Yesterday, 30th May 2024 the Graça Machel Trust's Women Creating Wealth programme in collaboration with Stanbic Biashara Incubator, hosted a Women, Leadership and Entrepreneurship Masterclass for women entrepreneurs, in the spirit of fostering women's economic and social advancement.
Kicking off the session in Dar es Salaam Tanzania, was a fireside chat with Ms. Fauzia Malik who is the CEO of Cool Blue moderated by the Women Creating Wealth (WCW) Country Lead Ms. Anabahati Mlay. By telling her own story, Ms. Malik shared the power of mindset for women in leadership, believing in the ability to develop skills and intelligence through effort, helps women entrepreneurs overcome gender biases and stereotypes that can undermine their confidence. "By building resilience and self-belief enables us to pursue and excel in entrepreneurship and as a result, we're able to build sustainable businesses that create wealth" she said.
Ms. Malik emphasised how the ability to grow and learn fosters a visionary approach to women in leadership and how they can thus inspire their teams, drive strategic changes, and create a positive organisational culture. She also encouraged women entrepreneurs to embrace challenges and learn from failures as part of calculated risks, which are necessary for business growth.
Joining Ms. Malik was the Graça Machel Trust's Senior Entrepreneurship Manager, Ms Korkor Cudjoe and Stanbic Head of People and Culture Ms. Rabina Masanja. Ms Cudjoe shared about how WCW is designed to build women entrepreneurs' confidence, skills, and networks to scale their businesses and transition from income generation to wealth creation through the provision of essential skills, tools, mindset, and business development support services through technical support.
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Ms Rabina Masanja shared how she was fortunate to use the breastfeeding products from one of the WCW programme participants' business, which helped her with increase milk production an her baby was happy! She used that as a prime example of how investing in women entrepreneurs brings unique perspectives and solutions to business challenges, creating a space for unique innovation.
The feedback from the session participants was overwhelmingly positive, with women entrepreneurs accepting the challenges given by the panellists. This included a change of lifestyle; reading books and journaling as part of self-care, using organising tools that will help them with prioritisation and time management.
Part of our mission at GMT is to partner with like-minded allies to achieve systemic change, so that Africa is continent that is truly equitable and prosperous for all. We deeply grateful for the organisational partner, individual partners and entrepreneurs who came to learn and grow together.
