Forget the old boy network, here's one for City women

A website to connect female high-flyers has been tipped as the next social networking phenomenon to hit London.

Dubbed "Facebook for grown-ups", the club aims to ease the isolation of successful women working in predominantly male environments.

Members will be invited to society events, restaurants and bars and be given discounts to major fashion and beauty brands.

The Influence site has been set up by Canadian-born businesswoman and mother-of-two Anita Curry. She said life could be lonely for high powered women, at a time when one in four FTSE 100 companies had no female directors and the pay gap between male and female directors stood at 22 per cent.

The 31-year-old former sales director from Kennington hopes it will help women in different professions make contact.

She said: "There are 700 women's clubs just in London and they all have the same objective; to provide networks. They try to help build a community so that women in certain professions - especially the senior ones who find themselves in the minority - don't feel so isolated.

"Influence aims to bring all these groups together. It's about linking up across the verticals-So instead of having lots of different groups, like women in law and women in banking and finance, you have one network.

"Existing networks can simply operate as they are with the added benefits of social networking tools to help them engage new and old members, employees, clients and even sponsors. What unites all these women is not only their professional success but their interest in arts and culture and lifestyle."

Ms Curry came up with the concept after experiencing isolation in male-dominated work environments during a 10-year career in the IT and shipping sectors.

"It was impossible to find the time to connect with like-minded women and I ended up having to change my working style to fit with the men I was working with and attend events I really wasn't interested in," she said.

"I was losing my femininity, adapting to male corporate culture and that didn't help my marriage. I also had to sacrifice time with my family and friends. I have built Influence to solve the problems and challenges I faced."

Ms Curry has also been approached about using the Influence model to provide a networking facility for female staff in the NHS.