosophy and stories of its students, we believed her.

At the end of the day, what stood out to us is how lucky we are to work in an environment where so many of the senior roles are occupied by women, in an industry where diversity and equality still have a long way to go. But we also came away thinking that we need to do more to support women in our own field, as well the wider creative community. Not only those in education, but mid-career women looking to take their next step, whether it's upwards or sideways. 

There's a lot of great stuff happening at WOW – we thoroughly recommend a visit to the festival next year if you can. Follow the festival on Facebook for more information.

We've got three new faces joining the W+K London family this month. Here's a little introduction.

This is the lovely Holly Baker-Cliff. She has joined us as an AE on Finish and UKTV. Holly was previously working with the Nike Foundation in London before moving to the more exotic climate of Rwanda, where she became involved in amazing work with the local community.

She also revealed a little secret at our agency meeting; she auditioned for S Club Juniors. We're looking forward to hearing that next time the karaoke machine gets rolled out.

George Lisanti is a fresh face in the finance department, stepping into an accounts payable role.  He joins us from a WPP shared services finance department. George is a massive football fan. We hope to get him on our agency football team shortly!

Finally, we welcome Sanket Avlani as a permanent member of the design department. He freelanced with us for a couple of weeks at the end of last year – doing great work on Nike and crafting the Book Of The Year's cover to within an inch of it's life.