Membership Terms

THE ATHENAE

Membership Terms

Last updated: 6 September 2026

These terms set out the agreement between you and The Athenae when you become a member. They are written to be read, so please do read them. If anything is unclear, write to us at [email protected] and we will explain it properly.

1. Who we are

1.1 The Athenae is a trading name of The Athenae Platform Limited, a company registered in England and Wales under company number 17377925, whose registered office is at 2 Silver Street, Buckden, St Neots, PE19 5TS. In these terms, The Athenae, we, us and our mean The Athenae Platform Limited.

1.2 You can reach us at [email protected].

1.3 These terms govern your membership of The Athenae. They apply alongside our website terms and our privacy policy. Where these terms and our website terms say different things about your membership, these terms are the ones that apply.

2. What membership is

2.1 Membership of The Athenae gives you access to a private community, a live programme of sessions, an annual gathering and a growing library of written work, as described in clause 5.

2.2 Being a member of The Athenae does not make you a shareholder or director of The Athenae Platform Limited. It gives you no shareholding, no share in its profits and no vote in how the company is governed. How The Athenae itself should develop is a different matter, and we ask our members for their view of that often.

2.3 Membership is personal to you. You may not transfer it, share it, or let anyone else use it.

3. Applying, and being accepted

3.1 Membership is by application. We read every application ourselves and decide who to welcome, so that the room stays what it is meant to be. We keep a short written admissions policy and we apply it consistently.

3.2 The Athenae is a membership for women.

3.3 We may decline an application, and we do not have to give our reasons. Declining an application is not a judgement on you or on your work.

3.4 Applying does not create a contract. There is no contract between us until we accept your application, you pay, and we confirm your place.

4. When your membership starts, and how long it lasts

4.1 Your membership starts on the day we confirm your place, after payment. That day is your membership date.

4.2 Membership runs for twelve months from your membership date. We call that your paid membership period. It then renews as set out in clause 7.

5. What membership includes

5.1 As a member you have:

•        access to the Circle, our private online community;

•        a place at our monthly Salons, held online with an invited guest, with a recording of the guest conversation if you cannot attend;

•        a place at quarterly Recognition Sessions, held in small groups of no more than eight;

•        the opportunity to bring a question of your own to a Member Counsel, a small group of fellow members chosen for the range of their experience, and to contribute your judgement to theirs in turn;

•        an invitation to The Athenae Gathering, our annual day together in London, included in your membership;

•        access to The Library, our collection of essays, frameworks and tools, opened to you across your first weeks and added to over the year; and

•        a guided welcome into the membership in your first weeks.

5.2 Member Counsels are part of your membership. They are convened between members, nobody is paid for taking part, and no client commissions or receives what is discussed. They are different from the Strategic Sprints described in clause 12, which are commercial work we carry out for organisations.

5.3 We will tell you how to request a Member Counsel and how we schedule them. They depend on other members being willing and available, so we cannot promise a particular number in a year.

5.4 The Gathering is held once a year. Your membership includes a place at the Gathering held during your paid membership period. If we have to move it, we will tell you as early as we can. If no Gathering takes place during your paid membership period, clause 8.2 applies.

5.5 Travel, accommodation and anything else you spend on attending the Gathering are yours to cover.

5.6 The Athenae is a membership, not a professional service, and it does not include individual professional advice. What is shared in Salons, in Recognition Sessions, in Member Counsels and in The Library is offered as insight and experience. It is not legal, financial, medical, career or other professional advice, and the decisions you take remain your own. None of this reduces our responsibility to provide the membership itself with reasonable care and skill.

5.7 Other members are not acting for us. If a member offers you information or an opinion, that is hers and not ours.

6. Your right to change your mind

6.1 Because you join online, you have a legal right to cancel without giving a reason. You have 14 days, beginning on the day after your membership date and ending at the close of the fourteenth day.

6.2 Your membership begins straight away, which means the Circle, the live programme and the first part of The Library open to you at once. We ask you to confirm at checkout that you want it to start immediately. If you cancel within the 14 days we refund your fee in full, whatever you have used in that time.

6.3 To cancel, simply tell us before the 14 days are up. Email [email protected], or use the cancellation form at theathenae.com/cancel. Any clear statement that you wish to cancel is enough.

6.4 We will refund you within 14 days of hearing from you, by the same method you used to pay.

6.5 After the first 14 days, your membership runs for the full paid membership period and the annual fee is not refundable, except where clause 8, clause 13 or clause 18 says otherwise. Separately from those, you keep any refund or other remedy the law gives you.

7. Fees and renewal

7.1 Standard membership is £1,500 a year. Members of the Founding Circle pay £950 a year.

7.2 We hold your founding rate for as long as your membership continues without a break. If a payment fails we will tell you and give you 14 days to put it right, and your founding rate is safe in that time. If your membership lapses, or you leave and rejoin later, the rate then current will apply.

7.3 Your fee is payable annually, in advance.

7.4 Your membership renews automatically each year on the anniversary of your membership date, at the rate that applies to you.

7.5 We will email you at least 30 days before each renewal to tell you the date, the amount, and how to stop it if you would rather not continue.

7.6 You can stop your membership renewing at any time before your renewal date by emailing [email protected]. Your membership then runs to the end of the paid membership period, and you retain access to your membership benefits until it ends.

7.7 We may change the standard membership fee. We will not change your founding rate while your membership continues without a break. Any change that affects you takes effect at your next renewal and we will tell you at least 30 days beforehand, so that you can decide whether to continue.

7.8 The fee you are quoted is the total you pay. It includes any VAT that is or becomes chargeable. The Athenae Platform Limited is not registered for VAT at present, and if we become registered during your membership your fee does not change because of it.

8. Changes, and if we stop

8.1 The Athenae will develop. We may change the programme, the platforms we use, the guests we invite and the timing of what we offer, where there is a reasonable ground to do so: a change in the law, security, a supplier or platform we can no longer use, or the practical business of scheduling. Any such change will leave the membership, taken as a whole, of a comparable standard and value to what you joined for.

8.2 If we make a change that significantly reduces what your membership gives you, we will tell you at least 30 days beforehand. You may then end your membership and receive a refund of the unused part of your fee, worked out by the number of days remaining. We will pay it within 14 days, by the method you used to pay.

8.3 If we stop providing the membership altogether, we will tell you as soon as we can and refund the unused part of your fee on the same basis.

9. How we are with each other

9.1 The Athenae depends on the quality of the company and on what is said being held carefully. As a member you agree to:

•        treat what other members share in the Circle, in Salons, in Recognition Sessions and in Member Counsels as confidential. You are free to carry away what you have learned. What is not yours to carry is anything personal, commercial or sensitive belonging to another member, whether or not you use her name;

•        treat other members with courtesy and respect, particularly when you disagree;

•        not use The Athenae to sell to, recruit from or market to other members, or to build a mailing list, unless we have agreed it with you;

•        not record, screenshot or copy sessions or Circle conversations for use outside The Athenae;

•        not bring recording tools, transcription services or AI note-takers and meeting assistants into any Athenae session or conversation; and

•        keep your access to yourself.

9.2 We ask this of every member, and we hold ourselves to it too.

9.3 Confidentiality does not stop you saying something where the law requires it, where you are taking confidential professional advice, or where you have a serious concern about someone’s safety or conduct and need to raise it.

9.4 Nothing in clause 9.1 prevents the Salon guest recording we make ourselves under clause 11, or any accessibility arrangement we have agreed with you beforehand. Anything agreed that way is still held to the confidentiality in this clause and to our privacy policy.

10. The Circle

10.1 What you post in the Circle remains yours. By posting, you give us permission to display it within The Athenae so that the community works.

10.2 We may remove anything that breaches clause 9, and we will tell you if we do.

10.3 Where your membership ends at the close of a paid membership period, your access to the Circle closes seven days later. Where we have ended your membership under clause 13 because of your conduct, your access closes at once.

10.4 When your membership ends, your earlier contributions may remain visible within the conversations they were part of, so that those exchanges still make sense to the members who took part in them. You can ask us to remove or anonymise them, and we will do so as our privacy policy describes.

11. Recordings

11.1 We record the guest conversation at each Salon, so that members who cannot attend live are not left out. The member discussion that follows is not recorded. We tell you before recording begins.

11.2 Recordings are shared only within the membership and are kept for twelve months.

11.3 Recognition Sessions and Member Counsels are not recorded.

11.4 How we handle recordings, including why we keep them, who can see them and for how long, is set out in our privacy policy.

12. Introductions, opportunities and advisory work

12.1 Part of why The Athenae exists is that experienced women are more useful to one another, and to organisations, when they are genuinely known. Where it seems right, we introduce members to each other and to organisations we are working with.

12.2 These introductions are made at our discretion, when a real fit arises. They are not a service you are buying. They are not guaranteed, and no part of your membership fee is a payment for finding you work.

12.3 Membership does not entitle you to paid work, to be chosen for any advisory engagement, or to any particular number or kind of introduction.

12.4 From time to time we may invite you to contribute to a Strategic Sprint, which is advisory work we carry out for an organisation that pays us for it. Any invitation is entirely optional. It is paid separately, under its own agreement, and it forms no part of your membership. You may decline without giving a reason, and declining will never affect your membership or any future invitation. If you accept and later need to step away, what happens then is dealt with in the agreement for that engagement.

12.5 We choose contributors for a Strategic Sprint according to what the question needs, together with availability and any conflicts of interest. Membership does not entitle you to be invited. Contributors are not drawn only from the membership.

12.6 We never pass your details to an organisation without asking you first.

13. Ending your membership

13.1 There are three different things you may want to do, and they work differently.

13.2 Cancelling in the first 14 days. Clause 6 covers this, and you receive a full refund.

13.3 Stopping your membership renewing. Email us at any time before your renewal date. Your membership then runs to the end of the paid membership period and you retain access to your membership benefits until it ends. Clause 7.6 covers this.

13.4 Ending your participation now. If you would rather stop taking part before the paid membership period ends, tell us and we will close your access and stop your membership renewing, so that nothing further is charged. After the first 14 days this does not ordinarily carry a refund.

13.5 We may suspend or end your membership if you seriously or repeatedly break these terms, or if your conduct amounts to harassment, serious disruption, or a breach of confidence that makes the room unworkable for others.

13.6 Unless the matter is urgent, we will tell you what our concern is and give you a fair chance to respond before we decide. Where we suspend your membership urgently, we will review it within 14 days and tell you the outcome. We will not leave you suspended indefinitely while your fee runs.

13.7 If we end your membership, we will refund the unused part of your annual fee, worked out by the number of days remaining, within 14 days and by the method you used to pay.

13.8 We will tell you in writing why we have ended your membership, unless there is a good reason not to.

14. Our work, and yours

14.1 The Library, the frameworks, the audits, the recordings and everything else we create remain ours. Your membership gives you permission to use them for your own purposes, professional and personal. It does not allow you to republish them, sell them, or use them to deliver your own programme.

14.2 Some of what appears in The Library or in a recording belongs to a guest or to someone else. Where that is so, their permission governs what may be done with it, and we will tell you where it applies.

14.3 Anything you write, say or contribute remains yours. Where you take part in a Salon guest conversation that we record, you give us permission to share that recording within the membership as clause 11 describes.

15. Our responsibility to you

15.1 We are responsible for loss you suffer that is a foreseeable result of us breaking these terms or failing to use reasonable care. We are not responsible for loss that was not foreseeable.

15.2 We do not exclude or limit our liability where the law does not allow us to, including for death or personal injury caused by our negligence, or for fraud.

15.3 Subject to 15.2, our total responsibility to you in any membership year will not exceed the fee you paid for that year.

16. Your information

16.1 How we handle your information is set out in our privacy policy at theathenae.com/legal.

17. If something is wrong

17.1 Please tell us first, at [email protected]. We would always rather put something right than have you leave quietly.

17.2 We will acknowledge what you have told us within three working days, and give you a considered answer within fourteen working days.

17.3 Nothing in these terms affects your legal rights as a consumer.

18. General

18.1 We may update these terms where there is a reasonable ground to do so: a change in the law, a change in how the membership operates, or a change to the platforms and suppliers we rely on. If a change materially affects your rights, we will tell you at least 30 days beforehand, and you may end your membership and receive a refund of the unused part of your fee, worked out by the number of days remaining. We will pay it within 14 days, by the method you used to pay.

18.2 If any part of these terms turns out to be unenforceable, the rest continues to apply.

18.3 These terms are governed by the law of England and Wales. If you live in Scotland or Northern Ireland you may bring proceedings in your own courts.

The Athenae Platform Limited, registered in England and Wales, company number 17377925. Registered office: 2 Silver Street, Buckden, St Neots, PE19 5TS. [email protected]