Diana Ninsiima BIOGRAPHY

I am currently serving as DOT Tanzania’s Country Director, Womenfy International’s Founding Member, UN Women Tanzania’s Civil Society Advisory Group Member, Ashoka East Africa Visionary Leader, Acumen East Africa Fellow, and One Campaign Africa’s Gender Equality Activist. 

I currently manage, pioneer and champion for innovation and funding in the youth sector in Tanzania. Under my leadership, DOT Tanzania is also the curator and host of two large annual events: the Tanzania Youth Digital Summit (TYDS) and Dare to Change Tanzania Social Innovators Conference. I have extensive experience diplomatically convening and activating large networks of stakeholders and partners towards actionable and impactful goals. 

As an advocate for gender, I was selected amongst the top 45 most powerful activists at the frontlines of gender equality across Africa by the ONE Campaign, which led to the subsequent formation of One Africa’s Gender Equality Group and co-writing the International Women’s Day open letter to World Leaders and the G7 Summit in 2018. I was also recently nominated to become Equals Access Coalition Global Chair, coordinating global partner organisations such as ITU, Microsoft, The World Bank, GSMA and World Economic Forum among others. 

I am dedicated to enabling organisations and communities embed gender-inclusive practices into their culture. I have been invited to integrate my feminist leadership and gender perspectives lens into programs by SWISSAID to conduct their gender and innovation study; I am a part of co-designing UNDP’s Innovation Facility to mainstream gender and innovation; As a member of the UN Women’s Civil Society Advisory Group (CSAG), I am a channel for counsel that will strategically strengthen UN Women's work with the Civil Society and local communities in Tanzania heading to 2030. 

At a national level, I sit in similar coalitions and working groups such as the Skills Development Working Group within Tanzania’s Ministry of Education and as a member of the taskforce designing the National Informations, Communication and Technology (ICT) skills framework, within the Ministry of Science and Technology. 

My leadership values are anchored in Acumen’s moral leadership - as an Acumen fellow in East Africa and an Ashoka Visionary Leader, I am conscious of systems thinking and practices to create healthier systems, unlocking change, being adaptive and shifting consistently. This strong foundation is critical to building strong ecosystem partnership modalities.

I am currently serving as DOT Tanzania’s Country Director, Woman International’s Founding Member, UN Women Tanzania’s Civil Society Advisory Group Member, Ashoka East Africa Visionary Leader, Acumen East Africa Fellow, and One Campaign Africa’s Gender Equality Activist. 

I currently manage, pioneer and champion for innovation and funding in the youth sector in Tanzania. Under my leadership, DOT Tanzania is also the curator and host of two large annual events: the Tanzania Youth Digital Summit (TYDS) and Dare to Change Tanzania Social Innovators Conference. I have extensive experience diplomatically convening and activating large networks of stakeholders and partners towards actionable and impactful goals. 

As an advocate for gender, I was selected amongst the top 45 most powerful activists at the frontlines of gender equality across Africa by the ONE Campaign, which led to the subsequent formation of One Africa’s Gender Equality Group and co-writing the International Women’s Day open letter to World Leaders and the G7 Summit in 2018. I was also recently nominated to become Equals Access Coalition Global Chair, coordinating global partner organisations such as ITU, Microsoft, The World Bank, GSMA and World Economic Forum among others. 

I am dedicated to enabling organisations and communities embed gender-inclusive practices into their culture. I have been invited to integrate my feminist leadership and gender perspectives lens into programs by SWISSAID to conduct their gender and innovation study; I am a part of co-designing UNDP’s Innovation Facility to mainstream gender and innovation; As a member of the UN Women’s Civil Society Advisory Group (CSAG), I am a channel for counsel that will strategically strengthen UN Women's work with the Civil Society and local communities in Tanzania heading to 2030. 

At a national level, I sit in similar coalitions and working groups such as the Skills Development Working Group within Tanzania’s Ministry of Education and as a member of the taskforce designing the National Informations, Communication and Technology (ICT) skills framework, within the Ministry of Science and Technology. 

My leadership values are anchored in Acumen’s moral leadership - as an Acumen fellow in East Africa and an Ashoka Visionary Leader, I am conscious of systems thinking and practices to create healthier systems, unlocking change, being adaptive and shifting consistently. This strong foundation is critical to building strong ecosystem partnership modalities.