Nationality Zimbabwe Role Businesswoman Name Eve Gadzikwa | Spouse(s) Celestine Gadzikwa Religion Christianity | |
Born 24 December 1964 (age 59) ( 1964-12-24 ) Zimbabwe Occupation Businesswoman, Philanthropist and Author Children Charlene and Kudakwashe | ||
Eve Christine Gadzikwa (née Mandaza) (born 24 December 1964) is a Zimbabwean businesswoman, leader, mentor, philanthropist and an author. She is the Director General and Secretary to the Standards Association of Zimbabwe, Board Chairman of the Zimbabwe Stock Exchange and Institute of Directors and Chairperson of The Institute of Directors (IoD) Zimbabwe.
Contents
- Early life and education
- Career and professional life
- Personal life
- Publications
- Honours and awards
- Philanthropic work
- References
Early life and education
Dr. Eve Christine Gadzikwa (née Mandaza) third born child of four (4) children of Joel and Grace Mandaza was born on the eve of Christmas (December 24), 1964 at Marondera village in Zimbabwe, hence her first name is Eve. She was raised in a strict Christian family and taught discipline and hard work at a very tender age. Her parents moved to Zambia where her father worked as a miner in the Nchanga Copper Mines of Chingola and her mother was a registered mid-wife and nurse.
Dr. Gadzikwa attended her primary education at Hellen Waller School and early secondary schooling Fatima Girls High in Ndola, Zambia where she became a fluent speaker of the Bemba language. In 1978 at the age of 15 years while studying Form II she returned to Zimbabwe where she attended St Johns’ High, Emerald Hill a catholic boarding school. It is at St Johns’ High, Emerald Hill, where Eve studied biology and developed a curiosity to learn more about the human anatomy.
This curiosity inspired her to want to become a medical practitioner however the university entry-level requirements in Zimbabwe were very stringent and she then decided to pursue a career as medical lab scientist in Microbiology instead. Having worked for more than twenty years monitoring the quality of tests in medical laboratories in a number of disciplines, Eve grew an appreciation and insistence on excellence standards. After years of practicing she needed a career change, she wanted to be in a role of power, decision-making, leadership and mentorship and to make a meaningful change in the world. She made enroute into the corporate environment.
In order to fast track the career progression and understand the mind of the business people, what makes them tick, what do they respond to, she obtained a Marketing Management Diploma at Institute of Marketing Management in South Africa (IMM SA) as a stepping stone into the corporate environment.
In 2004 she embarked on and further graduated with Masters in Business Administration from the Nottingham University (UK), to solidify her business knowledge.
Career and professional life
In September 2008, she was appointed to her present position of Director General and Secretary to the Standards Association of Zimbabwe. Eve has a passion for promoting quality standards and spent three (3) years as a consultant within the African region and visited countries such as Kenya, Namibia, Lesotho, Ghana; the USA where she spent her earlier professional career working with medical testing and public health laboratories. Prior to joining Standards Association of Zimbabwe (SAZ, 1 July 2015 (UTC)), she spent six (6) years at Zimbabwe National Quality Assurance (ZINQAP) Trust, a national Proficiency Testing organization where, she was Executive Director. Eve has worked to uplift the lives of women of all ages in society by spreading the message of hope.
She is the current chairman for the Zimbabwe Stock Exchange (ZSE) board, Institute of Directors of Zimbabwe (IODZ); and leading the country’s sole standards and quality assessment and certification organization – the Standards Association of Zimbabwe (SAZ).
Dr. Gadzikwa is the first woman in Zimbabwe to head the ZSE, IODZ and SAZ all at the same time. What makes her accomplishment considerably all the more captivating is the way that she is driving these key organisations during a period when the country is monetarily lacking to meet expectations. Moreover, she has successfully managed to register numerous noteworthy achievements during her tenure.
Dr. Gadzikwa feels she made the right move when she decided not to leave Zimbabwe in 2008 at the height of economic and hyperinflation crisis that saw thousands of Zimbabweans leaving for greener pastures especially South Africa and the United Kingdom. She decided to stay in Zimbabwe and fought the fight that helped the Zimbabwean economy kept afloat in what was described by many economic analysts as the worst economic quagmire ever witnessed in the world after the great depression.
Professor Hope Sadza one of the many women in Zimbabwe who made a breakthrough in the Zimbabwean male dominated corporate environment inspires her. “To get to where I am, I had to get over the fear to the unknown...When you are a woman you are stereotyped ...you get questions like how can a woman chair a board? When you are a woman you are harshly judged because if you don’t act in a certain way people think you are weak. If it’s a man doing the same thing they forgive him and say: ‘Give him time because he is still trying to solve the problem’.
“But all in all I sleep well at night; why; because I have a clear conscience. I have a clear conscience in the sense that I have never stolen money from anybody. You always read about chief executives going down because of having misappropriated funds...In all fairness I would like to be remembered as someone who was a law-abiding citizen who tried to build Zimbabwe...a person of integrity, honesty and morality.”
Personal life
Dr. Gadzikwa is married to Celestine Gadzikwa a Zimbabwean businessman with whom she has two children.
Publications
Author of “I Dare you to lead”
Honours and awards
In recognition of her good corporate governance practices, strong leadership, professional and excellent standards, Eve has won numerous awards, which include;