SHAWNA KAYE LESTER, FOUNDER AND CEO, MEMORABLE ESSAY

Q: What strategies do you employ to #InspireInclusion within your own sphere of influence? How are you investing in yourself, and in other women/girls, to accelerate progress and empowerment?”

A: My life mission is to enjoy a life that is free, present, and full, and to inspire others to do the same. That’s what drives the work I do with Memorable Essay, a boutique admissions consulting company I founded in 2016, after helping others land highly selective educational opportunities for years.

I inspire inclusion by:

1. Including myself wherever I want to make an impact instead of waiting to be chosen. Early last year, I decided it was time to bring a world-class summit to the Caribbean, to serve as the vehicle for the personal and professional development of medical students and doctors in the region, or with an interest in the region. So I created the Caribbean Medical Professionals’ Summit (CAMPS), and the inaugural staging will take place May 31-June 2, 2024 at the Jamaica Pegasus. This year’s IWD theme speaks to the inclusion of women in leadership and decision-making positions, in particular, and I don’t wait to be asked to lead, I just do. CAMPS is one example of that.

2. As the founder of Memorable Essay, I am also an entrepreneur. To be a successful entrepreneur, you have to grow. To grow, I consistently place myself under the leadership of other women who are authentic, transparent, and excellent at what they do. Over the last decade, I have invested in personal and small-group mentorship from a money mindset coach, a relationship coach for high-achieving women; a life coach and therapist; and a few business coaches — all women. These women have all accelerated my growth, and I hope that by investing in their transformative services, I have encouraged and empowered them.

3. In my daily work with Memorable Essay, I help women and men to secure highly selective educational opportunities. I love supporting women from diverse geographies; for example, in the space of a few years, I supported three women from Ghana, Jamaica, and China, to help them become members of the Schwarzman Scholars Program, the first scholarship created to respond to the geopolitical landscape of the 21st Century. They work in very different sectors, but they are all incredible leaders. I now specialise in helping doctors trained outside of the United States match into residency and fellowship opportunities. Here, too, the women I support are from different geographies, with the majority being from Caribbean medical schools. Most are sincere and powerful, but sometimes they don’t see that clearly or articulate it well. I try to accelerate their progress and empowerment by helping them to not only package themselves competitively, but also to know that they’re an invaluable asset to the spaces that decide to include them and they must navigate these spaces accordingly.