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Robin Muchetu, Senior Reporter
MS Nomalanga Ndlovu is a trendsetter when it comes to modern-day women empowerment skills impartation as she brings to the fore gurus in finance, leadership and grooming.
She exposes local female entrepreneurs to experts who help build their confidence, make sound financial decisions and also hold their heads up high in the world of competition.
Keen on ensuring that women hold a firm space in their entrepreneurship journey, Ms Noma, as she is fondly known, has for the past three years availed business and financial experts to help women who have small to large enterprises manage their businesses better by introducing the Money Soiree.
The month of March is set aside to celebrate women and the work they do in various spaces that they occupy and Ms Noma has shown keen interest in ensuring that women lead from the front in various areas.
Ms Noma, who is a lawyer, management consultant and corporate trainer, has been leading in ensuring women gain financial literacy via such platforms.
“The Money Soiree is a women’s organisation and platform that has been designed to curate conversations around finances. So basically, our vision is to pioneer financial conversations. Why is it important to have these conversations? Because of society and the way that our systems have been structured. If you look at our history and look at where we are now, you find that conversations around money have always been conversations that are had by men. Even if you look at the home set-up, you find that when it comes to money, the father is the one who goes out to make the money. Of course, the mum helps with the management of the money but most of the time, the responsibility of money is a responsibility that belongs to the men,” said Ms Noma.
She said this has seen many women not taking an active role in managing the finances of their homes or even in thinking about wealth creation.
“I think the reason why Africa is even where it is today is because when it comes to finances and wealth, it’s a conversation that we don’t have as a family. But if you look at history and conversations around people, when women are empowered, it changes children’s lives, it changes the generation. And I think when married women are financially literate and understand money, they’ll become a more effective partner in their marriages because they’re not only taking money from their husbands and spending the money, but they’re being intentional about how that money can be spent,” she said.
This, she said, was the driving force behind the creation of the Money Soiree where she could pioneer those conversations around money with women who have been disenfranchised for decades, especially women in business and those who seek to start businesses.
“I also realised that in a lot of young people, there’s an assumption that just because you have gone to school, just because you are now earning a salary, there’s an assumption that you know how to manage your US$500. We don’t plan for the future. So the Money Soiree is inspired by that. We want to inspire women to start being intentional about their money,” said Ms Noma.
The first edition of the Money Soiree was in 2022 and the event has been hosted each year since then. This year’s event which was hosted at the beginning of March, had a star-studded line-up of speakers including food and lifestyle concept builder and the founder of the famous Munch and Sip outdoor event that sets Bulawayo alive, Mandipa Masuku.
Renowned banker and former chief executive officer of ABC Holdings Zimbabwe and managing director of BancABC, Dr Lance Mambondiani was also part of the panel.
Dr Mambondiani, who was also CEO of Steward Bank, is a renowned turnaround strategist and recognised internationally as a digital banking thought leader, with an established track record of innovating and delivering financial results in challenging environments. Also speaking at the event were Thembe Khumalo, founder and lead consultant at Brandbuild Africa and an accomplished writer and Thelma Chimbganda, businesswoman, co-founder and CEO of Beyond Borders Logistics and Tsoka International.
Vimbai Masamba, an award-winning businesswoman and entrepreneur and Tsitsi Mutendi, a family business consultant, founder and Lead Consultant at Nhaka Legacy Planning were also part of the panel. Asked whether women entrepreneurs have been benefiting from the Money Soirees, Ms Noma said, “Absolutely, because we have women who are coming up to us and saying, if it wasn’t for the Money Soiree, I would have never gotten out of my comfort zone. We have women who have come there, they have networked with other women, and they have listened to other women’s stories about business, about how they’ve climbed the corporate ladder, how they’re growing. They’ve given us success tips that even myself till now, some of them, I’m still using them daily because it’s all about transformation and it’s all about exposure.”
She said the Money Soiree seeks to give women access to people that ideally, they would have never met and got financial advice.
“So the idea is that there is that CEO that I look up to that I follow on social media, but I’ve never sat down with them or spoken to them. So if I can expose myself to listening to them, to interacting with them, we’re hoping that there will be a mental paradigm shift for women to realise that there’s a whole world out there and you can be a part of that world.
“You can be able to shift in that world in every single thing that you do,” she added.
Ms Noma said such exposure has afforded women opportunities to excel in their areas of interest and a lot of women have clinched contracts from some of these spaces.
Others have secured jobs, networked, and have had a mental paradigm shift.
She said the networks women create on such platforms are vital as they propel them to greater heights in self-empowerment after getting access to key thought leaders and business gurus.
Ms Noma highlighted that women need to be intentional as they carry out their jobs in the corporate world or in informal trades.
“There is a misconception that the Money Soiree is a platform and event for well-to-do women in Bulawayo and surrounding areas because women are always dressed nicely and the pictures are great but I always tell people that, that is the Money Soiree experience, part of dressing up is part of getting out of your comfort zone, even the venue we choose is always apt so that we have women feeling glamorous in a glamourous place too. So women must not shy away but attend with us,” she said.
The 2024 event brought together the crème-de la-creme of the country so that women could interact with speakers who are making notable progress in business and other spaces they occupy.
This gives attendees a real picture of what it is like to be a firebrand in business or corporate spaces.
“This year we were teaching women about branding, how to make money from the brand you have built, how to build wealth, run businesses professionally, social capital, and how you can maximise on the relationships you have built. We spoke to women who are practically doing things in the market and that interaction was very good,” said Ms Noma.
She encouraged women to start businesses and not shy away from venturing into various sectors as an empowered woman who can create her own wealth, empower the next generation and not have a dependency syndrome but be a go-getter.
Ms Noma, however, said a lot more women still need to come out of their shells and start creating wealth from as little as selling tomatoes and vegetables to starting other small businesses and going up the ladder.
She highlighted that as one grows in business, they also grow and change many things around them, addind that women must not expect to remain the same as they develop in their careers.
“It is unfair to expect somebody to remain the same as they grow in business or career, if a person remains the same it means they might not be able to grow. You can’t remain the same. It means you might not be able to grow, you can remain the same in terms of personality and character but sometimes people are more comfortable with you defining yourself according to poverty. If you met me and interacted with me when I was poor, if you see me when I have changed the car that I drive, changed neighbourhoods and I’m choosing to fly as compared to using a chicken bus, I think it is unfair to say this person has changed because they are using luxury coaches to travel. Growth comes with change, growth comes with exposure, and it doesn’t mean that where you are is the standard,” she said. @NyembeziMu
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