Mlola’s Journey to the top of financial sector

Dar es Salaam. The journey to bringing about gender balance across all sectors is still long, particularly in the financial sector.

This is despite the efforts variious stakeholders to try and push for gender balance in all sectors of the economy.

This is particularly the case when it comes to those holding the top management posts.

However, Irene Mlola, a woman with 22 solid years in the financial and telecommunication sectors proved that gender was not going to stop her from achieving her goals.

She previously served as Financial Sector Deepening Trust Tanzania’s (FSDT) executive director.

Sharing her experience with The Citizen Rising Woman, Irene unfolds how her leadership journey began.

“I believe in the saying ‘charity begins at home’ for the way I have been brought up has had positive impact on my career and life in general. Since I was young, I saw how both my parents collectively worked and served different roles without any seggregation. Their commitment and hard work inspired me into choosing what kind of leader I wanted to become in future. They were disciplined, consistent and were always keen to quality of their work,” recalls Irene.

Her leadership journey officially started when she was studying her first degree in Commerce at Dalhousie University in Canada. Irene was working and studying at the same time.

“I was in an integrated form of programme whereby you had to study, then you were given six months for work related to your studies. Working gave me early exposure into the work space. Immediately after I graduated, I was picked into a leadership development programme by one of the largest banks in Canada, Scotiabank. I was then exposed into the banking environment. Immediately thereafter I was given the role of operations manager. I became grounded for the first time. The rest is history,” Irene narrates.

After being exposed to the banking world in Canada, Irene came back to Tanzania and got employed at Barclays Bank, currently known as Absa Bank.

She had to learn afresh how things worked here and the different challenges that came with that.

“My first formal employment in Tanzania upon returning from Canada was at Barclays where I was a leader without a title. I was entrusted and tasked with a lot of responsibilities by the managing director even though I did not have the managerial title because I was an executive assistant on special projects that came directly from the MD.”

“Amongst the challenges that I faced included people looking down on my abilities to deliver because I was young. They questioned the fact that I did not have any title in the bank. This challenge gave a picture of how leadership in Tanzania was autocratic and so much based on ranks,” she says.

Irene reflects on personal sacrifices that have pushed her to the leadership post she is currently serving.

“I honestly do not believe in the concept of work-life balance because to me, I always look at it as a see-saw. There are times I immerse myself on one side to the extent I have to remind myself of the existence of the other side. What has helped me along the way is self-awareness and intentionality,” she explains.

Irene reveals that leadership comes with many conditions including vulnerability.

“Vulnerability is perceived differently; there are leaders who look at it as weakness and there are others who let themselves embrace their vulnerable state and I’m one of them. One of the vulnerable times I have ever went through was 2021 when the world was still at the early stages of confusion with corona pandemic,”

“I had lost my mother and at the same time, I was handed over an overall leadership position of the organisation with very clear objectives that given the uncertainty, they needed a new strategy that would be make the organisation position itself in the financial market. I felt like all the odds were leading towards failure but I had to reflect on my goals and my mission to remind myself I’m grounded into the purpose and that it was not only about me, since I had a whole team looking up to me. That helped me,” she remembers.

Irene describes her leadership styles as mainly depending on circumstances and situations that she comes across.

“Despite the fact that I like to think that I’m a dominant leader, there are times I have to lead differently according to the person’s background; whether they are new or experienced. Naturally, as a person, I tend to lead with a trusting instinct whereas I would fully entrust my team with different responsibilities while I would be steering the directions and guide whenever necessary,” she says.

As she addressed gender inequality in leadership positions, Irene appraised the dissemination of awareness about the importance of women leadership.

“Gender inequality is a problem that has existed over the years. We have witnessed movements being conducted and initiatives created to talk about the issue in detail. We have seen organizations taking up intentional actions by recruiting women in top managerial levels or in the board. We also have the first female President in the history of Tanzania leadership, that itself is a bigger step, but there is still a lot that has to happen in our societies so that we can create conducive working environments for women,” Irene emphasizes.