SheLeads Voices: Women in leadership as a catalyst for the fight against discrimination and violence
By the Gender Equity and Protection Office
On November 24, USIU-Africa Gender Equity and Protection Office in collaboration with the SheLeads Project, hosted a webinar titled ‘SheLeads Voices: Women in Leadership as a catalyst for the fight against discrimination and violence’. The theme of the webinar was in line with this year’s UN 16 Days of Activism theme titled ‘UNITE! Invest to prevent violence against women and girls’ where discussions, actions were intentionally made to advance the agenda on and speak against violence on women.
The webinar hosted a panel consisting of three women handpicked to give and share their experiences in their various roles of leadership. They were: Edinah Nyaboke Kangwana-CEO and founder-Arise Circle Ke, Lucy W. Mukuria- CEO and Founder-True North Kenya and a USIU-Africa Alumna and Marianne Nyangi- CEO and Founder- Global Women’s Connections LLC.
The webinar session engaged panelists in a series of questions in an effort to gain their insights on various topical issues stemming from women leadership. The panelists shared their views and experiences on the importance women’s leadership, and highlighted the ways on what should be done differently in order to realize greater inclusion, involvement, and representation of women in leadership. Further emphasis was made about the role of women raising and supporting women leaders as a way to empower each other. Discussions were directed towards the role of stakeholders and how they measure/contribute to the impact of women in leadership roles in terms of reducing gender discrimination and violence, and what metrics or indicators should be looked at such as establishing an environment that creates self-confidence, awareness and representation among genders while acknowledging the contributions of the male gender and seeing how their roles contribute to women inclusion. A key idea shared among all the panelists was to help recognize the power of diversity, gender, equity, inclusion and champion the support of women across different sectors and levels.
