The power of mentoring
We did not know what we were getting ourselves into when we applied to be part of Chicas Poderosas’ New Ventures Lab first cohort.
It was November 2017, and Malquerida — the first journalism project entirely run by women in Peru — had been publishing stories by women, for everyone, during the past 14 months. We were slowly but firmly finding Malquerida’s true self with one goal in mind: to celebrate and enhance the work of more female journalists, writers, illustrators. We wanted to bring stories dismissed by traditional media to the front row because we believed (and, certainly, still do believe) the voice of the author and her place in the world are not neutral but, instead, shape the portrayal of stories. The world is a grey place when you only get to read the same story, told by the same voices, over and over. We wanted to disrupt the patriarchal narrative in journalism.
After a year on the run, we had reached some milestones and our community was growing. But we needed to start thinking bigger. That’s when we found out about Chicas Poderosas’ New Ventures Lab, the 17-week accelerator for women-led media projects in Latin America.
We met our mentors Akoto Ofori-Atta, Senior Editor at The Trace, and Leonor Mamanna, Senior Photo Editor at Pursuits, the luxury brand at Bloomberg, as part of the NVL program right after it begun. It was February and our Sunday meetings on Hangouts became a ritual. We got used to know what hour was in different time zones as we were joining from New York, Washington, Lima, Madrid. In our first conversation Akoto and Leonor asked: “what do you want to achieve in the weeks we have ahead?” We said we were very concerned about sustainability, and the first piece of priceless advice was put in place: Akoto and Leonor cut down an enormous, abstract goal as “sustainability” into pieces of concrete, feasible objectives. And they gently pushed us to look in the right direction: partnerships.
Placing our stories in platforms other than Malquerida was an idea that had been around for a while. Through partnering we could accomplish two purposes: to generate income and to take a space we have been told too many times that did not belong to us. But, for over a year until then, we never set partnerships as a priority. We did not grasp all its possibilities. We did not know where to start. Sometimes mentoring does not mean to shine a light in the unknown, to come with a brand new answer like a magician pulls a rabbit out of a hat. Mentoring sometimes means to point out where square one is.
And that’s what Akoto and Leonor did for us. Together we made a list of publications we would like to work with, including those belonging to our wildest dreams. Why not dreaming? Who was going to read the list other than ourselves, anyway? The number of media from all over the world kept growing. Any publication we could think of, we noted it down: top magazines like The New Yorker; feminist media like Bitch or Lenny Letter, investigative journalism like Ojo Público. If a genius in a lamp would have visited us on that week, we would have had a hard time picking only three wishes.
After selecting the Malquerida stories we believed were most likely to be re-published, Akoto and Leonor helped us to match them to publications in our dream list. As if they have not been generous enough yet, they provided invaluable feedback on our pitches and shared their contacts with us. You do not learn this in college: it is the power of community. However, the secret ingredient of success isn’t knowing the right people — contacts may or may not be part of it. What made a lasting impact on us was that, thanks to Akoto and Leonor, we were setting weekly goals towards a broader objective. Without mentoring, we may still be thinking whether partnering was or was not a good idea.
In mid-April we received wonderful news: one publication we deeply love and admire will be publishing one of our stories! We cannot share more details for now because it won’t be until late May but what we can tell you is: it’s been quite a journey. Looking back, one could think that all it takes is sending an email to the right person, but behind that final ‘click’ there are tones of hard work and the endless support from many people, especially super talented women. Thanks to the mentoring we are receiving in Chicas Poderosas, a rocky, sloping hill is all of a sudden shifting in a smooth, wide road where all the traffic lights keep turning green.
