In December, Zozibini Tunzi made South Africa – still euphoric after the rugby world cup win – proud again by winning the Miss Universe pageant in Atlanta. She also campaigns against gender-based violence and believes the world is ready to embrace a different narrative of beauty. 



From the quiet village of Tsolo in the Eastern Cape province of South Africa to the catwalks of the world, Zozibini Tunzi is the newly-minted Miss Universe, the first black South African to win the global pageant. In this interview FORBES AFRICA conducted with her before her historic win, while she was still Miss South Africa, she conveys the struggles of being a woman in her home country.



What does it mean for you to carry the title of Miss South Africa?



South Africa is a democratic country; that means it [must]
not discriminate against anyone, it should give everyone living in it equal
opportunity. The reality is that being a woman in South Africa is still a
struggle. We have come so far from the Stone Age and a lot has changed but more
can still be done. We find that women are still trying to shatter the glass
ceiling and I hope one day we won&#8217;t have to do that. 



It means that I am a representation of South African women.
I want women and young girls to look at me and see their faces reflected in
mine. 



What is the one thing you would like to change about the beauty industry?



For the longest time, the assumption of beauty has been
one-dimensional and westernized. There hadn&#8217;t been a wide range of
representation in the beauty industry for women. It has taken a while for the
world to recognize being African as beautiful. We are now slowly moving into a
space where black and being curvy is also beautiful just at it has always been.
It needs to change at a faster pace. I&#8217;m hopeful that we will soon get there.



Any anecdotes from the New York Fashion Week you attended ? 



It was one of the greatest highlights of my Miss South
Africa journey. What people may not know is that I have no background in
modeling, so for me to do a fashion show at that level, was mind-blowing. I
remember seeing the models I knew from America’s Next Top Model and thinking,
‘geez, Zozi, you&#8217;re really here doing this’. I am forever grateful to have been
able to experience that, especially with South African designers.



Who are some of your role models?



Mama Winnie Madikizela-Mandela and Harriet Tubman. What
these women have in common is their ability to be very firm in what they
believe in. They are fighters and they are fearless.



What are some of the values you live by?



Humility, kindness and respect. They are the core of
everything I live by.



What message would you like to leave young African women inspired by you?



My message to them is to never compromise on who they are and what they believe in. They should not be afraid to bend the rules even if just a little. All the greats in the world have had to fight for what they believe in so we shouldn&#8217;t be scared to do it too.

The 2019 Miss Universe Pageant – Show

‘Don’t Be Afraid To Bend The Rules’ – Miss Universe

Africa’s most dynamic thought-leaders, industry game-changers
and icons of social activism are set to feature at the ex<a>clusive
FORBES WOMAN AFRICA Leading Women Summit </a>presented by Mastercard (#LWS2020KZN)
and hosted by the KwaZulu-Natal government &#8211; taking place at the Inkosi Albert
Luthuli ICC Complex in Durban on Friday, 6 March 2020.



For the 5th edition of this globally-renowned
event, panellists and speakers will engage with the impactful 2020 theme, ‘The
Ceiling Crashers 2.0: Power with Purpose’. The day’s thought-provoking
discussions will be followed by the highly-anticipated <a>FORBES
WOMAN AFRICA Awards Gala Dinner </a>which celebrates the continent’s most
influential female ‘ceiling crashers’ across a number of key categories.&nbsp; 



“The <a>FORBES WOMAN AFRICA Leading
Women Summit </a>has grown to become one of the biggest female-empowerment
events, boasting a high calibre of attendees and unparalleled speaker line-up,”
said Renuka Methil, Managing Editor of FORBES WOMAN AFRICA. 



“This promises to be the biggest instalment yet,
featuring female pioneers and path-breakers across the continent. Audiences will
be exposed to dynamic discussions about the growing the number of women in
leadership &#8211; something government and business really need to factor into their
strategies. We will also get to grips with a new discourse that focuses on dismantling
power structures and the need for truly inclusive cultures in business and
society.”



This highly-anticipated event, which is hosted annually
in honour of International Women’s Day, is expected to draw an audience of
around 1 000 leading women. Through hard-hitting talks, fireside chats and
insightful panel sessions centred on ‘ceiling crashers’, attendees will be
inspired to make meaningful changes within their own industries, secure in the
knowledge that they have the support of these innovative allies. This year’s
programme promises an influential mix of leaders in healthcare and business;
advocates of social and environmental activism; award-winning artists and
internationally-renowned stateswomen. 



For the first time, FORBES WOMAN AFRICA will be releasing
its own list of ‘Africa’s Most Powerful Women’, many of whom will be attending
the summit. The list will be published in the March issue of the magazine, outlining
those who have been leading ideas and industries while purposefully
contributing to nation-building and positively impacting the lives around them.



The FORBES WOMAN AFRICA Awards Gala Dinner, which is
hosted the evening of the summit, is an opportunity to recognise the
trailblazers and role models who have created a new narrative within their
industries. By challenging authority and ‘old school’ traditions, they are
enabling future generations to live in a better and more equal world. 



Beatrice Cornacchia, Senior Vice President, Marketing and
Communications, Mastercard Middle East and Africa, said: “African women are a
vital source of innovation, prosperity, and economic growth. Yet inequality and
exclusion still hold women back in many aspects of their everyday lives &#8211; from
growing their businesses to having the financial tools to participate in the
formal economy; from joining the C-Suite to following their passions. We are
proud to partner with FORBES WOMAN AFRICA as we believe that it is only by
bringing diverse perspectives to the table that we can unlock Africa’s
possibilities to women.”



Managing Director of the ABN Group, Roberta Naicker, said
the organisation was excited that the KwaZulu-Natal government would, once
again, play host to this illustrious event, which serves to highlight the
continent’s most influential female leaders while also shining a spotlight on
this beautiful region. “A summit of this calibre showcases that KZN is being
positioned as a world-class events’ destination. We are excited to have
renowned speakers and attendees will get the opportunity to engage on hard-hitting
issues during the summit, while also affording them the chance to enjoy the
many recreational tourism sites and activities for which KZN is renowned.”



Tickets to the exclusive 2020 FORBES WOMAN AFRICA Leading
Women Summit and Gala Dinner are available at a cost of R3499, available
through Webtickets (<a href="https://www.webtickets.co.za/v2/event.aspx?itemid=1496991848">https://www.webtickets.co.za/v2/event.aspx?itemid=1496991848</a>).
Tickets are limited and interested parties are urged to book early to avoid
disappointment. There are also select opportunities to get involved with the event
sponsorship, exhibiting at the on-site marketplace or by sponsoring a mentee. Please
visit website for further details.



The 2020 FORBES WOMAN AFRICA Leading Women Summit is
presented by Mastercard (@MastercardMEA) and hosted by KZN Provincial
Government (@KZNgov). Keep updated on all the latest news and announcements on
Twitter @LWSummit and join the conversation using the hashtags #LWS2020KZN
#DOKZN.



Contact details:



Office: +27 (11) 384 0300



Sponsorship and exhibition opportunities: <a href="mailto:Sales_South_Africa@abn360.com">Sales_South_Africa@abn360.com</a> 



Media partnerships and press accreditation: <a href="mailto:oj@oliviajones.co.za">oj@oliviajones.co.za</a> 



Event-related queries: <a href="mailto:events@abn360.com">events@abn360.com</a>



Website:<a href="http://www.Leadingwomensummit.co.za">www.Leadingwomensummit.co.za</a>

LWS_Social-Media_Twitter_announcement_1

Africa’s Most Dynamic Thought-Leaders, Industry Game-Changers And Icons Of Social Activism Set To Feature At The Exclusive FORBES WOMAN AFRICA 2020 Leading Women Summit

Nompumelelo (Mpoomy) Ledwaba is the darling of social media. In a mere 12 months, she has grown her Instagram following to close to 100,000.

The 24-year-old was first introduced to the media-crazy masses when she married South African Idols finalist and recording artist, Brenden Praise (Ledwaba). It intrigued thousands and generated quick clicks, likes and follows. She is today an influencer in her own right.
It is a warm Friday afternoon in Melville, a hip suburb in Johannesburg, South Africa, when we meet Mpoomy and Brenden at their nail and coffee bar located on the bustling 7th Street. The salon is packed with women getting their nails done for the weekend. The room is painted grey and decorated in white and spurts of pink and yellow.
Stars such as Mapaseka Koetle-Nyokong, Mmatema Moremi, Jessica Nkosi and Thickleeyonce come here for nail pampering.
This is a world away from where it all began in Middelburg, a farming and industrial town in eastern South Africa where Mpoomy was born. She moved to Johannesburg to study accounting at the University of Johannesburg (UJ). In her second year, she took on a job as a banker at Investec to pave the way for a career in corporate.
“It was a busy year. I worked from 4PM until midnight or from midnight till 8AM. In between, I had classes to attend. It was fun at first until I got bored and frustrated,” says Mpoomy.
It marked the beginning of a journey that broke and built her.
First, she quit her job.
“I didn’t diagnose it as depression but now because I understand what depression is, I know it could have been that,” she says.
Then, she did something no one thought she would.
It was in one of UJ’s exam halls where she was scheduled to take her finance exam. On this day, she says she was well-prepared. The examiner gave students 10 minutes reading time before the exam started. During this time, students plan their answers to the questions but Mpoomy says she was planning a business.
“When the examiner said ‘you may start’, I hadn’t read through the exam questions. I tried to page through it but I just couldn’t start. I stood up and I left the room and I never went back,” she says.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/woman/2015/04/01/the-man-in-the-beauty-business/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">READ MORE: The Man In The Beauty Business</a>
It was a brave move. She had no money, no experience and she knew her parents would not be impressed.
“I went home to my parents immediately. I think my mom knew this could happen. She wasn’t shocked but she was hurt… My dad was upset. I stayed home for a day and my mom told me to go back to Johannesburg to write my exam and I refused but still went back to Johannesburg.”
Her father cut her off financially. It was time for Mpoomy to fend for herself. The road to entrepreneurship was cold, lonely and frustrating.
“I didn’t even ask my dad why he wasn’t sending me money anymore. I knew I had lost the right to do so because I had decided to be an adult by making that decision. He didn’t owe me anything. I was hurt and upset but I’m grateful that happened because it gave me the push to hustle. I even tried to borrow R10,000 ($703) from my mother to do a nail course and she refused,” she says.
Although the plan was not clear and everyone around her said she was making a mistake, Mpoomy says she had faith her dream to open a nail business would one day come true.
<blockquote>“I spent my days crying and praying. It was a tough time. I knew I had made the right decision but everyone and everything around me tried to break me,” she says.</blockquote>
According to Mpoomy, Brenden, her then boyfriend and now husband, is the only one who shared the same faith.
“He was there with me all the way no matter what. He supported me and told me everything will be ok,” says the now-pregnant Mpoomy.
While trying to find her way, she joined a modeling agency. Her first job was a billboard and a TV advert that paid her R22,000 ($1,546). Following in her father’s footsteps, she invested it in a cleaning business.
“My dad’s business started as a cleaning company. He was a hustler trying to figure things out. Now, he manufactures various cleaning products and has a safety line…one day, when I was home, my mom was reading a magazine and came across an article that listed 10 businesses that require no startup capital and she showed it to me and I knew I had to start,” says Mpoomy.
She made a flier of her new-born cleaning business and posted it on WhatsApp groups. She found her first customers. She ran it for a year until she had to clean client homes herself.
“In December, all my helpers went home for the holidays and I had to clean for our clients. It was tough and I learned you can’t start a business in something you don’t know or you are not passionate about,” she says.
In January 2017, she got married and Brenden gave her R15,000 ($1,054) to go to nail school.
“He had just paid lobola and we had just gotten married which didn’t come cheap and now he had just invested in my education. Although my fees were paid, we didn’t have money for transport. At our wedding, someone gave us an envelope with R2,000 ($140) and that is what we used,” says Mpoomy, her eyes watering.
Life got tougher.
“We sacrificed everything we had to get started. We had financial problems at the time. It was the first year of our marriage and we had so many things to do. We just worried about getting through the day. I remember there was one time I didn’t know if we were going to have food for the rest of the month,” she says.
After three months, she was ready to get working experience but no one would hire her. She then mounted a poster on her car advertising her services and started a mobile nail salon.
“I did my nails every three days. We would go to a restaurant every week because they have a lunch special for R50 ($3) that comes with unlimited wifi. We would download videos so I learned how to be better.”
The mobile salon grew and she started making about R1,000 ($70) a day. She knew it was time to grow, open a shop and employ staff. With the help of a mentor, she opened Aneno Nail &amp; Coffee Bar.
<div id="attachment_37613" style="width: 750px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-37613" decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="wp-image-37613 size-large" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Mpumi-153-1024x683.jpg" alt="" width="740" height="494" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Mpumi-153-1024x683.jpg 1024w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Mpumi-153-300x200.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Mpumi-153-600x400.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Mpumi-153-768x512.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Mpumi-153.jpg 1654w" sizes="(max-width: 740px) 100vw, 740px" />Mphoomy Ledwaba. Photo by Motlabana Monnakgotla</div>
“A week before our opening, I asked a family friend, who is a celebrity, to help me by coming to my nail bar and have her nails done for free and advertise on social media so I can get clients, but she undermined me. I could tell from the way she looked at me. She told me she works with big brands…I was hurt but I understood that you don’t need anyone to make something successful. God is the one who makes things happen.”
Today, she employs six people and plans to get into the hair industry, create a nail product line and then franchise the business. This is definitely not the last time you hear about this small-town girl with big dreams.

Mpumi-182

The University Drop Out Who Built A Beauty Business

The Managing Director of the ABN Group, Roberta Naicker, wins the Top Businesswoman of the Year Award at the 2018 Standard Bank Top Women Awards.

For over 11 years, the ABN Group, home to the FORBES AFRICA and CNBC Africa brands, has diligently told the African growth story and shared the perspectives of the titans of industry.
For over a decade now, Durban-born Roberta Naicker has been an intrinsic part of the company’s journey, and as its Managing Director, is today a success story herself.
In August, which is regarded as Women’s Month in South Africa, Naicker won the Top Businesswoman of the Year Award at the 2018 Standard Bank Top Women Awards.
The function, at the Emperors Palace in Johannesburg, drew over 650 guests from corporate companies, government departments and the entrepreneurial sphere.
<div id="attachment_37297" style="width: 210px" class="wp-caption alignright"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-37297" decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="size-medium wp-image-37297" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/strikeaposephotography-0243-200x300.jpg" alt="" width="200" height="300" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/strikeaposephotography-0243-200x300.jpg 200w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/strikeaposephotography-0243-300x450.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/strikeaposephotography-0243-600x900.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/strikeaposephotography-0243-768x1152.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/strikeaposephotography-0243-683x1024.jpg 683w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/strikeaposephotography-0243.jpg 1241w" sizes="(max-width: 200px) 100vw, 200px" />Roberta Naicker. Photo provided.</div>
&nbsp;
The awards were to recognize outstanding leadership in individuals and organizations that have stepped up and shaped the role of women within the private and public sectors.
“It was not an easy task, but with a dedicated group of men and women, we’ve been able to position Africa as the continent of tomorrow,” said an elated Naicker about the ABN Group as she received her award in a room filled with the prominent and the powerful.
In March 2008, Naicker was hired as the head of finance of the group, and had to find her feet in the media industry.
She currently serves as a board member, is the Chair and Managing Director of ABN Productions, ABN Pictures and the ABN Training Institute, Chair of the ABN Education Trust, and Chair of ABN Nigeria and Kenya.
She speaks to FORBES WOMAN AFRICA about winning and why she believes gender parity will be achieved faster with the 4th Industrial Revolution.
How does it feel winning? 
I was genuinely surprised and grateful to be awarded Businesswoman of the Year. This award is as much an award to me, as it is an award to ABN for recognizing potential and helping it grow. My journey with ABN has been a cherished adventure which started in 2008. I have held the position as MD since 2011. This award is a special milestone for me personally and professionally. It is a testimony to the guidance of the Board, the support of the management and the hard work of every single member of the staff.
What do you attribute your success to? 
Success is not a one-person game, it is team work. It is all the people who stand behind me – the staff, the management, the executive team, the Board and the shareholders. My success and growth is attributable to being able to work with so many wonderful people and being able to bring the best out of them. Our Vice-Chairman, Rakesh Wahi’s trust and faith in my leadership, and steadfast support has been very crucial in defining my career.
What has changed in the media landscape in the last decade since you joined? 
A decade is a long time and a lot has changed. The media landscape has evolved so rapidly. We stand in the middle of the 4th Industrial Revolution, one in which technology impacts everything we do and is evolving at such a rapid pace. The media industry is one of the most impacted industries. The digital revolution has drastically changed how the world consumes media especially news media, and at this time it is important to be one step ahead!
You came in taking up a position in an industry new to you, what advice would you have given yourself at that time? 
My advice has always been [to] take one day at a time, and give your 100% for that day. It has worked so well for me because each day brings new highs, new challenges and new opportunities and it brings me great satisfaction to give each of these my 100% best.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/woman/2018/09/27/celebrating-five-years-with-the-founder-publisher-rakesh-wahi/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">READ MORE: Celebrating Five Years With The Founder &amp; Publisher: Rakesh Wahi</a>
What are you looking forward to? 
Over the past 11 years of operation in Africa, we are proud to have created employment opportunities, promoted the development of women within the organization and a niche for financial journalism on the continent. The group still aims to their spread our wings across the continent, a goal which keeps me up at night and brings me back to work in the morning with enthusiasm and energy.
How would you describe your leadership style? 
My leadership style has also grown with the company. I have been able to lead the organization through its journey across the African continent and watch us become Africa’s largest business news aggregator. I don’t believe leadership style can fit into one box but the term I guess which suits this journey the most is ‘transformative’.
Will there be a time when gender will not be a topic in the workplace? 
Women represent the largest disruptive force in business. We are currently the largest unserved market in business. Sheryl Sandberg has beautifully put the answer to this question – it lies in more women in more positions of power. Empowered women empower other women. While this is not something that will happen overnight, I believe we are on the right path, and I believe that this journey will arrive at its destination.
We are leapfrogging in tech and the 4th Industrial Revolution, but when do you think we will achieve gender parity? 
It is because of the 4th Industrial Revolution that I believe gender parity will be achieved faster. The internet has changed the way we consume news; every consumer is also a contributor. The internet has brought people from all over the world together. With a click of a button, we can connect to women across ages, cultures and countries. It can be an amazing tool for empowerment and it can be used to create momentum to women’s issues. Women always had a voice, now we have a platform where we can use it and be heard.
What are some of the views you have on the gender pay gap existing in Africa? With so many women in the media profession, how do you advise this must change? 
Based on statistics released in 2015, women collectively represent the second-largest economy in the world. Yet it is a widely-known fact that women are paid 25% to 40% less than men globally. Women are the single-largest productive economic force, and drive almost every economic indicator for businesses. This gap will close only if there are more women in power, empowering other women. As mentioned earlier, this is not an overnight phenomena, but a journey. One which has gathered more momentum, and one which will surely get us to a better world with more empowered women only if we keep at the journey.

strikeaposephotography-7864

‘Gender Parity Will Come Sooner’

Sixty two years ago, on August 9, 20,000 women of all races, classes and creed marched, singing and chanting, babies on their backs, to the Union Buildings in Pretoria, South Africa’s capital city, to deliver a petition to then Prime Minister J.G Strydom against the introduction of the apartheid pass laws.
This meant black women were not allowed in urban areas for more than 72 hours unless they possessed a pass with the holder’s details, including payment of taxes and permission to be in these urban areas. The march was led by the struggle stalwarts: Lilian Ngoyi, Helen Joseph, Albertina Sisulu, Sophia Williams-De Bruyn and Rahima Moosa.
“I didn’t see much of Helen Joseph at the march, she was in front of the crowd. She was a big strong woman and she led the march with other strong women. They told us that women are holding passes and if we don’t demonstrate against [the government], we [too will one day end up] holding these passes,” recollects Ramnie Naidoo to FORBES AFRICA. She was only was 14 years old at the time, escorting her mother at the march.
Pictured here is Helen Joseph (1905-1992), founding member of the Federation of South African Women, and Rahima Moosa (1922-1993), union activist and member of the Transvaal Indian Congress, both co-leaders of the 1956 Women’s March.
They have been immortalized in the Long March To Freedom, a procession of 100 life-sized bronzes celebrating the pioneers of South Africa’s journey to democracy, at the Fountains Recreation Resort in the City of Tshwane, Gauteng, South Africa.

Womens-march-470

Celebrating Women With Monumental Strength

Simidele Adeagbo, the first Nigerian Winter Olympian at PyeongChang 2018 and the first African and black female skeleton racer at the games, is using the sport to uplift other young women.

In 2008, Simidele Adeagbo was determined to qualify for the Beijing Olympics. Every muscle, every cell, in her body was tuned and trained to accomplish this dream.
A place at the world sporting event would be a culmination of a decade of sweat and tears in athletics, a journey she began while in elementary school.
The catalyst was winning a race at school that propelled Adeagbo to become a four-time National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) champion as well as the triple jump record-holder for the University of Kentucky.
Adeagbo put everything she could into her Olympic dream but destiny made her fall short, literally. She failed to qualify for the Olympics by eight inches and just like that, it was all over.
“I went all out and I put everything I could into qualifying. I worked with the best coaches and best facilities. I had two good tries and I just came up short. Of course I was disappointed but I was satisfied with my effort and at that point, I was ok with moving on in life and walking away from athletics,” says Adeagbo.
She moved to South Africa to begin her new life away from competitive athletics until December 2016 when things took on a new course.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/woman/2017/08/31/female-gamers-new-sport-stars/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">READ MORE: Female Gamers: The New Sport Stars</a>
Nigerian women’s bobsled team members Seun Adigun, Ngozi Onwumere and Akuoma Omeoga made news headlines with an audacious goal to become the first team from Africa to qualify for the winter Olympics.
“As I was reading it, I felt really inspired and excited and I thought it was really cool. So something inside me rose up and I thought I wonder if it could be something I could be a part of?” recalls Adeagbo.
The bigger picture for Adeagbo was recognizing how significant it would be to make history as part of the Nigerian team, however the initial days of training were anything but smooth. She tried out for the team in August 2017 and was subsequently invited to come back to a camp in Canada.
“That was when I realized that bobsleigh wasn’t going to work out. The timing was not right to join the team. The team was already made.”
But before her Olympic hopes would be crushed again, someone introduced Adeagbo to skeleton-racing, a winter sliding sport in which a person rides a small sled, known as a skeleton bobsled, at speeds of about 90 miles per hour.
“I tell people to imagine a frozen water slide because that is kind of similar to what it might be like. The tracks are about a kilometer to a kilometer-and-half long. Depending on the track, it generally takes anywhere from 50 seconds to a minute to finish the race. Sometimes, when I am driving down the highway, I realize I am going slower down the freeway than I am on my skeleton sled driving down the track,” says Adeagbo.
The track has a number of twists and turns and the goal is to get down as quickly as possible, with the fastest person declared winner.
“Your face is usually about an inch from the ice at any given point in time. The irony of the sport is you are on the edge of danger and control at any given point in time. The best way to be in control is to be relaxed,” says Adeagbo.
Adeagbo started training as a skeleton racer in September 2017 and in 2018, became the first Nigerian to compete at the Winter Olympics in February and the first black woman to compete in the sport.
“It was an amazing accomplishment knowing that nobody had done it before and it just spoke to the possibilities out there. I was filled with pride when I qualified and knowing all the hard work that had gone into it, not only the four months before the Olympics but everything I had worked hard for during my track and field days, contributed to that moment,” recalls Adeagbo.
It’s her zeal to step out of the comfort zone that makes her successful today even if it means playing the role of a body double for one of her sports heroes, Serena Williams.
“That was an interesting opportunity, I got discovered one day when I was at work. Someone came to me and asked if I would like to audition for the role. I auditioned and that was really cool playing Serena for that day,” recalls Adeagbo.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/sport/2017/07/13/full-list-worlds-50-valuable-sports-teams-2017/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">READ MORE: Full List: The World’s 50 Most Valuable Sports Teams 2017</a>
Besides sport, Adeagbo is paving the way for Africa’s youth by inspiring the next generation of girls in Nigeria through a master class developed by the Youth Empowerment and Development Initiative (YEDI).
As she puts it: “I am passionate about helping people with my God-given gifts and talents, and to inspire people to enjoy the gift of athleticism and achieve their fullest potential.”
It took 20 years for Adeagbo to achieve her dream of qualifying for the Olympics and with everything she learned on that ride, her goal is to encourage Africa’s youth to never give up on their Olympic-sized dreams – no matter what.

SKELETON-OLY-2018-PYEONGCHANG

The First Lady Of Skeleton

Heroes exist in history, on celluloid, in pop culture or in these digital times, at the forefront of technology. These are the mighty who shine on the front pages of newspapers, as the paradigms of victory and virtue. But every day in public life, surrounding us are some of the real stars, the nameless, the faceless we don’t recognize or celebrate. In the pages that follow, we look at some of them, exploring the exemplary work they do, from the war zones to your neighborhood streets. They are not flawless, they are not infallible, but they are heroes.

<h3>Adeline Oliver, 67, nurse</h3>
<div id="attachment_36972" style="width: 693px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-36972" decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="wp-image-36972 size-large" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Adeline-Oliver-596-683x1024.jpg" alt="" width="683" height="1024" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Adeline-Oliver-596-683x1024.jpg 683w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Adeline-Oliver-596-300x450.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Adeline-Oliver-596-600x900.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Adeline-Oliver-596-200x300.jpg 200w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Adeline-Oliver-596-768x1152.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Adeline-Oliver-596.jpg 1365w" sizes="(max-width: 683px) 100vw, 683px" />Adeline Oliver. Photo By Motlabana Monnakgotla.</div>
<blockquote>“We finally came to a clearing, where we are now crossing into Syria. The field coordinator said to me, ‘run when I say run’.”</blockquote>
Volunteers for Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), also known as Doctors Without Borders, focus on delivering emergency medical aid in areas of crisis.
Adeline Oliver, a South African, has been an Operation Theater nurse for the last 35 years.
She was 60 years old when she joined MSF. She had retired from an active nursing job, and didn’t know what she was going to do with her life.
One day, her daughter called and told her she had made an appointment on her behalf for an interview at MSF.
“I knew at the time that it’s what I would have liked to do, my life wasn’t over. I am healthy, and wanted to give back. I’ve got enough experience, skills and knowledge wouldn’t be knowledge if it was not shared,” says Oliver.
Little did she know that in just two weeks, she would be leaving the cosy comfort of her Johannesburg home and be on a flight to war-torn Afghanistan, where she would be for six months on her first assignment with MSF.
She recalls the country as very poor and the people exploited. Their homes had been bombed, they were living in shelters or the streets and sold every little thing they had.
She witnessed terrible fatalities during her stay there.
“A woman came with a pitch black foot and I questioned why she hadn’t come in earlier because the foot happened over a period of time, but later, when a family member related the story, I was ashamed. They were traveling through these horrible roads in the mountains, they encountered bandits on the way and the family members were killed, and the poor woman had been brought to hospital. She died two weeks later.”
Oliver managed to save some of the lives with her expertise.
Syria was her second assignment, when the civil war had just begun.
Her long journey to reach the MSF field hospital in Syria’s Idlib government took her on a midnight hike through forests and past the ruins of Aleppo. When she finally reached her destination it was just before sunrise. After two hours of sleep she joined the rest of the team to start working in the hospital MSF had set up inside a cave.
“In the cave were a fully-equipped operating room, and a fully-equipped emergency room. It’s a huge cave. Once it was closed it was just another hill”.
From this unusual location where Adeline and her team provided life-saving medical care for several months to people who needed it most – regardless of their political affiliation or social status. 
This was in a rebel area just outside Aleppo; the historic city had been completely destroyed.
Their first patient was a pregnant woman, injured in a bomb blast. Oliver managed to save her but her unborn child didn’t survive.
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“The baby took the hit and died in the woman’s womb. So we had to do an emergency caesarean section. Luckily, the cave was well-equipped and we could do life-saving operations,” she says.
Oliver has worked in challenging circumstances in South Sudan, South Africa (during the xenophobic attacks), in Afghanistan several times, and Syria, Turkey, Yemen, and most recently Iraq.
<h3>Monica Genya, 43, logistician</h3>
<div id="attachment_36973" style="width: 750px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-36973" decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="wp-image-36973 size-large" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Monica-Genya-625-1024x683.jpg" alt="" width="740" height="494" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Monica-Genya-625-1024x683.jpg 1024w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Monica-Genya-625-300x200.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Monica-Genya-625-600x400.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Monica-Genya-625-768x512.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Monica-Genya-625.jpg 2048w" sizes="(max-width: 740px) 100vw, 740px" />Monica Genya. Photo by Motlabana Monnakgotla</div>
“The first thing I heard was machine gunfire…”
With all the traveling doctors and nurses at MSF do, someone has to be accountable for all the logistics; lives can’t be saved without the correct equipment or movement of people and goods.
Monica Genya has worked with MSF for 24 years around the world as a logistician. Straight after college, she joined the organization and wanted to make a difference.
“My job is to make sure the camps are working smoothly for our medical personnel. It means getting all the supplies necessary to put up out-patient departments so doctors can come in and see patients and dispense medication,” she explains.
The first place she worked in was Somalia, in a tiny port town called Kismayo, south of Mogadishu and closer to the Kenyan border, which was besieged. Theirs was the only hospital in the entire town because the country was at war.
She was just out of her teens at the time, assisting to source supplies in Kenya, making sure they got airlifted to Kismayo because it was quicker and safer.
“When I landed in Kismayo for the first time, the first thing I heard was machine gunfire…tadadadadada, tadadada. It was constant and I was scared witless,” she recalls.
She was terrified by the gunfire, and slept under the bed until she got used to the staccato sounds three days later.
She also had to get used to not sitting up straight at breakfast on the rooftop dining areas because she was afraid she would get hit by stray bullets.
Soon, Genya set up tents and medical equipment to save lives, forgetting her life could be in danger too.
“There was a time when the hospital was besieged in Kismayo by invading forces. We were forced to go into a bunker and lock ourselves in and hide. We could hear the invaders going from room to room asking where the doctors were. Eventually they gave up and walked out. At that point, you realize that things could be really bad if you were found. That was a profoundly scary moment,” she says.
But that was nothing compared to Sierra Leone during the Ebola crisis in 2014.
“If it’s a man with a gun, you might be able to plead, reason or negotiate. Probably not, but in your head you are thinking this is a person like me. But there is no negotiating with Ebola,” she says.
While Genya was in Sierra Leone, she lost two colleagues to Ebola; one was a medical doctor and the other a guard at a warehouse. Three more were infected but managed to receive treatment and survived.
Thousands contracted the virus across Sierra Leone, Guinea and Liberia. As a logistician, she had to stay the longest to make sure everything that was needed was in place for both the medical staff and patients. Sadly, half the Ebola victims died but a quarter of the population survived due to the help of Doctors Without Borders, she says.
The cholera outbreak in Zambia was yet another project Genya successfully worked on.
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“One of the many interesting things to know about cholera, besides the much-needed medical attention, is mainly the logistics intervention; it means we have to get a cholera camp up and running, as quickly as possible to start receiving patients,” she says.
It called for a great amount of experience, and quick action. Cholera kits had to be readily available, as the disease can kill in 48 hours.
“So we have to be there as quickly as possible to minimize the death toll and we have to do it in 48 hours. Within that time frame, we are able to receive medical personnel and start receiving patients. Our job is to make sure that whatever you need is where you need it when you need it, but if what you need is not where you need it when you need it, then lives are lost. There is no point in having a doctor there if there are no IV fluids,” says Genya, proving that you don’t have to be a medical doctor to save lives.
<h3>Nthabiseng Mogale, 25, paramedic</h3>
<div id="attachment_36974" style="width: 750px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-36974" decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="wp-image-36974 size-large" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Nthabiseng-Mogale-163-1024x683.jpg" alt="" width="740" height="494" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Nthabiseng-Mogale-163-1024x683.jpg 1024w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Nthabiseng-Mogale-163-300x200.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Nthabiseng-Mogale-163-600x400.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Nthabiseng-Mogale-163-768x512.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Nthabiseng-Mogale-163.jpg 2048w" sizes="(max-width: 740px) 100vw, 740px" />Nthabiseng Mogale. Photo by Motlabanna Monnakgotla.</div>
<blockquote>“Emotionally, you get attached even though you don’t know the person.”</blockquote>
Nthabiseng Mogale qualified as a professional medic in 2014 in Johannesburg. She has since saved countless lives working out of an emergency room on wheels.
But even today, she admits to being nervous every time she gets a call out.
“You don’t know what kind of an accident you are going to find. You get to an accident and someone has a broken leg, or a scratch, some of them are horrible and traumatic. Emotionally, you get attached even though you don’t know the person. This job is difficult, but it’s also lovely because you get to save lives.”
She recalls one morning when she received a call about a seven-year-old, who was involved in an accident and suffered brain injury. The child had been sleeping since the night before, and didn’t wake up the following morning.
“Calls about children are more emotional than any others. That little, tiny body lying there, dead, not breathing, not responding, is not nice, it’s never nice actually,” says Mogale, who is a young mother herself.
Recently, she received another call, this time from Midrand, north of Johannesburg, at around 1PM. It was an old man who had low sugar levels and a history of heart failure; he also had high blood pressure and hypertension. On the day, he was not responding.
She checked the vitals – blood pressure, heart rate and sugar. The sugar was low, he had a variant heart rhythm and there was nothing they could do about it.
“In my scope of practice, you give sugar to that kind of person; if you give a drip, that water will hydrate the body, you give oxygen, the blood flows and it will bring color back. So I gave him sugar, he woke up, the drip hydrated him, he woke up and he started coughing, I asked him how he was and he said ‘I am not well but I am awake’.” She had saved his life.
The gratitude from her patients is what keeps Mogale going.
“Just a thank you is more than enough,” she says.
These are everyday heroes, fearless and loyal to the call of duty.

heroes-collage

The Heroes Among Us

Ellen Johnson Sirleaf has an iconic status in Africa and the world. As the first elected female head of state in Africa, she served as the leader of Liberia for two elected terms.
Those terms saw Liberia’s slow and steady march from what was considered a pariah state to a country with what the Mo Ibrahim Foundation calls a “trajectory of progress” that has helped transform its economy, survive the shock of Ebola, and restructure public institutions to respond to the needs of the people.
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It is only fitting that FORBES WOMAN AFRICA gets to meet the Nobel Peace Prize winner in Rwanda, a country known for its high representation of women in Parliament, and where Sirleaf is awarded the Ibrahim Prize for Achievement in African Leadership at a special ceremony.
Q. Please share your thoughts on the African Union (AU) self-funding reform goal, the Kaberuka Proposal. 
The dependency of the AU on external sources has been the subject of debate for many years, and the thinking of our leaders is that it is better to finance our operations by ourselves and alleviate pressure and dictation from these external sources. On the other hand, we know that to have financial autonomy, every country must be able to contribute consistently. So, the crux of the reform is to change the payment formula and make sure everyone knows they have to pay their part.
When it comes to the Kaberuka suggestion, it meets our objective of financing our organization ourselves. However, it does place a burden on the poorer states&#8230; So, our position with the Kaberuka plan is to study it some more so when we commit, we do not fall into arrears. We want to see the reform implemented, and for it to include cost-reduction in structural aspects such as travel and positions etc., thus reducing the burden on poorer countries.
Q: Will Africa really be able to tackle illicit financial flows? And with women being conspicuously absent from financial decision-making, yet being the greatest losers on such issues, how do we tackle these discrepancies? 
We have to become more accountable and pass stringent mandates in institutions, as well as instill practical capacity to understand the complexities of these financial transactions. Also, we must implement a legal system that will enforce against such flow violations.
Access for women is difficult even in the case of legitimate flows. Even with a growing manufacturing sector and agri-industrial activities usually manned by women, access is still limited, for rural women particularly.
There is a big effort being put in by different regional institutions; in Liberia’s case, GIABA, the Intergovernmental Action Group Against Money Laundering in West Africa, has been analyzing the flows and determining what is illicit. 
But it is up to women to stand up and put other women in leadership roles, because the record is clear: women are more credit-worthy when it comes to financial transactions, and this suggests the more women there are heading these institutions, the more we can be assured that regulatory laws will be more effective.
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Q: What are your plans? How would you encourage young women to follow in your footsteps, or even create their own path? 
We are establishing the Ellen Johnson Sirleaf Presidential Center for Women and Development. The activities will center around five themes that will promote women in business; women in leadership; women in fragile states; women in migration; and education for women and girls. We will use the life experiences of women who have excelled in these areas. For the young women, I say to all, be self-confident and pursue your goals&#8230;Let us be bold as women.
&#8211; Interviewed by Laura Rwiliriza

UN-GENERAL ASSEMBLY-LIBERIA

First African Elected Female Head of State Urges Women to Be Bold

At least 110 women are raped in South Africa. Every day.
There are many similar statistics, all pointing to the same stupefying fact – that South Africa is one of the most dangerous places for girls and women.
This writer too is a survivor of an episode of violence, which – ironically – happened the evening before the country celebrated Women’s Day (August 9) in 2014.
In South Africa, a strong patriarchal mind-set, coupled with the intersection of race, gender, class and other identities, influence gender-based violence. There is also a gross underreporting of such crimes.
In the following pages, two educated young women recount how they didn’t let their own experience of violence get them down.
Samantha Smit* (name changed to protect identity) and Bukelwa Moerane reside 40 kilometers from each other, one in the affluent area of Roodepoort, and the other in Diepsloot, a township in the northern suburbs of Johannesburg. Their paths have never crossed, but destiny served them the same experience from hell – and they survived it.
<h2>Samantha Smit, 28</h2>
In 2013, three days after South Africa celebrated Women’s Day, Smit was drugged and raped by three male friends she had known for seven years. 
When we meet her on a warm Thursday evening in January, the neighborhood is quiet, and her home warm and secure with high security fences. Wearing an oversized t-shirt and jeans, she leads us to the pool area her father helps set up for us. 
Underneath Smit’s warm exterior is the aching heart of a woman still trying to comprehend a disturbing episode in her past. 
“When you read statistics about women who experience violence, whether it’s sexual violence, domestic abuse or interpersonal violence, I would think I was lucky to not have experienced anything before I was 18 years old. And [this state of the country] is a sad reality,” says Smit. 
What was an ordinary night out with friends ended up being her worst nightmare. 
“They asked us to come through to their flat which was nothing strange, because we have all been friends for a long time. We trusted them, we knew them and often went to each other’s houses.” 
They offered her a drink, which she didn’t know was spiked with Liquid E, a date rape drug. 
Fifteen minutes later, she felt dizzy. 
The next thing, they were stripping her in the kitchen and dragging her into the bedroom. 
“The more I put my clothes back on, the more they were taken off. They found it amusing,” she recalls. 
Smit was powerless at the time. 
“It was like a ragdoll effect. I knew it was happening, I didn’t black out, I didn’t lose consciousness. But I wasn’t able to do anything about it. I felt like I was looking into the situation. The next morning, I had a cup of coffee and left,” she tells us. 
She was in denial and did not want the stigma attached to being a victim. 
“I think a part of me knew all along, but did not want to accept it. I also felt like maybe if we don’t give it a name it won’t have the impact… Because at least you still have a little bit of power and it is not completely stripped from you,” she says. 
Her life was never to be the same again. 
“Suddenly I couldn’t stand people touching me. It would suddenly repulse me. I was startled incredibly easily,” she says. 
She suffered post-traumatic stress disorder and checked into a clinic five months after the incident. 
“It’s a difficult thing to admit to yourself… I realized I was spiralling out of control.” 
But she soon reclaimed her power by writing a letter to the three men and confronting them individually. 
Though the scar will never completely heal, counselling, and opening up to other women, has helped. 
“Every woman I opened up to had a similar story to share. That helped me a lot in breaking down the stigma.”
<h2>Bukelwa Moerane, 25</h2>
Moerane has been more vocal about her “near-death experience”. She lost her teeth trying to escape from her abductor in February last year. 
She was on her way home in a taxi one night from Maponya Mall in the township of Soweto. As she stepped out at the Bara taxi rank in Soweto, it was near empty; then out of the blue, a man driving a navy Polo came up from behind and shoved her into his vehicle. 
“What was going through my mind was ‘I don’t know if this guy has a gun behind me or a knife’. He said to me, ‘don’t do anything stupid, you will get hurt’. Instantly, as he said that, my mind stopped working,” shares Moerane. 
The abductor drove off with her, holding on tightly to her wrist. 
“He was swearing at me, and saying ‘I will rape you, I will kill you, don’t even try anything funny’!” 
Moerane started saying her last prayers thinking of her mother and four-year-old daughter. Then, she noticed the door was unlocked. 
“My heart started to beat faster. I started thinking ‘I need to get out, I need to get out, there is something I need to do’,” she says. 
The kidnapper headed down a dark road she knew. 
“I knew if he did something to me in that area, no one was going to find me. I know there are most [probably] thousands of bodies in that area not checked for. I was not going to be one of them,” says Moerane. 
She pretended to be relaxed. 
“I then looked at him, and noticed he was scared as well. His voice was shaking. I think he had gone through something and felt the need to revenge on me.” 
She was no longer frightened. 
“So if this person is scared, why should I be scared? I told myself to calm down and I started calming down, because he was holding on to my right hand at the time,” says Moerane. 
She somehow mustered the courage to jump out of the moving vehicle kicking the door until it opened. 
“He was slapping me and was trying to hold my hand. With the other hand, he was trying to drive and there was oncoming traffic.” 
Her biggest fear was for the kidnapper to grab a weapon and kill her, so she leapt out. She lost two of her front teeth, and was bruised and injured. 
“I could see my skin peeling off, and dark particles. My glasses fell off. While this car was dragging me, I don’t know for how long, I landed with my hands trying to protect my face, but I guess I was too late,” she says. 
Bleeding, she got back up and ran for her life. She tried to stop moving cars, pleading for help, but none did. At the nearest garage, she was taken to Baragwanath Hospital. 
Moerane still fears traveling by herself, but finds solace speaking out. 
She was a participant at the #NotInMyName march last year to the Union Buildings in South Africa’s capital Pretoria sparked by the death of Karabo Mokoena, the young woman allegedly stabbed 27 times by her ex-boyfriend. 
Moerane also took to Twitter to speak out against gender-based violence in the country. She posted images of her after the kidnapping and sought crowdfunding to fix her smile. 
That’s when celebrity dentist Alexander Faizi Rawhani, known as Dr Smile, helped put the smile back on her face. 
“I believe God kept me safe that time and he [the abductor] could do it again. But one thing I know is if he comes back, we go out together. I don’t go out alone. We die together this time,” says Moerane.
Physical violence against women 
• 21% of women over the age of 18 reported they had experienced violence at the hands of a partner. That’s one in five women. 
• Divorced or separated women are more likely to experience physical abuse. 
• The Eastern Cape has the highest rate of physical abuse (a whopping 32% women reporting it).
Sexual violence against women 
• 6% of women over the age of 18 reported they have experienced sexual violence. 
• 16% of divorced or separated women experienced sexual violence by a partner. 
• 10% of women living with a partner reported sexual violence against them. 
• The North West Province reported the highest rate of sexual violence (with 11.8% of women reporting). 
[Source: South Africa Demographic and Health Survey 2016]

Portrait of a Danish woman, 35 years old, with arm and hands up

The Perilous Life Of A Woman In South Africa

One spring day in 2015, Julia Lee, a top performer on the engineering team at the payroll-software start-up Gusto, asked Edward Kim, the company’s cofounder and chief technology officer, for a one-on-one meeting.
Sitting together on a gray couch in the middle of their open-plan office in San Francisco’s SoMa neighborhood, Lee, a Stanford grad who had interned at Google and Palantir, told Kim that she loved her work but was struggling with one issue. Of the 18 people on Gusto’s engineering team, Lee, then 26, was the only woman.
Before she got to Gusto, she told Kim, “people often assumed I didn’t know the answer to a problem because I was a female engineer.” Even at Gusto, she was reluctant to share her feelings of self-doubt. Kim, Lee says, was extraordinarily receptive. In fact, he made it a personal project to study the gender breakdown on the engineering teams at other tech firms. The numbers he found were dismal.
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Only 12% of the engineering staffers at 84 tech firms were female, according to statistics gathered in a public Google Doc posted in 2013 by Tracy Chou, then an engineer at Pinterest. Kim read a U.S. census report on racial and gender disparity in STEM employment and was troubled by a National Public Radio report that showed an increase in women graduating with computer science degrees through the early 1980s and then a steep decline from 1984 on.
He also read a 2015 McKinsey study showing that companies with diverse workforces outperform financially. “The fact that no one else in tech was able to really crack the gender diversity nut and solve it represented an opportunity for us,” Kim says. “If we want to reimagine what HR is like for the very diverse workforces of our small-business customers, we ourselves have to build a diverse workforce.”
After a series of meetings with Kim and Lee, Gusto’s human resources team launched a plan to attract women engineers. Initial steps included writing job descriptions that avoided masculine phrases like “Ninja rock star coder.” Gusto’s most important step: For a six-month period starting in September 2015, the company devoted 100% of its engineering recruitment efforts to women.
While it solicited only women, it considered male applicants who approached the firm and treated all candidates equally, which kept Gusto from running afoul of antidiscrimination laws, according to Gusto lawyer Liza Kostinskaya. The pitch to women included emails signed by Lee inviting female candidates to have an initial talk with her and was backed by $60,000 the company spent to be a sponsor for two years at the biggest annual women’s tech conclave, the Grace Hopper conference.
Kim also published a blog post that made Gusto’s diversity numbers public and broadcast its goal of hiring more women engineers. “We believe that diversity is in itself a core strength that will enable us to write better software and build better products,” he wrote.
In line with more than 80% of start-ups, according to a 2017 Crunchbase study, Gusto’s three founders are men. Kim and Gusto’s CEO, Joshua Reeves, both 34, met as undergrads in Stanford’s electrical engineering department.
They launched Gusto in 2012 along with Tomer London, 33, an Israeli immigrant who got to know Reeves while a Ph.D. student at Stanford. Like its boom-and-bust competitor, Zenefits, which launched the following year, Gusto sells cloud-based comprehensive subscription software to small businesses to help them manage employee records like payroll and health benefits.
At the outset Gusto even had a similar name, ZenPayroll, which it changed in 2015 when it started offering a more complete selection of employee-tracking software.
Zenefits attracted $584 million in venture capital and hit a valuation of $4.5 billion in 2015 before running into regulatory problems related to the way it sold health insurance. It sacked its CEO, reworked its business model and saw its valuation slashed to $2 billion. Gusto, meanwhile, grew less feverishly.
By late 2015 it had raised $176 million from firms like CapitalG (formerly Google Capital) and General Catalyst, and 75 individual investors handpicked by Reeves, including Ashton Kutcher and PayPal cofounder Max Levchin. That year it broke through to a $1.1 billion valuation. Forbes estimates Gusto’s annual revenue at nearly $100 million.
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At the start, Gusto’s founders acknowledge, diversity was on the backburner, and as it grew, they found that it didn’t happen organically. When it came time to hire a chief operating officer in 2015, they made it a priority to find a woman. Lexi Reese, a veteran of Google and American Express, is one of two women on the six-person executive team, and firmwide, women account for 51% of Gusto’s 525 employees.
Even after Gusto began its diversity initiative, applications from women didn’t flood in. Gusto assigned two in-house recruiters to the job, and it hired TalentDash, a Singapore-based firm that sources talent, to look exclusively for women.
Though hiring women engineers took more time, Kim says, Gusto never dropped its standards. “It bothers me when people say that prioritizing diversity lowers the bar in terms of the calibre of talent you’re able to hire,” he says. “That is simply not true.” Nor, he says, was there any pushback from inside Gusto.
Gusto also addressed its compensation policy. Since 2016 its salaries have been audited by Mercer, a human resources consulting firm, which has found no gender pay disparity. Benefits include 16 weeks of paid leave for a primary parent, plus an additional $100 a week for groceries and food deliveries, $100 a month for six months of housecleaning and up to $500 for a baby-sleep coach.
Gusto’s women-only recruiting effort lasted six months. It stopped, Kim says, because “we exceeded our goals.” In 2015 Gusto was trying to hit 18% women engineers, the proportion majoring in computer science as undergraduates, according to the National Center for Education Statistics, and it reached 21%.
Since then it has started staffing a Denver office, where it aims to increase the engineer head count by at least 25 this year and where the company is reprising its women-only recruiting strategy. Now that 17 of Gusto’s 70 engineers are female, it’s getting a little easier, says Gusto’s HR head, Maryanne Brown Caughey. “It’s kind of a domino effect,” she says. “Women know they’re joining a welcoming community.”
While Gusto has made progress, its engineering team has no Latinos and no African-Americans. Kim says Gusto has two hiring goals in 2018: senior women and racial diversity in engineering. “The way we make progress is by focusing on one problem,” Kim says, “and then we move on to the next.”
&#8211; By Susan Adams

FO022818_093

Cracking the Code and Bridging The Gender Gap

Born in Tanzania, living in South Africa, and dressing the world, Anissa Mpungwe, is difficult to pin down.
In the end, we manage to do it online.
I look for her on Google Maps, and set out to seek her home address, with nothing but the online search tool. I travel with FORBES WOMAN AFRICA’s layout artist Lucy Nkosi. Luckily for us, just outside her home, which we eventually locate, we bump into one of Mpungwe’s two sisters, a student of architecture, leaving for her classes.
She helps us get in touch with the designer and set up an appointment with her at her Kyalami studio in Midrand, north of Johannesburg.
Around Mpungwe is a melange of color and couture, as she shares her story.
<div id="attachment_35909" style="width: 1034px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-35909" decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="wp-image-35909 size-large" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/TLH_2691-1024x683.jpg" alt="" width="1024" height="683" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/TLH_2691-1024x683.jpg 1024w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/TLH_2691-300x200.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/TLH_2691-600x400.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/TLH_2691-768x512.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/TLH_2691.jpg 2048w" sizes="(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" />Anissa Mpungwe. Photo by Motlabana Monnakgotla.</div>
Mpungwe has been in South Africa since she was 10, attending junior school, high school and university in the Rainbow Nation. Until the age of 19, she was just another foreigner in South Africa. 
But her career took off after that.
“After graduating in South Africa, getting my degree in fashion and marketing, I went to do my post- graduation in London. They have a good network there, so you get to work with different spaces and [get enough] work experience for you to know what you want to do; and I didn’t know which part of the fashion industry I wanted to be in. So I had to do all those different [types of] work experiences to know I definitely didn’t want to work for a magazine, [and] definitely not in a factory,” says Mpungwe.
Her career kick-started in South Africa in 2008 after winning the Elle New Talent competition, when she had the opportunity to work with fashion retailer Mr Price (MRP). Thereafter, she showcased her creations at fashion weeks in South Africa; however the biggest jump was in 2010 when she showcased at the prestigious New York Fashion Week in the United States.
“For me, it was an odd jump,” she says.
From being a student overseas, coming back home to South Africa trying to figure out where her career was going, to winning a competition, working with MRP to have her range out and then off to another country representing her home country, Tanzania.
That was in 2010 in New York City that she believes was the year that launched her career and the Loin Cloth &amp; Ashes brand.
Her first store opened in 2012 in Maboneng Precinct, a trendy art hub outside Johannesburg’s Central Business District.
Visitors to her store have included international musicians such as Swedish singer-songwriter Yukimi Nagano from Little Dragon, and American singer-songwriter Amel Larrieux.
She has over the years also had the opportunity to dress American singer-model-actress Solange Knowles for the cover of Elle as well as local South African stars such as Lira, Anele Mdoda, Bridget Masinga, and Simphiwe Dana amongst a slew of other celebrities.
In 2013, Mpungwe won Emerging Designer of the Year Africa awarded by African Fashion International.
She worked with MRP producing ranges reaching countries from Nigeria to Namibia, Botswana and stores across South Africa.
Mpungwe was also chosen to gift one of her designs to former American First Lady Michelle Obama during her visit to South Africa in 2015.
<div id="attachment_35910" style="width: 693px" class="wp-caption alignright"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-35910" decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="wp-image-35910 size-large" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/TLH_2450-683x1024.jpg" alt="" width="683" height="1024" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/TLH_2450-683x1024.jpg 683w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/TLH_2450-300x450.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/TLH_2450-600x900.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/TLH_2450-200x300.jpg 200w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/TLH_2450-768x1151.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/TLH_2450.jpg 1366w" sizes="(max-width: 683px) 100vw, 683px" />Mpungwe dresses a model with one of her designs. Photo by Motlabana Monnakgotla.</div>
“That for me was a very proud moment because of who she is, how she operates as a female. I [received] a little letter from her to frame to put next to the accolades. As much as those things excite me, to be honest with you, I think it is the everyday people that make me feel good about what I do,” she says.
Over the last few years, she has worked with corporate brands such as Maserati, Converse and Nestle among others.
Mpungwe operates out of two studios in South Africa and one in Tanzania employing 17 people.
“It has been great, a good learning curve. I’ve learned a lot, in such a short period. I’ve learned the business of fashion and the construction of clothing, the product itself,” says J K Khoza, one of her fashion interns.
Mpungwe is now sharing her experiences and showcasing her creations in the hope of seeing more young Africans traverse the globe spreading the beauty and bounties of African fashion.

Anissa_2066

Designs For Africa, And Michelle Obama

For centuries women have outgrown the roles which they were previously bottled in, but they seem to be struggling to conquer the entrepreneurial sphere.
The numbers don’t add up. Why are there fewer female entrepreneurs and what’s hindering them?
If you look at the FORBES list of billionaires you’ll notice there are fewer women than men on the list and even fewer of those women are self-made billionaires (56 globally in 2017) – a considerable number have inherited their wealth.
Madam C. J. Walker is someone I hold in high esteem. She is regarded as the first female self-made millionaire in America and the world&#8217;s most successful female entrepreneur of her time. She did this despite being an African-American in the late 1800s, into the early 1900s, in a racially segregated country at the time.
On our continent, we have Folorunsho Alakija from Nigeria who has made billions from a clothing business and then venturing to oil.
There is a vast difference between what an entrepreneur is passionate about and what is commercially viable. It could be for this reason you find many women gravitating to sectors such as fashion, training, consulting, cosmetics, and their fascination with social entrepreneurship.
Passion is key and there is nothing wrong with those sectors, but we need to start graduating to the next level of pragmatism and what’s possible for all humankind.
It can&#8217;t be a trend that ladies married to successful entrepreneurs usually go into philanthropy.
I’m deeply concerned about what is transpiring, for I believe women are equally or more competent than men. Women need to shatter the perception that they blossom in smaller companies whereas men tend to run bigger companies.
However, women are successful despite facing many challenges that their male counterparts don’t. Women have to balance both family life and building a business. They are also less likely to get funding.
As equal rights were granted to all, women were able to integrate into fields they would have not necessarily occupied before. However, many still feel that one could be more effective running your own business if you didn’t have to deal with kids.
With regards to women struggling to find funding, Donna Kelley, lead author of the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor 2012 Women&#8217;s Report, states that, “Women are less likely to receive venture capital funding. The fact that those making the investment decisions are primarily men can be an influencing factor.”
Much of the reasons associated with the lack of representation of women is due to the roles assigned to gender is primarily biological. Women are seen as caring and house-based individuals whereas men are seen as decision-making and dominant individuals. This perpetuates itself in numerous business sectors.
It is even more of a challenge when you’re coming in as a female having to give direction to males that may not appreciate it.
In the business world, women are often not taken seriously or, even worse, merely reduced to a potential sex partner. Many meetings are converted to flirting sessions – and if the lady does not cooperate, she stands a chance to lose the deal. This results in women developing mistrust, and working even harder to avoid being seen as ‘sleeping their way to the top’.
Instead of hindering women in business, let them excel and dominate sectors where they are often underrepresented and yet overachieve. &#8211; Written by Paul Mashegoane

Women Need The Freedom To Achieve Greatness

Johnnie Walker, in partnership with Million Men March, Tswharanang Legal Advocacy Centre and Lifeline, held an event on Saturday at the iconic Nelson Mandela Bridge in support of an abuse-free society by pledging to do what they can to eradicate the causes and effects of women and children abuse for not only 16 days, but for all 365 days of the year. The South African public is also invited to pledge their support to eradicate the causes and effects of abuse for all 365 days of the year by pledging their support on <a href="http://www.strideforgood.co.za" target="_blank" rel="noopener">www.strideforgood.co.za</a>.
Alcohol has long been associated in many parts of the world with enjoyment and celebration. At Johnnie Walker, our brands are made with pride, but are also made to be enjoyed – responsibly. Unfortunately, this is not always the case. Violence against women is often related to the irresponsible use of alcohol.
<div id="attachment_34756" style="width: 511px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-34756" decoding="async" loading="lazy" class=" wp-image-34756" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/Diageo-Johnnie-Walker-pledge-e1512991006125-300x191.jpg" alt="" width="501" height="319" />Representatives from Diageo, Million Men March, Tswharanang Legal Advocacy Centre and Lifeline, on Nelson Mandela Bridge. (Photo supplied)</div>
Several studies from low- and middle-income countries show that men who misuse alcohol are 1.6 to 4.8 times more likely to perpetrate intimate partner violence than men who do not misuse alcohol. Fortunately, research also shows that violence against women is predictable and preventable. By identifying the social, cultural, legal and economic factors that influence such violence, it is possible to predict its occurrence and to understand how to prevent it.
The Striding Men event is just one of the many initiatives Johnnie Walker will champion to promote responsible drinking and combat alcohol misuse. Johnnie Walker is proud to invite South Africa to participate and contribute towards 365 days of Activism for No Violence against Women and Children by continuing to promote responsible drinking in South Africa.

South African public invited to pledge and #strideforgood

“Calm down. You’re so sensitive. Where’s your sense of humor? You’re crazy!”
If you’re a woman, in all probability, you’ve heard it before.
Psychologists refer to this as ‘gaslighting’ – silencing techniques used to shut you down after you have addressed someone else’s behavior. In that moment, the speaker is making a judgment about how you should feel.
Gaslighting is when one person systemically confuses the other person into thinking their reactions are crazy, to the point where they actually question their sanity. The term is not very mainstream as it originated from the 1940’s film Gas Light, where a husband manipulates his wife into thinking she is crazy.
While gaslighting is not a universal truth for all women, there are plenty of women who unknowingly encounter it at home, in personal relationships and especially at work.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/woman/2017/12/05/80-hours-week-work/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">READ MORE: Over 80 Hours A Week At Work?</a>
Sbusi Dlamini, HR Business Partner for ShowMax in Johannesburg, says gaslighting commonly manifests in the workplace when there is a power imbalance, such as a manager and his/her assistant. It starts with simple acts such as withholding key information like dates or details of a project, lying about instructions given or not providing the necessary support when in a position to do so.
For instance, if a woman raises valid concerns at work, she is considered to be whining or moody. If she is insulted and her feelings are hurt, it’s her fault for not having a sense of humor. In both these scenarios, the woman is to blame and both parties are conditioned into believing that women’s opinions don’t hold as much weight as men’s, and what women have to say and what they feel aren’t as legitimate.
“It is malicious because it plays on your worst fears and desire to be understood,” says Dlamini.
Dlamini points out that gaslighting is not exclusive to submissive, introverted women, but confident, assertive women with power are also vulnerable to it.
“Women are traditionally labeled as too sensitive or over-emotional, so they are more susceptible to gaslighting in various roles and industries.”
An example of this is the infamous ‘Google Memo’ written by a now former Google engineer, James Damore. He wrote that women are not suited for certain jobs because of their genetic make up, and the gender gaps at work are not due to discrimination, but inherent biological differences between men and women.
Such gender stereotypes are harmful to women because spending your days working with a colleague who believes you were born incapable of being good at your job can eventually lead you ask yourself: “What am I doing here?”
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/woman/2017/08/14/we-men-for-women/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">READ MORE: We, Men For Women</a>
Dlamini also believes that in addition to gender, race plays a role in the reality of women in corporate Africa.
“People of color, women in particular, are historically taught to be submissive and this undeniably follows them into the workplace. As a result of this, they find themselves submitting to those in power in order to progress, thus allowing abusive behavior,” she says.
Dlamini says the first step in dealing with gaslighters is to detach yourself so you can distinguish between the world of the gaslighter and the real world.
“It’s important to remember that gaslighting only works when you believe what the other person says,” she adds.
In her experience, she advises victims to keep a written record in case they should doubt their memory. Bringing in a third party can also help keep track of what transpires, as well as reporting the case to human resources.
Women deserve the equal, unbiased opportunity to prosper in the workplace without abusive mind games that perpetuate discrimination.
“Once you are aware of it, the hard part is over and you can work to mentally overcome it,” she says.
<h2>7 signs you are a victim of gaslighting:</h2>
<ul>
<li>You are constantly second-guessing yourself and doubting your capabilities</li>
<li>You often feel confused and “crazy” at work</li>
<li>You often ask yourself if you’re being too sensitive</li>
<li>You are always apologetic or feel you’ve done something wrong</li>
<li>You feel your thoughts and ideas are shut down</li>
<li>You are indecisive because you don’t trust your own judgment</li>
<li>You doubt your own sanity</li>
</ul>
&#8211; Written by Cadine Pillay

Gaslighting – Surely, This Has Happened To You Too

In March, the MasterCard Index of Women Entrepreneurs (MIWE) report was released and it contained good news. Uganda has the highest percentage (34.8%) of women business owners in the world.
The East African country led in various key components of the survey; the highest percentage (90.5%) of female entrepreneurs in the world borrowing and saving money to start a business, highest (93.9%) labor force participation rate and a 100% women entrepreneurial activity rate, meaning women are as likely as men to start a business. Notably, cultural perceptions of female entrepreneurs in Uganda were surprisingly higher (68.8%) than the average (41.3%). Second in the index was another African country – Botswana at 34.6%. Sadly, out of the six African countries included in the 54-country survey, four were in the bottom half – South Africa, Tunisia, Egypt and Algeria.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/investment-guide/2017/10/30/west-africa-less-attractive-investors/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Why Is West Africa Less Attractive To Investors?</a>
The survey reveals certain important points. First, women are good for business. Second, markets with supportive entrepreneurial conditions, such as strong SME support, high quality of governance and ease of doing business, tend to drive the progress of women business ownership. Lastly, women advancement in business is not tied to wealth and the level of development in the economy. In other words, the entrepreneurial drive of African women is exceptional. That said, going forward, it’s critical for the rest of the continent to emulate their trailblazing neighbors.
To achieve this, a key question needs to be answered: why should the African woman entrepreneur matter? Findings from the survey show that women entrepreneurs are the backbone of economic growth and are powerful engines of development and financial inclusion. Success for the African woman entrepreneur is success for the economy. Additionally, according to the MIWE survey, like most of their counterparts in developing countries, African female entrepreneurs are driven by resilience, determination and the desire to provide for their families. Investing in women benefits an entire community. Women are also opportunity-seekers and risk-takers – attributes that are vital in inspiring them to become entrepreneurs.
Harnessing these qualities will require the active participation of all stakeholders within the entrepreneurial ecosystem; financial institutions, government and private equity. In fact, women-led private equity funds can help catalyse this change by fronting this movement. With many of them now taking leading roles in developing private equity in Africa, their rise should in turn be positive for female entrepreneurs. Private Equity Women Investor Network (PEWIN), a global organization promoting senior women in private equity, estimates that there are more than 150 women in senior roles investing or allocating capital across Africa. This is crucial considering the MIWE survey mentioned lack of venture capital as a constraint on the African woman entrepreneur.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/homepage/2017/10/09/power-woes-stall-ugandas-rise/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Power Woes Stall Uganda&#8217;s Rise</a>
Governments have a central role to play. Enacting business-friendly regulations, removing institutional inefficiencies and ensuring ease of doing business will go a long way in helping the woman entrepreneur realize her potential.
Family and society are also instrumental, especially when it comes to easing gender-related challenges that often hinder women from prospering in business, such as taking care of children. Further inroads can be made in other ways, including training and mentoring programs, honoring successful female business owners and encouraging women networking events.
A brighter future awaits the African woman entrepreneur. Although much of the African women’s full potential and value as entrepreneurs and business owners remains unleashed, gradually implementing a supportive environment will help pave way for more women in the market place.
Hopefully in the future, Africa can realize this and join Uganda as a leading light of the world. &#8211; Written by Rufus Mwanyasi

Tag: Women

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