The Hidden Gem of Africa: PART 1
“A mentor is someone who allows you to see the hope inside yourself. A mentor is someone who allows you to know that no matter how dark the night, in the morning joy will come. A mentor is someone who allows you to see the higher part of yourself when sometimes it becomes hidden to your own view.”
— Oprah Winfrey
Imagine of a Continent without dependency, a continent with rich networks, a continent with a shifted mind set and shifted narratives, a continent on its two feet; doing its own productions, providing worldly solutions to the problems affecting the world at large? Africa is a rich and diverse continent in terms of culture, heritage, natural resources and levels of intelligence. Why is Africa then termed as a dark continent? A poor Continent? A continent that always seeks solutions from the outside world and not the provider of the solutions? A continent that is great on consumption as opposed to production. Isn’t it funny with the fact that most of the raw materials come of Africa, for instance most minerals are found in Africa, the African land is rich for production; why then do we need food reliefs? Why and how did we get there? The answers to these questions would or can probably solve our problem.
From lots of research and dissatisfaction on the state of Africa, the vision of Timeless Women of Wonder (TWOW). TWOW was formed to act as the vehicle to drive Africa to restore its glory, the glory it once held before, through TWILE (Timeless Women in Leadership and Enterprise). One would then wonder why women; TWOW is not meant to compete with men but rather to complement them and work closely with them towards building a better Africa; with collaboration for greatness.According to (Aswegen, 2015) Men and women differ in their strategies for information processing and decision-making. Women tend to be more comprehensive and take both subjective (customer reviews) and objective information into consideration, while men tend to favour objective information (make, model, speed etc) over subjective information. Most of the consumer decisions are made by women this makes it very necessary to include women in the production industries to collaborate together with men because then not only will the sales and productions go high but this also in a way will help Africa secure a place in the global arena. The approach of issues by women is also a major factor why TWOW chose the woman, the woman is naturally wired to apply emotional intelligence to issues as opposed to a man and this is required for the making of better policies and this will mean smooth running of the different set ups of governance. With better systems of governance there will be increased productions, informed decision making and this will put Africa in a position to place itself globally in terms of providing global solutions, health wise and production wise. Africa has a dream to become integrated, united, prosperous and a peaceful continent driven by its citizens and representing a global focus in the dynamic area.
Africa wants to achieve its dream, the 2063 vision and to reach to this dream a strong commitment to building a just society with the capacity to develop without leaving anybody behind. To become a dynamic force in the global arena we have to first put our home; Africa, in order. According to (Dearden, 2017) an estimate of $29bn a year is being stolen from Africa in illegal logging, fishing and trade in wildlife. Is Africa then poor as we are meant to believe? What can we do to ensure we get to where God intends us to be? Where we are meant to be? Which is the way out? What measures can we take? There is the need to change the mindsets of the African people and this will be done by Empowerment to shift thinking paradigms through Mentorship. What is being done? Timeless Women of Wonder through its sub-branch Timeless Women in Leadership and Enterprise (TWILE) Mentorship Program has taken the initiative to empower women to take lead in their various areas of influence.
References
Aswegen, A. v. (2015, october 29). Retrieved from Guided Selling.org: https://www.guided-selling.org/women-vs-men-gender-differences-in-purchase-decision-making/
Dearden, N. (2017, may 24). Aljazeera.com. Retrieved from https://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2017/05/africa-poor-stealing-wealth-170524063731884.html
Editors note’s
Timeless Women in Leadership and Enterprise (TWILE) Mentorship Program is a 8 and 1/2 months program designed to equip women in leadership to become Transformational Leaders in their institutions and in turn drive social and economic change through value-based relationships and action.
For more information kindly contact twile@twowafrica.com
