Julia Weber
Assistant Editor
At 10:45 a.m. today in the Amphitheater, Alyse Nelson will continue the weeklong Chautauqua Lecture Series theme, “Icons and Instigators: Women Who Change the World,” with individual remarks and a group discussion with select Vital Voices Fellows.
Nelson is the co-founder, president and CEO of Vital Voices Global Partnership, a nonprofit organization advocating for women in leadership spaces.
“We are venture catalysts, so we search the world for women who have a daring vision — women who are taking on some of the world’s greatest challenges, doing so with heart, with empathy, in collaboration and doing so in a cause-driven and very inclusive way,” Nelson explained. “We basically get behind them and support them.”
Even in difficult times, Nelson said she remains motivated and inpired by the women she works with.
“What inspires me and keeps me going through difficult times is these women and their ingenuity, their sheer drive and tenacity, the way they do things through the heart but with such incredible innovation. They inspire me.”
Joining Nelson are Vital Voices Fellows Breeze Liu, Leah Lizarondo, Kakenya Ntaiya and Ariela Suster. The Vital Voices Global Fellowship program combines social entrepreneurship and public leadership. The Fellows joining Nelson in today’s conversation have expertise on issues including online abuse, food rescue, girls’ empowerment and personal and professional development.
“Each of them was called to leadership — [they] stepped up to lead — not because they had planned a life of leadership, but because they saw a wrong in their community and they stepped up to right it, to fix it,” she said.
Vital Voices has supported approximately 49,000 women in 195 countries since its founding, and Nelson said the most effective way to support leaders, Vital Voices has learned over time, is to “create that net of opportunity and support.”
For her, that looks like providing women with training, mentors and a peer network as well as visibility and credibility for their work and access to grant opportunities. Support can also look like solidarity when difficult decisions need to be made or threats need to be addressed.
“We really began to see that if you’re a woman leading change in an increasingly divided, increasingly authoritarian world, you will be threatened. You will have a moment of crisis, and our commitment to the women leaders that we support is that we’re going to be with them on their journey, supporting them on their best days and celebrating them, but also, we’re going to be there on their worst days, the days when they need to — maybe — evacuate their country,” Nelson said.
Amid a changing landscape, Nelson said women leaders will continue to lead change across issues with skills like inclusivity and collaboration.
“It is a very difficult time to be leading change, but yet at the same time, women leaders lead differently. … Women are inclusive. They’re cause-driven, they’re collaborative, they tend to lead and step into leadership because they see a wrong in their community and they want to step up to right it,” Nelson said. “That authentic leadership that follows is really, really powerful.”
