Leading Across Borders: Creating Women Entrepreneurs in Iraq

Regular guest contributor Anne Doyle sent me the link to this inspiring article by journalist Diane Tucker. Entitled “In Iraq, Women Entrepreneurs Staring a New Kind of Insurgency,” the piece is a good illustration of how financial resources underlie the capacity to achieve independence and elevate their status in society. It’s this kind of social change that also contributes to building a stronger democracy.

Tucker interviewed an American woman of Indian descent Amber Chand. Chand–who grew up in a wealthy family that lost everything when she was a child and later became an entrepreneur herself, is teaching Iraqi women, as well as women in Afghanistan and other countries in distress, how to become successful businesswomen. Here’s the story in her words:

How did you become an entrepreneur?
About 12 years ago my business partner and I created a catalog company to support artisans who produced beautiful handmade gifts. That’s when I began to experience a yearning to connect with people who had become lost due to war, genocide, and other distresses. I saw it as a path of healing for me personally, as well as a chance to help others starting from scratch.

So you launched Prosperity Candle.
This month nearly 2,000 candles made in the kitchens of 50 Iraqi women will be shipped from Baghdad to the United States in time for Mother’s Day. You can buy their beautiful candles on the Prosperity Candle Web site, and listen to their stories on the site’s Voices page. Our next pilot program will take place in Afghanistan or Rwanda, or possibly Haiti because of what happened there recently.

Chand also grappled with the social dynamics of changing the power balance within relationships when the wife begins to earn more than her husband. Acknowledging this change can causes stresses, she says her company provides classes beyond the basic business capabilities, including “transformational skills to show women how to take this step without engendering a hostile reaction.” They found that the men actually felt relieved when they didn’t have to bear the entire burden for supporting the family.

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Tucker’s next question drew this intriguing reply:

Why train only women to become business leaders? Is it because you’re a woman?
It’s bigger than that. My former company, which was launched during the Internet dot-com boom, became huge and then collapsed during its seventh year. I spent the next eight months wondering how a company with $40 million in capital could collapse so quickly. I concluded it was because our business model did not incorporate feminine principles into its DNA. A fast-growing, testosterone-driven model is not sustainable. The attributes we consider aspects of the feminine — empathy, collaboration, intuition — need to walk boldly alongside the masculine to create a sense of thoughtful balance…Financial systems all around us are collapsing, so now we must recognize the truth. In order to rebuild distressed societies, women must have a central place in the dialogue. Women must share their stories, even if it’s from a place of profound vulnerability — which fortunately is our strength. When women reclaim their voices and share what they know to be true, it is powerful.

Chand believes that the most important thing she and her business partner, Ted Barber, are doing goes far beyond teaching women to make and sell candles. Their hope is that a substantial percentage of the women they work with will build their small business into larger ones, thus creating wealth for the community and snowballing the effect of female business leadership.

Personally, I hoping that one of the millions of women globally who are currently small entrepreneurs will turn out to be the next Bill Gates.

Gloria Feldt

GLORIA FELDT is the New York Times bestselling author of several books including No Excuses: 9 Ways Women Can Change How We Think About Power, a sought-after speaker and frequent contributor to major news outlets, and the Co-Founder and President of Take The Lead. People has called her “the voice of experience,” and among the many honors she has been given, Vanity Fair called her one of America’s “Top 200 Women Legends, Leaders, and Trailblazers,” and Glamour chose her as a “Woman of the Year.”

As co-founder and president of Take The Lead, a leading women’s leadership nonprofit, her mission is to achieve gender parity by 2025 through innovative training programs, workshops, a groundbreaking 50 Women Can Change The World immersive, online courses, a free weekly newsletter, and events including a monthly Virtual Happy Hour program and a Take The Lead Day symposium that reached over 400,000 women globally in 2017.