hello everyone I need you all to be very
honest with me how many of you all if
you came home with a 30% on an exam you
know in primary school or secondary
school how many of you all would have
received one hot slap from your parents
raise your hands everybody you know and
some of you all are the parents who were
doing the slapping so you all are also
part of it all right so of course we’re
not talking about mistreatment of any
children not at all right but some of
you all would have been finished because
to bring such a poor score home in
African home would have been
unacceptable
now perhaps your parents were on the
other side they were the ones who would
give a lecture and it wasn’t just any
regular type of lecture it’s the type of
lecture where they talk about how they
moved to this country to give you a
better life how they had to walk ten
kilometres and jump over a crocodile to
get to school how one time a goat ate
their final exam and they had to rewrite
it in two hours
all right one of those kind of lectures
and it doesn’t just stay in the house
right you know it goes from your room to
the kitchen to the car to that family
gathering where they talk about how your
unserious child and you’re wasting their
school fees back into the car into the
house and then family prayers that night
all right one of those kind of things
needless to say our parents did not play
when it came to standards and excellence
in education so what if instead of the
thirty out of a hundred you know it was
30 out of 52
I know some people are very relieved
because you can feel that pressure from
your parents even here right so 30 out
of 52 we get you a 58% it’s much better
than before but you’re still failing and
we all know that an F is not something
that we want to aspire to but in that
case right if
a 30 out of 52 isn’t good why is it that
we’ve accepted 30% as some kind of
target or status quo as to where we
should be when it comes to women’s
involvement in business and technology
all right in in the corporate world we
say 30% women on boards right when we
have public events and speakers and
panels we say that there should just be
one woman at least on every panel and
when you think about it you’re like only
one woman out of five or six speakers
that’s such a low target to aspire to
and as we know that we don’t grow up
with these low targets and these low
aspirations we’ve always been taught to
reach high and to be the best so why are
we accepting it when it comes to
business and technology so let’s take a
step back in 2013 I was a first graduate
from business school and I’d moved to
Lagos Nigeria back then life was sweet
the exchange rate was $1 to 116 era so I
was a baller right it was fantastic it’s
fantastic now many of my friends in
business school were interested in
finance and they really inspired me and
encouraged me to start looking at
investing in startups so that’s what I
did I started going to tech meetups
networking events pitch competitions
meeting people learning people in
understanding the ecosystem after a
couple of months I started to notice a
pattern
the men were upfront center stage and
there were very very very few women that
were at the events there were always
those couple of people that you’d see
every single time and those are the
names that you would see on every single
list who are always there but besides
those few women the rest we either
assistants in the back or they were
doing check-ins at the table now at that
point I didn’t jump to any conclusions
right I am a scientist a political
scientist but scientist is still in
there or my diploma right
so I took the time to listen to learn to
understand the data after a couple of
more months I went and I asked one of
the main organizers and I asked him why
aren’t there more women on stage or why
aren’t there more women at these events
and his answer was very simple he said
we just can’t find any now at that point
my response was similar to what your
response would be if you brought that
30% test back to your mother
right I was like excuse me what’s like
what do you mean we can’t find any right
are women interested in business hiding
like a leprechaun are they a fable like
Anansi the spider are they missing in
action like my future husband
right right for my Mother’s sake we hope
not okay we hope not
now I knew and I really believed that
there had to be other young women who
were interested in this kind of stuff I
was there I had friends so instead of
turning to Twitter you know giving my
Twitter fingers and start to you know
bless people out I instead wanted to do
something about it I pulled together a
team I found a co-founder and we started
a pitch competition for women
entrepreneurs within six weeks we had
more than 400 applications from 25 plus
countries we had women from Morocco to
South Africa Rwanda to Senegal who
raised their hands and said that they
were interested in these opportunities
to grow and scale their business they
weren’t interested in us because we had
a brand name they weren’t interested in
us because we were well-known back then
they were interested in us because we
were being authentic and sincere for the
Google Form and a website that I wrote
died designed myself four years later we
turned the 400 applications into a
community of 450,000 young women all
across the continent and all across the
globe who are smart and ambitious and
focus
it has been incredible building this
community to connect all of these young
women as well as this platform to inform
inspire and motivate the next generation
of African women business leaders now
thankfully I’ve had a chance to learn
some things about what it means to build
a community of women who are active in
business and technology and I have a lot
of friends who in the ecosystem who send
me a whatsapp like do you know good
candidate for this job or can you send
out this email listing and I always send
them my price list they never pay me but
you know I wanted to share some ideas
because instead of thinking about it
from just a one-off approach how can we
make sure we are enacting systemic
change and we’re thinking about it from
a strategic point of view so first it is
definitely you not them right young
African women are not some exotic zebra
that’s bedazzled and has
lactose-intolerant right we’re not that
special
where’s fantastic but we’re not that
different right so if you find that your
program is not getting a lot of
applications if women aren’t seeing your
tech hub as a destination of choice it’s
probably because your program isn’t
designed with them in mind right so I
have a dog he’s fantastic he has an
Instagram page please follow him lucky
in Lagos okay right and if I had to
leave him for three months I would be
devastated
who’s going to rub him with coconut oil
who’s gonna update his page right I
don’t know who would do that
and I imagine that if I had a child I
probably would feel the same way right
so can you imagine what it would feel
like to go apply to an accelerator
program that’s in a random City very far
away far away from my personal
responsibility responsibilities and my
friends and family it’s unlikely that I
would want to do that and it’s because
we’ve taken startup examples from other
places and we’ve brought them here when
they don’t really apply to the
demographics and the communities that
we’re working with and if we thought
more about flexible and
Digital training and learning
opportunities that would allow us not
only to connect with more young women
but perhaps those who live in rural
areas those who don’t have the financial
resources to move but overall a more
strategic and more inclusive type of
startup and accelerate our ecosystem
secondly you can stay away from pink I
know we’ve all seen those razer
commercials with the young woman who’s
spinning in the garden her hands are up
there’s a wind machine she’s very
excited but at the end of the commercial
you actually don’t even know that it’s
really for razors or what they’re
selling
whereas when they’re selling men’s
razors it’s all about performance and
power and bah-bah-bah and you’re like
yes that razor is really going to cut my
face it’s the same product right
it’s blades it’s rubbers but one we’re
marketing to women for some reason we
have to have flowers and roses and and I
don’t know what it is that we need to
have but we’re doing something there
unfortunately we often times take the
same approach when it comes to marketing
our startup programs to women all right
something must be fam it must have girl
geek it must be pink and instead of
focusing on the attributes of the
program how it’s going to help someone
reach their goals about the success
stories we choose to just take a very
low impact approach that’s not really
that thoughtful or authentic when it
comes to marketing right so I think the
way that we communicate these
opportunities also can play a big role
in how we demonstrate they were actually
focused on this demographic finally we
should listen and we should learn if you
need someone to build your rocket ship
don’t call me if you want someone to
cook you jollof rice still don’t call me
if you want someone to write a very
creative self-deprecating Instagram
caption I’m your girl right because we
all know what we’re good at so if you
find yourself as a creator as an
innovator and you’re saying actually
don’t know how to position my product or
service or how to get more women
involved there are so many groups in
organizations and platforms and
individuals who’ve been doing this work
for years well very rarely are they
brought into the car
precision and actually asked for their
input or we design solutions and
policies and programs without actually
asking young women what it is that they
want so if you’re looking to turn your
program from mediocre to excellent you
should take the feedback talk to young
women see what it is they need and apply
those lessons and improve I really
appreciate now that I’m older I really
appreciate the high standards that our
parents set for us growing up it didn’t
matter who else was in the class where
they came from or who they were we were
supposed to be the best so should we
care that the u.s. ecosystem that has
the highest number of female founders in
Chicago at just 30 percent shouldn’t
matter that Microsoft only has 26
percent of their workforce as women does
it mean anything to us that Y Combinator
has only funded 12.5 percent of women
founders any African mom we tell you
that’s not your business right it’s your
business to be successful in to reach
your goals and standards that you know
that we can reach there’s a start-up
fund that was really excited because
they had 30 women founders they had 30
founders that were women out of their
portfolio and I was like why are you
excited that is such a low target right
so for all of us who are innovators
creators influencers who are designing
programs right we should stay away from
this 30% target we should stay away from
this number that we’ve decided it’s good
enough because good enough is not what
we need we need excellence and I believe
that African ecosystems technology
startup companies can be leaders and can
show the globe what it means to create
inclusive and wonderfully made startup
systems right after all it does not take
two heads to get this right thank you
honest with me how many of you all if
you came home with a 30% on an exam you
know in primary school or secondary
school how many of you all would have
received one hot slap from your parents
raise your hands everybody you know and
some of you all are the parents who were
doing the slapping so you all are also
part of it all right so of course we’re
not talking about mistreatment of any
children not at all right but some of
you all would have been finished because
to bring such a poor score home in
African home would have been
unacceptable
now perhaps your parents were on the
other side they were the ones who would
give a lecture and it wasn’t just any
regular type of lecture it’s the type of
lecture where they talk about how they
moved to this country to give you a
better life how they had to walk ten
kilometres and jump over a crocodile to
get to school how one time a goat ate
their final exam and they had to rewrite
it in two hours
all right one of those kind of lectures
and it doesn’t just stay in the house
right you know it goes from your room to
the kitchen to the car to that family
gathering where they talk about how your
unserious child and you’re wasting their
school fees back into the car into the
house and then family prayers that night
all right one of those kind of things
needless to say our parents did not play
when it came to standards and excellence
in education so what if instead of the
thirty out of a hundred you know it was
30 out of 52
I know some people are very relieved
because you can feel that pressure from
your parents even here right so 30 out
of 52 we get you a 58% it’s much better
than before but you’re still failing and
we all know that an F is not something
that we want to aspire to but in that
case right if
a 30 out of 52 isn’t good why is it that
we’ve accepted 30% as some kind of
target or status quo as to where we
should be when it comes to women’s
involvement in business and technology
all right in in the corporate world we
say 30% women on boards right when we
have public events and speakers and
panels we say that there should just be
one woman at least on every panel and
when you think about it you’re like only
one woman out of five or six speakers
that’s such a low target to aspire to
and as we know that we don’t grow up
with these low targets and these low
aspirations we’ve always been taught to
reach high and to be the best so why are
we accepting it when it comes to
business and technology so let’s take a
step back in 2013 I was a first graduate
from business school and I’d moved to
Lagos Nigeria back then life was sweet
the exchange rate was $1 to 116 era so I
was a baller right it was fantastic it’s
fantastic now many of my friends in
business school were interested in
finance and they really inspired me and
encouraged me to start looking at
investing in startups so that’s what I
did I started going to tech meetups
networking events pitch competitions
meeting people learning people in
understanding the ecosystem after a
couple of months I started to notice a
pattern
the men were upfront center stage and
there were very very very few women that
were at the events there were always
those couple of people that you’d see
every single time and those are the
names that you would see on every single
list who are always there but besides
those few women the rest we either
assistants in the back or they were
doing check-ins at the table now at that
point I didn’t jump to any conclusions
right I am a scientist a political
scientist but scientist is still in
there or my diploma right
so I took the time to listen to learn to
understand the data after a couple of
more months I went and I asked one of
the main organizers and I asked him why
aren’t there more women on stage or why
aren’t there more women at these events
and his answer was very simple he said
we just can’t find any now at that point
my response was similar to what your
response would be if you brought that
30% test back to your mother
right I was like excuse me what’s like
what do you mean we can’t find any right
are women interested in business hiding
like a leprechaun are they a fable like
Anansi the spider are they missing in
action like my future husband
right right for my Mother’s sake we hope
not okay we hope not
now I knew and I really believed that
there had to be other young women who
were interested in this kind of stuff I
was there I had friends so instead of
turning to Twitter you know giving my
Twitter fingers and start to you know
bless people out I instead wanted to do
something about it I pulled together a
team I found a co-founder and we started
a pitch competition for women
entrepreneurs within six weeks we had
more than 400 applications from 25 plus
countries we had women from Morocco to
South Africa Rwanda to Senegal who
raised their hands and said that they
were interested in these opportunities
to grow and scale their business they
weren’t interested in us because we had
a brand name they weren’t interested in
us because we were well-known back then
they were interested in us because we
were being authentic and sincere for the
Google Form and a website that I wrote
died designed myself four years later we
turned the 400 applications into a
community of 450,000 young women all
across the continent and all across the
globe who are smart and ambitious and
focus
it has been incredible building this
community to connect all of these young
women as well as this platform to inform
inspire and motivate the next generation
of African women business leaders now
thankfully I’ve had a chance to learn
some things about what it means to build
a community of women who are active in
business and technology and I have a lot
of friends who in the ecosystem who send
me a whatsapp like do you know good
candidate for this job or can you send
out this email listing and I always send
them my price list they never pay me but
you know I wanted to share some ideas
because instead of thinking about it
from just a one-off approach how can we
make sure we are enacting systemic
change and we’re thinking about it from
a strategic point of view so first it is
definitely you not them right young
African women are not some exotic zebra
that’s bedazzled and has
lactose-intolerant right we’re not that
special
where’s fantastic but we’re not that
different right so if you find that your
program is not getting a lot of
applications if women aren’t seeing your
tech hub as a destination of choice it’s
probably because your program isn’t
designed with them in mind right so I
have a dog he’s fantastic he has an
Instagram page please follow him lucky
in Lagos okay right and if I had to
leave him for three months I would be
devastated
who’s going to rub him with coconut oil
who’s gonna update his page right I
don’t know who would do that
and I imagine that if I had a child I
probably would feel the same way right
so can you imagine what it would feel
like to go apply to an accelerator
program that’s in a random City very far
away far away from my personal
responsibility responsibilities and my
friends and family it’s unlikely that I
would want to do that and it’s because
we’ve taken startup examples from other
places and we’ve brought them here when
they don’t really apply to the
demographics and the communities that
we’re working with and if we thought
more about flexible and
Digital training and learning
opportunities that would allow us not
only to connect with more young women
but perhaps those who live in rural
areas those who don’t have the financial
resources to move but overall a more
strategic and more inclusive type of
startup and accelerate our ecosystem
secondly you can stay away from pink I
know we’ve all seen those razer
commercials with the young woman who’s
spinning in the garden her hands are up
there’s a wind machine she’s very
excited but at the end of the commercial
you actually don’t even know that it’s
really for razors or what they’re
selling
whereas when they’re selling men’s
razors it’s all about performance and
power and bah-bah-bah and you’re like
yes that razor is really going to cut my
face it’s the same product right
it’s blades it’s rubbers but one we’re
marketing to women for some reason we
have to have flowers and roses and and I
don’t know what it is that we need to
have but we’re doing something there
unfortunately we often times take the
same approach when it comes to marketing
our startup programs to women all right
something must be fam it must have girl
geek it must be pink and instead of
focusing on the attributes of the
program how it’s going to help someone
reach their goals about the success
stories we choose to just take a very
low impact approach that’s not really
that thoughtful or authentic when it
comes to marketing right so I think the
way that we communicate these
opportunities also can play a big role
in how we demonstrate they were actually
focused on this demographic finally we
should listen and we should learn if you
need someone to build your rocket ship
don’t call me if you want someone to
cook you jollof rice still don’t call me
if you want someone to write a very
creative self-deprecating Instagram
caption I’m your girl right because we
all know what we’re good at so if you
find yourself as a creator as an
innovator and you’re saying actually
don’t know how to position my product or
service or how to get more women
involved there are so many groups in
organizations and platforms and
individuals who’ve been doing this work
for years well very rarely are they
brought into the car
precision and actually asked for their
input or we design solutions and
policies and programs without actually
asking young women what it is that they
want so if you’re looking to turn your
program from mediocre to excellent you
should take the feedback talk to young
women see what it is they need and apply
those lessons and improve I really
appreciate now that I’m older I really
appreciate the high standards that our
parents set for us growing up it didn’t
matter who else was in the class where
they came from or who they were we were
supposed to be the best so should we
care that the u.s. ecosystem that has
the highest number of female founders in
Chicago at just 30 percent shouldn’t
matter that Microsoft only has 26
percent of their workforce as women does
it mean anything to us that Y Combinator
has only funded 12.5 percent of women
founders any African mom we tell you
that’s not your business right it’s your
business to be successful in to reach
your goals and standards that you know
that we can reach there’s a start-up
fund that was really excited because
they had 30 women founders they had 30
founders that were women out of their
portfolio and I was like why are you
excited that is such a low target right
so for all of us who are innovators
creators influencers who are designing
programs right we should stay away from
this 30% target we should stay away from
this number that we’ve decided it’s good
enough because good enough is not what
we need we need excellence and I believe
that African ecosystems technology
startup companies can be leaders and can
show the globe what it means to create
inclusive and wonderfully made startup
systems right after all it does not take
two heads to get this right thank you
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