EmpowHER Week3 concludes enabling girls to ‘pitch their idea’

Kathmandu, June 19, 2016: The third session of EmpowHER, a premier leadership and personality development programme for Nepalese girls was successfully held this Saturday at King’s College in the presence of the guest facilitator for the day Mr. Aashish Adhikari, the founder of Red Mud Café. This was the session where the participants were molded and trained through learning and exposure. The 14 different Saturdays the programme will run are designed with various specific topics to develop the overall aspects of the cohort of 16 ladies, ultimately growing them to become leaders in the present day society.

EmpowHER was started in 2015 to provide a platform for women to exude their ideas, exercise leadership, and contribute as an effective member to the community. Through this programme the aspiring women leaders will be exposed to innovative learning through various trainings in leadership, networking, mentorship, and designing and implementing projects that help other marginalized women. Running into third week this year, the girls have already been groomed with different skills and competency. In today’s session, Mr. Adhikhari, the facilitator for the day, gave an insightful presentation on ‘Expressing Yourself through Art’ and emphasized the overall importance of Art of Pitching.

“Ideas without actions won’t work, and it’s still not necessarily true that the idea needs to be the perfect,” he shared initiating the session. “Moreover, there is no shortcut to success in life. And, ambition only is not sufficient for success. It needs to be matched with hard work,” he added. Continuing the inspiring session, he further shared that once an idea comes into our mind, the next step we need to take is to get out of our comfort zone and work in the real field researching on the idea, sharing it with a group of like-minded people and review the idea time and again. “The most convenient way of pitching the idea is to pitch and communicate with everything around us, including mirror, parents, friends, and strangers,” he inspired.

In reply to this scribe’s question on why the girls applied for the programme, a participant there shared that EmpowHer is probably the best platform for those girls who want to come forward and shape their own career. “It’s like an eye opening experience. We’re getting opportunities to explore and enhance our own hidden potential which we were unknown about. We are being polished and groomed in every way possible.”

All the participants in the cohort pitched their ideas on their different project areas like empowering a person with hearing impairment, a green project named ‘Hariyali Digital’, Menstrual Discrimination, Swagatam Service, Climate Change, Connecting through Technology, Narishakti (The Women Force), Public Service, Domestic Workers, etc. Everyone presented the details about their project ideas within the timespan of 3 minutes on how they will be pitching the idea and make it to work in our society.

The participants will undergo an extensive 14-weeks of programmes with activities ranging from volunteering, designing and planning of their ‘Impact Service Projects, participating in group projects, attending several leadership workshops to hosting their annual EmpowHER 2016 Meet and Greet among many other activities.

The core motive of the ‘fellowship’ is to provide a safe platform for women leaders where they can work on their innovate ideas and exercise their leadership skills freely in a way to make an impact in the society. Throughout the duration and after, Ujyalo Foundation, the organizer of the programme, will act as their roots giving them maximum support to flourish with the mission to create self-reliant women leaders who will showcase their independence, resilience and competence in today’s world and be the role models for other women in the community and effectively contribute to the society.

Started with a belief that empowered women will empower society as a whole, EmpowHER strives to groom these young ladies to not only bring about a change in themselves, but also the community around them and create a ripple effect ultimately creating a society where all the women are empowered like never before.

By Sangita Tiwari

Senior Reporter, Glocal Khabar