Leadership & Self-Confidence

As a social enterprise, TWB is an organization where our staff can learn and experience different skill-sets. One of the skills acquired at TWB is strong leadership. Leadership can look like a lot of different things, but I know for certain that it has improved my self-confidence, more than anything. Having a new perspective and attitude allows me to be positive, hold realistic views of myself, and to be mindful of our mission and women, no matter what happens. Too often, we imagine leadership to be one that improves the people around us, but leadership improves our own selves, too.

Leadership – and thus, self-confidence is not only something experienced by our staff. It’s happening with the women who work in our bakeries, as well.

Faith, who is a notable female leader within her community, has demonstrated immense leadership ability and growth while I have worked with her. She is our internal accountant at TWB, and helps us manage daily production and sales reporting. Recently, at a church event, Faith noted that it was at TWB where her leadership skills developed most. With a healthy and practical approach to decision-making, she is learning to lead our team of women effectively – and with confidence. Now, Faith has an expressed desire to even become a pastor within her community, something that could only be accomplished if she believed in herself. She does.

Leadership also involves the ability to believe in existing, innate skill-sets. One of our TWB employees, Jeanne D’Arc, is not able to read or write. Instead of letting this sideline her from opportunities to lead in her community, she is a visible advocate for herself, her family, and TWB where she lives. Inability has not stopped her – it’s propelled her.

Together, leadership and self-confidence are powerful. They are outcomes from a bakery that is producing bread – and also, a dynamite, women-led work-force. That’s #breadpower.

Cycling for Change

On March 11, over 30 cyclists set off from Byumba in Northern Rwanda on a 70km bike ride to Rwanda’s capital city Kigali.

Aside from the oddity of seeing so many amateur cyclists flying down the narrow s-curve roads at once, the group stood out because almost every rider was female. In Rwanda, this is not typical. Though some girls do learn to ride bicycles as children and there are some communities where it is less unusual to spot a woman pedaling a bike, the general trend is that older girls and women do not ride bikes. This is based on myths surrounding the ill health effects cycling has on a woman and stereotypes about the sex drive of girls/women who ride bikes.

The ride was hosted by current Peace Corps Volunteers as part of the Let Girls Ride Campaign, and was meant to challenge these ideas – not only through the visual of 30+ women rode proudly throughout the countryside, but also through education. The group took three stops in community centers to teach lessons on girls’ empowerment, gender equality, and challenging myths and stereotypes about women cycling.

The Women’s Bakery was honored to participate in this event, as well as to be chosen as the recipient of funds raised during the Let Girls Ride Campaign. Connecting bicycling directly with our work in Rwanda, The Women’s Bakery has long dreamed of teaching our women in the bakery to ride bicycles which they can then use for more efficient bread deliveries.

Currently, most deliveries are made on foot and the bread is carried by hand in baskets or buckets. With a bicycle and custom designed bread box attached to the back, more bread can be delivered faster and further!

In the coming weeks, the Remera Bakery group will start bicycling lessons on the new delivery bike that was given to them at the end of the Let Girls Ride event. Our hope is that over time some of the women will embrace cycling, empowering themselves, growing their business, and challenging stereotypes.

#letgirlsride #cyclingforchange #womenonbikes #breadbike