Featuring Tendai Simende Bosha
Group Category Director | Promasidor | Johannesburg, South Africa
“Leadership isn’t about becoming someone else; it’s about bringing the best of who you are into the spaces you occupy.” — Tendai Simende Bosha
Tendai Simende Bosha is a marketing leader with over 20 years of experience driving growth for FMCG brands across Sub-Saharan Africa and Europe. She currently serves as Group Category Director at Promasidor, where she leads brand strategy, innovation, and digital transformation. With a strong track record in category leadership, Tendai has successfully led multi-country campaigns, new product launches, and insight-driven strategies that build brand equity and deliver results.
Her board-level strengths span strategic marketing, digital transformation, and Pan-African market expertise. Her deep understanding of diverse consumer segments—combined with data-led decision-making and strong commercial acumen—makes her a valuable voice in guiding brand-led growth strategies. She also offers governance insight from a consumer trust and reputation lens, critical for high-visibility industries.
Outside the boardroom, Tendai is the founder of Mum In Stilettos, a platform that inspires working mothers to thrive professionally and personally through coaching, tools, and storytelling that blend wit, wisdom, and real-life insight. Recognised among the 2024 9to5 Chick Top 100 Women in Africa, she embodies modern, people-centred leadership, balancing strategy with empathy and execution with purpose.
With a passion for authentic leadership and a belief in the power of insight-driven strategy, Tendai shares her reflections on marketing in emerging markets, digital transformation, and redefining balance for modern women leaders.
How do you translate consumer insight into strategies that both build brand equity and deliver commercial results?
“Consumer insights are only useful if they are used to drive commercial impact. I see this as a three-step process:
First: Deep insight mining. This will typically involve using multiple data sources, it could be sales data, social listening, trend analysis, and ethnography research. Using multiple sources helps build a 360-degree view because what consumers say and what they do might be different. It is therefore important to go beyond the what of consumer behavior and understand the why more deeply.
Second: Translating the insight into a strategic lens. The sweet spot for any business is when what consumers care about overlaps with the business growth objectives and capabilities.
Third: Bring everything to life through products, campaigns, and routes to market that reflect that insight—and then measure it both in terms of brand love and bottom-line improvement.
At the end of the day, insights should never just sit in a report. They should guide decisions in the boardroom and shape stories in the marketplace. That’s when they build lasting brand equity and deliver growth.”
From a marketing and brand reputation perspective, what risks should boards pay closer attention to in high-visibility sectors?
“Two key risks stand out.
First is brand authenticity. Consumers can now spot tokenism, greenwashing, or empty CSR claims instantly. Boards must ensure that brand actions genuinely align with their stated values.
Second is real-time crisis response. In the digital era, reputation damage can happen in minutes, not weeks, so boards must invest in social-listening tools and crisis protocols, and ensure decision-making happens at speed.”
What does a digitally intelligent board look like, and why does it matter?
“A digitally intelligent board is one that recognises that digital is not just social media. Too often, companies reduce digital to Facebook or TikTok posts. In reality, digital is a core business capability. It shapes how consumers behave, how products are discovered, how transactions happen, and even how supply chains operate.
For a board to be truly digitally intelligent, it must see digital as a driver of competitive advantage across marketing, commerce, operations, and data.
The best way to ensure digital fluency in the boardroom is:
- To have directors who can question assumptions on data privacy, AI ethics, e-commerce strategy, and digital-talent needs.
- To understand that digital capability is enterprise-wide, not confined to marketing, communications, or PR.
Once conversations are reframed to digital-commerce ecosystems, data-driven consumer insights, and technology-enabled distribution, business growth is unlocked immediately.
Why does this matter? Because digital transformation succeeds only when it’s championed from the very top. Without board-level understanding, digital will always be relegated to social media campaigns rather than embedded as a long-term growth engine.”
Through Mum In Stilettos, you inspire working mothers to lead with courage and authenticity. What’s your top advice for women balancing career ambition with personal priorities?
“This is such an important question and one I never take lightly. I have often heard women ask why men are never asked about ‘balancing’ careers and family, and the fact that this question is only ever asked to women highlights the extra weight women carry. When I was a new mother, balance was an area of real struggle for me, so I know how valuable it is to hear from others who have walked that road.
If I had to narrow it down, my top three lessons would be:
- Drop the myth of perfect balance. There will be seasons where your career demands more and seasons where your family needs you more. Instead of chasing ‘perfect balance,’ think of it as a rhythm and give yourself permission to adjust without guilt.
- Prioritise with intention. Your version of balance won’t look like someone else’s. Decide what truly matters to you in the season you’re in—whether that’s being home for bedtime or saying yes to a stretch project—and make peace with letting go of the rest.
- Build a support system and use it. You don’t have to do it all alone. Whether it’s a spouse, extended family, childcare, or workplace flexibility, support is not a weakness, it’s a strategy. It frees you to show up better both at work and at home.”
If you were delivering a keynote to emerging female leaders, what core message would you want them to remember?
“If I were speaking to emerging female leaders, I would want them to remember this: leadership isn’t about becoming someone else; it’s about bringing the best of who you are into the spaces you occupy.
My three takeaways would be:
- Lead boldly on your own terms. Don’t let the world shrink you into a mould. The most powerful leaders are those who stay rooted in their values, trust their instincts, and make room for their own voice.
- Courage grows in motion. You don’t need to feel 100% ready to step forward. Start where you are, take the opportunities that stretch you, and learn as you go. Confidence comes from doing, not waiting for perfect timing.
- Lift as you climb. True leadership isn’t just about your title or corner office. It’s also about the doors you open and the hands you pull up as you rise.”
Conclusion
Tendai Simende Bosha’s journey illustrates how modern leaders can marry data with empathy and digital fluency with human insight. Her approach to brand building and leadership proves that when strategy meets authenticity, disruption becomes a pathway to purposeful growth.
Her Ascent Journey is powered by Ascent Club, the premier visibility platform for African and diaspora women who are board- and speaker-ready. Through curated storytelling, media amplification, and strategic positioning, we elevate the expertise of our members so they are not only seen but sought after for the world’s most influential tables.
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