Photo by Kiana Bosman on Unsplash
I had the opportunity to speak at the Soroptimist International Western Canada Region 2025 conference recently, which was themed What If We Fly. This global volunteer movement is invested in making the dreams of women and girls around the world a reality, through access to education to achieve economic empowerment.
Through my keynote, we reflected on lessons from global women changemakers, the women and girls who continue to lead, wherever they find themselves, from micro actions that have macro systemic outcomes for generations, to women leading in public arenas and everything in-between.
This post is a summary of the key points that framed my call to action. This is a call to all of us in the context of our current human story…the story of us and the story of now, which is also a personal story for each of us, me and my family, and you and yours. Each of us are here, living in the storyline of the past handed to us, shaping the present and creating the future we will hand over to generations to come.
The Story of Us: Current State of Gender Equality By the Numbers
The world’s population stands at over 8 billion—4.05 billion men and 4.01 billion women[1]. Nearly equal in numbers, yet continually unequal in opportunity.
In Canada[2], women make up just over half of the world’s population (50.4%) and an even greater share of the working population (52%)[3]. Over two-thirds of women aged 25 to 64 have post-secondary education—placing Canadian women among the most educated globally.
And yet according to the Canadian Women’s Foundation,
Women in Canada still earn only 89 cents for every dollar earned by a man.
For immigrant women who arrived as adults, the wage gap widens to 20.9%.
For Indigenous women, the gap stands at 20.1%.
Racialized women as a group make nearly 60% less than non-racialized men.
Since 2020, 10x more women than men have exited the workforce.
Globally, there is also much to do. Oxfam reminds that nearly two thirds of the world’s 781 million illiterate adults are women, a proportion that has remained unchanged for two decades. Women make up less than 24% of the world’s parliamentarians and 5% of its mayors. According to the UN and Focus 2030, no country has yet achieved full gender equality. Repression, regression, and stagnation in 40% of the world means we are not on track to meet the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by 2030. At the current rate, it will take 300 more years to close the global gender gap.
300 years…
Imagine the possibilities.
The cost of inaction is immense and impacts everyone. For example, the Canadian Women’s Foundation also notes that if Canada alone could close its gender gap, an estimated $150 billion in incremental GDP could be added to the economy.
There is so much potential for more human flourishing. According to the UN, empowered women are more likely to promote equity for people and planet, advance peacebuilding and contribute to economic growth.
Faced with this reality, where do we turn? What can we learn from global women changemakers, contending with these challenges.
What if we imagine gender equality not as a distant, idealized goal but as something alive, urgent, and already happening—through the work and stories of women changemakers around the globe?
Herstory: My History
I come from generations of women changemakers that has always given me a strong sense of agency and an outlook of possibility. The current state of gender equality and continued systemic inequities may look bleak in some senses, but everyday, I am the embodiment of women overcoming and leapfrogging over the odds. I am named after my grandmother. That ancestor, came of age in colonial Sierra Leone, in an era then and now around the world, when girls are not always afforded opportunity and access to Western education. Yet, when her husband, a man ahead of his time by all accounts, suggested that their daughter go to school, she agreed. This would mean not getting in the way of her daughter stepping into something she herself had no context for…into the unknown. I think of her willingness to go along with this plan as a quiet but radical choice…and as an example of all the ways that transformational change happens.
That choice, has now led to 3 generations of women who continue to learn, lead and create legacies in their personal lives, professions and public spheres. It was very profound for me to hear my own daughter speaking recently of the influence and impact of her grandmothers on her life and my example to her as a role model. Furthermore, she spoke of the positive impact on her current sense of self and confidence, as a result of being paired with a Black woman professional who has mentored her through a leadership program. All of this, the journey from the grandmother who did not go to school, to my daughter, happened in less than 150 years. Half the time we’re told today that it will take to reach gender equality. Imagine the possibilities if we each supported, mentored and lifted another. Global women changemakers, whether my grandmother, professional mentors or community leaders, have always understood that when you educate a woman, you educate a nation—and generations…and that is one way we can keep accelerating the path to global equality. As the Oxfam tagline proclaims, the future is equal.
What if we fly? What if we each also said yes to a simple spark to lead within our communities and/or our sphere of influence? Take my work with We Will Lead Africa. Nearly a decade ago, three co-founders launched We Will Lead Africa to create platforms for sharing and inspiring everyday African leadership through storytelling. Our spark was the dearth of African leadership narratives for us to draw on in our field. Through this initiative, we are now cataloguing everyday African leadership stories, including those of African women leaders, ranging from elected officials (such as one of the 5% global mayors!), health innovators, tech disruptors, educators, entrepreneurs, cultural and social advocates and more.
Our work on We Will Lead Africa was featured in a volume of Women Community Leaders and Their Impact as Global Changemakers that showcased female leaders doing work that could be replicated to create impact on a global scale. It featured over 50 women changemakers from around the world, including those creating movements to educate, mentor and uplift women and girls, to in turn contribute to and regenerate their communities.
The Story of Now: A Call to Action
This is a call to action.
Who can you lift up today? What global woman/girl can you lift up in your sphere of influence? What woman or girl could you mentor, sponsor, encourage, or stand beside?
What collective action is possible to lift up global women & girls today in your community and around the world?
What If We Fly?
The truth is that global women have always been flying despite the odds. They are the uneducated women who say yes to sending their girl child to school. They are the self-taught tech entrepreneurs in South Africa or Nigeria galvanizing women to code. They are the global women running for elected office.
From village circles to classrooms, courtrooms and boardrooms…
In labs, in legislatures, in literature, and on the land…
What if we activated to bend and shorten the projections of 300 years to equality?
What do we do to make sure the next generation inherits a better world like my ancestors and yours did for us?
What if we fly?
[1] 8.06 billion people living on the Earth
[2] https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/12-581-x/2023001/sec7-eng.htm
[3] 2023 Annual Report –Diversity of Board of Directors and Senior Management of Federal Distributing Corporations