'Too technical' no more: How women are conquering toughest industries
Honourees and guests celebrate together in a group photo at the Top 40 Under 40 Women Awards dinner gala held at the Serena Hotel, Nairobi, on August 28, 2025. The top 40 list revealed structural shift as female leaders dismantle boardroom biases and funding prejudices.
What you need to know:
- A new generation of Kenyan women under 40 is transforming leadership in industries once considered off-limits, proving that results—not gender—define success.
- From infrastructure to fintech and politics, women are bringing empathy, precision, and vision to leadership, dismantling outdated stereotypes of power.
Across Kenya, a quiet but unstoppable shift is reshaping the definition of leadership. In industries once considered off-limits to women, including engineering, finance, politics, logistics, technology, a new generation under 40 is not waiting for permission to lead. They are stepping into spaces that for decades were described as “too technical” or “too aggressive” to women, and they are proving that leadership is defined by results, not gender.
This transformation represents more than individual success stories; it signals a fundamental reimagining of what effective leadership looks like. For far too long, success in these fields was measured by traits narrowly associated with masculinity such as dominance, risk-taking, and unyielding assertiveness.
However, today’s women leaders are rewriting that playbook entirely. They bring empathy, collaboration, precision, and vision qualities long dismissed as ‘soft,’ but which, in reality, are strategic advantages in our complex, interconnected world.
The impact of this shift is most visible in traditionally male-dominated sectors. Consider the transformation happening in infrastructure, where women are increasingly taking charge of multimillion-shilling projects, a responsibility once reserved for a select few men in hard hats and boardrooms. Their leadership is not merely symbolic; it delivers tangible results, from streamlined project execution to inspiring young girls to imagine themselves in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (Stem) careers.
Similarly, in fintech, women are building platforms that not only thrive commercially but also challenge systemic biases about who is “bankable”. These are not isolated achievements but rather proof points in a larger story of cultural disruption reshaping Kenya's economic landscape.
What this means for the country’s future is clear: when women lead, the rules change. They are not simply participating in existing systems; they are fundamentally reimagining them. In logistics, efficiency gains are paired with stronger vendor relationships because leadership is exercised with both data-driven clarity and emotional intelligence. In politics, representation is matched with policy depth, demonstrating that visibility matters most when it is backed by substantive expertise.
These emerging patterns matter because they dismantle two dangerous myths that have long constrained women's advancement. First, the misconception that leadership is a finite resource with room for only one woman at the top, and second, that women must emulate male models of leadership to succeed.
The women rising today are challenging both assumptions with remarkable consistency. They mentor, they hire, they advocate not just for themselves, but for the women who will come after them. They understand that progress is only meaningful when it is shared and sustained.
This understanding is perfectly exemplified by the 2025 Top 40 Under 40 Women list, which makes it evident that Kenya’s industries are undergoing a structural shift. The glass ceiling is no longer the primary barrier; the harder battle is dismantling the cultural ceilings, the lingering biases embedded in boardrooms, funding decisions, and political spaces. These stories prove that investing in women is not charity; it is a growth strategy for national development.
And this is where the challenge lies. Recognition alone while important is not enough to sustain this momentum. If institutions, investors, and policymakers truly want to accelerate Kenya’s progress, they must dismantle systemic barriers with the same urgency and precision that these women bring to their work. That means actively opening up procurement pipelines to women-led firms, providing robust funding women in tech and infrastructure, and ensuring that political representation translates into real influence over policy decisions.
To the next generation of girls watching from the sidelines, the message emerging from this transformation is both simple and profound: not only do you belong in these spaces, you are needed in them. The blueprint has already been rewritten by those who came before you, creating pathways that were previously unimaginable. The future is not waiting for you to be ready; it is ready for you to shape it.
Ultimately, Kenya’s continued growth and competitiveness will depend on whether we see the rise of women leaders not as an exception, but as a fundamental driver of national progress. Embedding women’s leadership into every sector, every boardroom, every decision-making table is not optional, it is essential. The challenge and the opportunity for all is to match this ambition, embrace this vision, and build a future where leadership knows no gender.
The writer is the Marketing Manager, Scotch and Reserve Portfolio, EABL.
