It's in the early hours of International Women's Day. A woman is keeping me up. :-) But I figured I should write this blog post before it's 2:33am and then I will finally go to bed. I want to honour some great young women I know on the occasion of women's day. Before I get to women I know who lead, I'd like to give a special mention to my first girlfriend +Phelele Fakudze. She leads too, don't get me wrong. She was and still pretty much is a female version of me. We connected on so many levels and shared many passions. I've not seen her since she moved to Swaziland after 2008, and she's continued to inspire many young women. I will never forget this blog post she wrote. She has some of the best advice any woman can give women, and really, men as well.
Last weekend at the African Business Conference at Harvard Business School, I attended the women in leadership panel. One of the panelists wrongly attributed this following quote to Kofi Annan or someone who wasn't James Kwegyir Aggrey - "If you educate a man, you educate an individual, but if you educate a woman, you educate a nation". This doesn't belabour the point, it's the truth. Men have to go out and influence, women have people come up to their bosoms for influence. Maybe the fact that men go out to do so many times has given birth to the many men who've led in years past. More women need to lead.
After the panel, I asked one of my role models, +Ory Okolloh, about an issue which has been heavy on my heart. Through the many +Barcamp Ghana events, the +GhanaThink Foundation has failed to attract a good number of women to participate in our networking forums. It could be that we are using wrong channels - ie social media - but I see many women using Facebook, Twitter and Instagram greatly, even if a lot of the posts are pictures. I asked Ory, how can we attract more women to participate in Barcamps and forward thinking events in general? She said that we should work with those who have already shown an interest and ...
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