Quality of Life
THE IMPOSSIBLE
YES
“It always seems impossible until it’s done.” These wise words, attributed to Nelson Mandela, have been a guiding principle for women through the ages and continue to ring true today. Women possess the uncanny ability to stare what is impossible in the face, smile, and make it happen. When Dr. Terry Neese received a call from the White House in 2006 to travel to Afghanistan and create a business training program for Afghan women, it felt impossible. She did it anyway. When one year later she was asked to create that same program in Rwanda and bring together Afghan and Rwandan women for an in-person education and mentorship experience in the U.S., it felt impossible. She did it anyway. Sixteen years later, the impossible has become reality as the Institute for Economic Empowerment of Women (IEEW), the organization born out of Dr. Neese’s first impossible “yes,” has graduated more than 1,000 women from our PEACE THROUGH BUSINESS® program.
IEEW’s mission is to educate and empower women around the world economically, socially, and politically. We are doing that through PEACE THROUGH BUSINESS, an educational program targeting female entrepreneurs. PEACE THROUGH BUSINESS comprises four primary components: classroom training, mentorship, leadership development, and paying it forward. The classroom training focuses on a broad range of business topics, including operations, financial management, sales and marketing, and business planning. Each student is given the option to be assigned a mentor, an American business woman or man, who provides additional coaching and support throughout the program. The top students from the classroom training are invited to the US to attend Leadership Development, a program that provides additional classroom learning, coaching, mentorship, and first hand exposure to businesses. Each of these is aimed at enabling women to
