WE Lead Food: building leadership capacity for a more sustainable food system
Behind the scenes : insights & take aways from 3 sessions of the WE Lead Food Programme
Creating space for connection and honest conversations
Over the course of eight weeks, WE Lead Food brings together around 40 women from across Europe and beyond, all working in different parts of the food sector.
The programme runs fully online, with 14 live sessions that combine expert input, group work and personal reflection. It is intensive, but intentionally so: this is not a course you passively follow, it asks for presence, preparation and engagement.
We followed three sessions with the 2025 cohort to get a closer look at how the programme works in practice – and what participants take away from it.
Creating space for connection and honest conversations
The second session of the programme, the Inspirational Panel, starts with an unexpected ice breaker. Programme lead Shima Barakat asks participants to reflect in the chat on How does a tomato represent you?
The answers come quickly: “Versatile and flexible.” “Full of potential.” “Superpower inside.” It is a light moment, but it immediately lowers the threshold for participation. From the start, people are encouraged to bring more than just their professional role into the room.
When asked about their expectations for the programme, participants mention wanting new perspectives on leadership, a supportive environment, inspiration, connection with others, and practical insights they can apply straight away. Those expectations are revisited, explicitly and implicitly, throughout the sessions.
Leadership, seen from different angles
The Inspirational Panel brings together four speakers whose career paths look very different on paper, but whose stories resonate in similar ways.
Dr Cara Griffiths, scientist-entrepreneur and co-founder of SugaROx, talks openly about ambition and balance. She does not pretend that combining opportunities, leadership and personal life is easy. “You can do it all, but only if you keep your balance,” she says. “Take opportunities when they come, take risks sometimes, but keep your values front and centre.”
Sam Dyer is CEO of Cambridge Sustainable Food CIC, a non-profit organisation working to build a fairer, more sustainable food system, for example through community-led action. For her, leadership is fundamentally collective. “It takes longer, but decisions that are made together are stronger.”
Kari Tronsmo, Sustainability Project Leader at Danone, reflects on leadership within a large, mission-driven company. She speaks about learning on the job, navigating different cultures and the realities of change management. “It goes step by step,” she says. “Not every country, not every business unit at the same time.”
Professor Corinna Hawkes, who leads the Division of Agrifood Systems and Food Safety at FAO, shares perhaps the most personal reflections. She speaks about confidence dips, learning through experience and saying yes to opportunities even when they feel uncomfortable.
“The best decision I made in my career was networking,” she notes. “It terrified me, but it changed everything.”
Across the discussion, familiar themes keep resurfacing: how decisions are made, how to avoid burnout, how to deal with unsupportive or patriarchal environments, and how to stay grounded while aiming for impact. Participants actively contribute and ask questions.
“Don’t do what society tells you you should be doing.” — Shima Barakat
Practising what you want to say: Pitches & Pledges
The Pitches & Pledges session is one of those moments where theory turns into practice. Every participant prepares a short pitch and presents it to peers.
Shima is clear about the purpose: “Every presentation is a pitch. There is no such thing as ‘just a presentation’.”
Participants are asked to think about how to open strong: why should anyone listen? What is the hook?
They work with the five C’s of content – clear, concise, congruent, convincing and compelling – and structure their pitch around a problem, a solution, their own role, what they need, and what they personally commit to.
The exercise is fast-paced. Five minutes to prepare. One minute to pitch. Immediate feedback from peers. Then revise and pitch again. It is challenging, but supportive.
By the end, most participants have not only a better pitch, but a clearer understanding of what they are actually asking for – and what they are willing to give.
Power, resilience and choosing where to act
In the final session, the focus shifts to leading systemic change and developing a personal impact plan. Rather than starting from solutions, Shima brings the group back to problem definition.
“We don’t know yet which innovation will have the biggest impact,” she says. “So focus on the problem you want to solve. Choose problems where your strengths and your energy meet. You cannot solve everything.”
The session also explores value creation: who benefits from your work, what they expect from you, and what unintended consequences might arise.
Towards the end, the conversation turns to power and resilience. Power is discussed as something necessary, but often uncomfortable – and too easily given away by women.
“If you want to drive change, you need to use powerful statements and maintain your power,” Shima emphasises. “Claim it. Signal it. Leverage it.”
Participants finish the programme by writing their personal impact plans and a letter to themselves, scheduled to be sent a year later.
Leaving with clarity – and a network
WE Lead Food does not promise quick fixes or ready-made leadership styles.
What it offers instead is space: to think, to practise, to challenge assumptions and to learn from others who are asking themselves similar questions in different contexts.
By the end of the programme, participants leave with practical tools, sharper thinking and a strong sense of connection.
Perhaps more importantly, they leave with greater clarity about how they want to lead, and why.
As Shima puts it in her final words to the cohort: “We need to create a new and better world. Own who you are, go and be fabulous, and stay in touch!”
Another WE Lead Food cohort signs off, ready to challenge and reshape the food system.
Inspiring, right ? Would you like to join the next edition of WE Lead Food ?
Applications open traditionally on 8 March, International Women's Day - keep an eye on our Social Media Announcements!