African women history embraces a huge variety of strong women in society despite a common trend of matrilineal descent. From heroins like Yaa Asantewa of Ghana and Winnie Mandela of South Africa to Funmilayo Ransome Kuti of Nigeria, there is no doubt that women can conquer the world. The road to a woman’s success in Africa is not a smooth ride. Especially in business and entrepreneurship. The struggle to raise business funds is a common issue that many startup owners are faced with, especially women entrepreneurs. With lack of support and mentorship programmes, patriarchal nature of societies, many women are challenged in running sustainable businesses despite their potential but they keep on rising against all odds.
In a male dominated sphere of startups and entrepreneurship, She leads Africa is one solution taking steps in breaking barriers in entrepreneurship and leadership for women. It is a free social network community for startups in business and already existing businesses to over 400,000 communities aimed at helping women achieve their diverse goals. It engages online content across Africa to events that promote effective networking as a way of educating women about businesses and to also boost their confidence and self esteem their accelerator. As a result a platform for real nurturing of innovative ideas can be identified, giving rise to overwhelming positive results which have the potential to accelerate personal development.
It is founded by two young passionate women, Yasmin Belo-Osagie and Afua Osie who want to overcome barriers of accounting education, fundamentals of finance access and mentorship to most women across Africa as far as businesses and entrepreneurship are concerned. Their initiative is in partnership with a number of alliances such as Work in Progress Alliance, which focuses on promoting sustainable living incomes, Lagos innovates, which focuses on promoting technology and start ups in Africa, VC4Africa and many others. Such initiatives have not provided a platform for creativity and confidence development only. The massive growth in She leads Africa through its communities throughout many countries in Africa does signify that more innovative ideas are yet to grow and change in the African entrepreneurship world for women for generations to come, providing solutions and promoting women empowerment in the long run.
Women are already playing a significant role in African innovation. This two add to our list of powerful innovative women once featured in our blog. The likes of Lucy Quist is one. She was the first female CEO a telecommunication company in Ghana with Airtel Ghana, a mentor to the youth and women in Ghana. Oluwayimika Angel Adelaja is another, she is a Co-founder and executive Director of We farm Africa. We cannot forget Hawawu Mustapha Yaajalal and her innovation My doc Ghana, one of the most viewed posts on Inventive Africa. You can check out this blog to read more about them.
One article from Imagination defines innovation as a visionary strategic lever for change, business transformation, management, profitability and overall sustainability. It is also a systemic lever that engages, empowers and enables people to affect business breakthroughs and deliver profound culture, system, process, product and people changes. The result is increased organisational engagement, reach, competitiveness, faster business growth and increased business value to enable businesses to flow and flourish in this age of disruption. She leads Africa seems to be walking in the same footsteps with its powerful communities such as she hive, which through its classes in many African countries covers and mixes relaxation, connecting, coaching, brand building, partnering, and speed networking all at once for many women across the globe.
From women having access to different callings than men to having multitasky societal roles, it is evident that women entrepreneurs have far more value and sharpened perspective which can provide sustainable economies for the African continent.
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