#13 Eileen Akbaraly: Why Fashion's Future Is a Living System, Not a Brand

In this episode, Philippa Hann talks to Eileen about what it takes to build a luxury fashion business where dignity, sustainability and profitability reinforce one another, why the concept of a brand is too limiting for what she is creating, and what other industries can learn from rebuilding a supply chain around the people inside it.

Eileen Akbaraly is the founder and CEO of Made for a Woman, a luxury fashion social enterprise based in Madagascar working with handwoven raffia. Half Italian, half Indian and raised in Madagascar, she trained in fashion only to find an industry obsessed with making more money rather than making better lives. After graduating she went to work in the slums of Phnom Penh, then returned home to build something different.

Six years on, Made for a Woman works with over 1,000 artisans, predominantly single mothers, gender-based violence survivors, disabled individuals and women from disadvantaged backgrounds. The company collaborates with major luxury houses, runs childcare facilities and is building a primary school, mental health centre and shelter on site. Eileen was awarded Gold for Individual Changemaker of the Year at the Global Good Awards.

In this conversation, you'll hear about:

• Why CSR cannot be bolted on later: how Eileen built her supplier relationships, certifications and company culture around impact from the foundation, so doing the right thing is structural rather than heroic
• The SHAPE model and how Made for a Woman measures social stability, health, autonomy, professional development and economic empowerment as core KPIs alongside production
• Why happier artisans produce better work, why the company is hiring a "happy manager", and how investing in wellbeing pays back in product quality and delivery
• The tension between handmade luxury and a fast-paced industry, and why even certified, B Corp, Fair Trade companies are still operating inside a system Eileen believes is fundamentally unsustainable
• Why she rejects the idea of being just a brand and is building a "living system" instead, with traceable supply chains, blockchain digital product passports, and a replication model now launching in Brazil
• How values get tested in practice: turning down well-connected collaborators and lower pricing that would have unlocked faster growth, because they did not fit the long-term vision
• Why the antidote to consumerism is community, why consumers need a real relationship with the people behind the products they buy, and what changes when that separation disappears

Key takeaway

Made for a Woman is a working argument that luxury and human flourishing are not opposites. The fashion industry has spent decades treating the people in the supply chain as invisible, then spending millions on marketing to sell the resulting products as dreams. Eileen's case, built from inside one of the world's biggest manufacturing hubs rather than from a boardroom in Europe, is that the dream is fake and the real value lives upstream, in the artisans, raw materials and communities that make the work possible. The shift is not just a better factory. It is a different definition of what luxury means and who it is for.

This podcast is intended to be of a general nature, will not be suitable for everyone, and should not be treated as a specific recommendation. We recommend taking professional advice before entering into any obligation or transaction.

Paradigm Norton Financial Planning Limited is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority. Our FCA Register number is 455083. 

Registered in England. Reg No 4220937, VAT Reg. No 918550904.

Transcript

SPEAKER_03 0:02

I'm Philip Graham, CEO of Paradigm Norton. And this is Life Matters More, where we explore ESG, sustainability, and the future of business. Welcome to Life Matters More, where we explore how people are using their money, work, and influence to build a life and a world that truly matters. Today's guest is someone who is reimagining what business can be when we stop treating people as a means to an end and instead build systems where people are the point. Eileen Accaborelli is the founder and CEO of Made for a Woman, a pioneering luxury fashion social enterprise based in Madagascar. What Eileen has done is build something far more ambitious than a fashion brand for purpose. It is a model where dignity, sustainability, and profitability are designed to reinforce one another. Her work has created opportunities for hundreds of women in vulnerable communities, providing access to healthcare, education, and personal development. In doing so, she's challenging some of the deepest assumptions in global supply chains about who creates value and who gets to keep it. It is no surprise then that she was awarded gold for Individual Changemaker of the Year at the Global Good Awards, a recognition of both what she's built and of what she is proving is possible. In a world where so many organizations still optimize, often unconsciously, for speed, scale, and short-term gain, Eileen offers a different blueprint which asks, what if we designed businesses around human flourishing from the start? Eileen, I am so delighted to have you with us today.

SPEAKER_01 1:49

Thank you so much. I'm super excited too. And it was amazing, you know, to be part of this and the awards last year. Um, it was actually our first award in a while, so it was super exciting. And so, yeah, I know I'm very happy to be here and talking about Made for a Woman.

SPEAKER_03 2:08

Well, see, this is the thing. So I go to award ceremonies, I see amazing people who've won, and I think to myself, I want to know more. So this is where we got you on, because we want to know more. Okay, let's start from the beginning. So you trained in fashion, and you could have followed quite a traditional fashion career, but you didn't. What was the moment? I always like these trigger points. What was the moment when you realized that you you wanted to build something very different?

SPEAKER_01 2:38

Yeah. So I mean, I'm actually half Italian, half Indian, and I grew up in Madagascar. So Madagascar is my country. Uh, but at the same time, you know, I've I have a multicultural background. And growing up in one of the poorest countries in the world, um, I really never understood the injustices and the differences in people's lives due to financial, you know, abilities or due to the fact that, you know, gender or or culture or, you know, whatever we sort of created a society upon, I just never understood how we could discriminate each other, despite the fact that we're all humans. And so I would, you know, be super young in Madagascar and I would be going to school, and I would see children scavenging for food or or barefoot outside not being able to afford to go to school or having their parents not give them the opportunity to because of poverty. And so I just never really accepted that. And I think that from a very young age, I tried to do everything I can to sort of be active in that aspect. Um, and then when I went to university for fashion, I realized that it's a joke. In the sense that I went to a school where, you know, I grew up in one of the poorest countries in the world, being one of the biggest manufacturing hubs in the world. And so I was excited to go to school where I would be learning about the people behind the scene, how to, you know, improve production processes, um, how to create a better world. And in reality, I found the complete opposite. I was found and surrounded by education and structures that only cared about making money. And how do we make more money? And how do we make more money? And so I just I was really rebellious around it. I I even remember that during graduation, I didn't even stay. I decided to leave for Cambodia and work at Phnom Penh with like in the slums area because it was like my rebellious state of saying I am not part of this. And so I realized like I just didn't want to live in a world like ours anymore. And I knew that we have to do something about it. We can't just keep accepting things as they are. I have a lot of people around me who, you know, kind of just say, but this is the way the world works and it is what it is. And I'm like, no. You know, you you gotta get up and you gotta put in place actions and you gotta change the world that we live in for ourselves, but for anybody else who comes along.

SPEAKER_03 5:21

Wow. Okay, that that is very strong. I love that. Thank you for for telling us that. Um, you've given me goose pimples just by by what you've spoken about there. Um so I I'm really interested in this kind of question around congruence. Like, I don't particularly like the word greenwashing, but I I prefer the word congruence, like being what you say you are uh on the inside compared to what you um to what the outside looks like. So how would I how would I know if I you know walked into Made for a Woman that it was really optimizing kind of human flourishing, if you like?

SPEAKER_01 6:01

Yeah, so um first of all, we've just created the most beautiful mural. Uh in our atelier, we have this. I I love to send you pictures, but we have this huge hand-drawn painted mural on this, because uh our atelier is a soap factory, so we have these huge walls, and we've created some sort of mural that is representative of everybody. So everyone's spirit animals, you know, we have dragons, we have whales, we have dolphins, we have the people, we have all the dogs that I have running around yesterday. So just by entering there, you're like, okay, this is very weird and very different from what I would think a factory looks like. Um, I've had people, clients from luxury brands come in and leave crying because uh they're just so touched by what we do. And and I think that I realize when people come into our space, it reminds them of who and how authentic humans can be. Um we remind, we we we are a space where we are reminded of who humans are and of our sole purpose rather than just you know falling into that program of nine to five where you know I have a role today and I have to act like, you know, I don't know, the coordinator of communication or the coordinator of a supply chain. But no, in that space, the space, the energy that I've been trying to create is you come in, we don't really care who you are, where you come from, how much money you have, what color you are, what you look like. We don't care about any of that stuff. You are welcome as you are. And our goal is to be able to support you in the ways that you need to flourish and to grow. And so we've created a whole structure that supports our artisans at an emotional and psychological level. Today we work with over 1,000 artisans coming from very disadvantaged backgrounds. We work specifically with single mothers, GBV survivors, uh, you know, disabled individuals, sex workers, um, majority are women. And we've put in place a whole social department known as, you know, the shape model, where uh we work with social assistant workers, we have psychologists, we have doctors on place, we have two childcare areas. We're putting in place the first health mental welfare center, the first primary school, the first shelter. So we've created a space where we can behave as a community, you know? Because I feel like it's so sad to think that a lot of people wake up every day miserable having to spend the majority of their lives in a job that they don't even like. How horrible is that?

SPEAKER_03 8:45

Right. Uh and so many people. So okay, I have so many questions, right? Number one, what is your spirit animal? Yeah, my spirit animal is a dolphin. Okay, number two, you mentioned the shape model. Yeah. Tell me more about that.

SPEAKER_01 9:05

Okay. So the shape model is kind of cool because it was created by one of my colleagues in reality. You know, I wanted to create a model out of what we were doing. And so uh her name is Gaia. She actually came up with it and she was kind of putting in place, you know, all the important um words that represent who we are, which are social stability, health, autonomy, professional development, and economic empowerment. And so what we try to do is we try to make sure that, you know, those remain our KPIs. That is what we're trying to measure our everyday work around. And so if we achieve that, that means that we have achieved our KPIs.

SPEAKER_03 9:44

Okay. How do you measure those as KPIs?

SPEAKER_01 9:48

So we measure them in many different ways in terms of social stability, health, autonomy. As I said, we have a whole team disposed that that spends all of their days working one-to-one with these individuals. So we have, you know, formation courses, we have sensibilizations, we have partnerships with local associations that work on health, that work in education. So we we accompany every single individual that we work with every single day. And being able to measure that every single day gives us the possibility to understand if what we're doing in the short and long term actually makes sense or not, or if we have to revisit the model so that we are sure that the lives of the people that we're working with are actually improved. And we actually have every year we have our impact report that is published on our website for free. Everyone can read it. We have also been, in the recent years, part of Chloe So Richmond Group's brand um impact report as an example of how companies should behave in business uh areas. So, I mean, you know, I think that's how we're able to measure the work that we're doing. And we're also able to measure it through the production, right? So if we see there's more stability in the lives of the people that we're working with, well, automatically our production qualities and even times are much better linked to their well-being, right? And so that's what people forget is that you know, people push on all the more stress-related aspects. So produce, produce, produce, but people don't like they don't realize that if you invest a little more time in the health of the people producing these beautiful handmade products, well, automatically production will be so much better in so many ways, right? Um just I could not agree with you more.

SPEAKER_03 11:50

Like happy person does good work.

SPEAKER_01 11:53

Yeah, we're actually hiring a happy manager right now. Yeah, I like that.

SPEAKER_03 12:00

Yeah, that's we're gonna have to dig into that. Um, so okay, so let's move on to the structure a little bit because uh and your happy manager may well form part of kind of the the this question that's going around my head around people listening might be saying to themselves, this all sounds heroic, frankly. Like this is so far away from anything I've ever heard or experienced, sadly. Um like structurally, what have you had to put in place that that actually makes this the easy thing to do rather than the heroic thing to do?

SPEAKER_01 12:38

Yeah, so I think it's a foundation, right? When I started Made for a Woman, I asked myself the questions that I needed to ask to know what was going to be the foundation and the company culture of Made for a Woman. And so, you know, CSR or impact isn't just, you know, a part of what we do. No, it is the essence of who we are. And so when I started, I made sure that whatever suppliers I was gonna work with, whoever the artisans I was gonna work with, whoever the collaborators I'm gonna work with, they shared my values. So I made sure that when I was looking for suppliers, they were certified, even if Madagascar, I mean, it's almost impossible to find certified suppliers. Um, so I made sure that I was able to contact suppliers in Madagascar that were certified. I went to visit them. I actually filmed the first supply chain documentary on Rafia ever with a friend of mine who works at National Geographic, uh, really showcasing what Rafia is, where it comes from, and the opportunities and the threats around it, right? I had no idea it came from a palm tree. And so I think when you start a business, you really need to understand why you're doing what you're doing and what objective do you have in the long term, right? And if that objective is only for your personal, you know, accomplishments, that's great. I'm not judging. That's really great. But when you're trying to create something with real impact, you need to, you need to understand what kind of impact are you about to create and how many lives around you are you willing to impact, right? And so when you start off from that mindset, I just feel like everything that you create around it just embodies that. And therefore, it's not heroic what we're doing, but it's really embedded in the structure of who we are as an enterprise.

SPEAKER_03 14:46

And everyone believes in it.

SPEAKER_01 14:48

Yeah, everyone believes in it. I mean, you know, I've been able to do things that apparently are things that I need to mention, but I thought that were normal. But like, you know, I don't have an office. I work in between all the artisans, I know all their names, I know where they come from, I've been to their homes, I've been to their family gatherings, I've like, I just know them because we're all humans. Like, I don't know. I feel like just mentioning this is kind of strange. But um, you know, and like being able to treat another person with dignity is the most important thing in the world. No matter how many amazing projects you want to put in place, how many amazing social impact KPIs you have, if you're not able to look into someone else's eye and just be vulnerable with that person and say, sure, we don't come from the same financial background. Sure, you know, you've had a different childhood than I have, but I'm just here like you as a human, and I want a better life, just like you do. So let's work together to make that happen, right? And just from that perspective, everything you do changes.

SPEAKER_03 16:00

Yeah, yeah, I totally get it. I mean that that word humanity is so strong, isn't it? It's so strong. I was reading some research the other day about um the effect of purpose on longevity. And it was a 14-year longitudinal study, and they they corrected for age, they corrected for socioeconomic circumstances, they corrected for sort of those external things, and they could not get away from the fact that people who had a stated purpose, didn't matter how old they were, didn't matter what their financial circumstances were, lived longer than people who did not have a purpose, which I just thought was wild. Really, really amazing. That's beautiful. In all of this, which I utterly love and completely agree with, you still have to have a long-term sustainable business because there's no point in you being so lovely that your business goes under. So, how do you hold the line? Where does where is that line when you're looking at speed, scale, you know, when all those the profitability questions are pushing you in potentially a different direction? How do you manage that as a balancing act?

SPEAKER_01 17:09

Yeah, so I think it's a lot of work in progress. It's a lot of trial and error, right? You gotta you gotta see what works and you gotta stick to what works, right? And so we're an enterprise that was created six years ago. Um, you know, I started with Meet for a Woman, just the brand, and then I got contacted by some of these huge luxury brands who wanted and who wanted to start collaborating with us officially, right? Which honestly had never happened in the fashion industry in the past at the level that we were able to do. And so um it's it's very interesting because it's still a lot of work that we need to manage and and balance out because our priority is the well-being of our artisans. And so, how do you manage that in a fast-paced industry when it's luxury? So, going from two extreme polarities, which is we're producing handmade products that take days to make and that cannot be machine made, working in an industry that expects perfect looking products at a fast-paced, you know, way uh with deliverables. Um, and so yeah, it's a lot of balancing out, it's a lot of trying out, it's a lot of trying to understand how we can and what can we implement on a daily basis to make sure that the artisans that we're working with are getting what they need to fit the demands and then and the needs that they need to actually produce accordingly, right? And so it's really, really interesting. Um, but I must say that the way the fashion industry works, it's it's not it's not sustainable. You know, it's really not sustainable. Um even if you know you're certified, even if you know you you've got it all. We're B Corp, we're fair uh uh fair trade, you know, we've got it all. Um despite that, the the way the industry is so fast-paced, it's it's really hard to keep up. And so six years of of working in this industry and and getting amazing feedback, being able to work with some of these luxury brands at a very close level and really understanding their side, but also the fact that a lot of them actually do want to support industries like ours. Um I'm I'm starting to really uh re-evaluate our internal strategies um to see how can we, as made for women, not behave as a brand, because I think the concept of a brand is pretty limiting, but how can we be part of a new way of doing fashion, of a new system? And so that's where it becomes interesting because uh you gotta create a lot of new things, and that's that's fun.

SPEAKER_03 20:03

Wow. So sort of a movement more than a brand.

SPEAKER_01 20:08

Yeah, a movement. I I call it the living system divided between the nervous system and just a little, a lot of different things, but a living system, and and to be honest, I completely agree with you. It's beautiful to be, you know, all happy and and being able to please the needs of your artisans, but you gotta be a profitable company, right? And so for us to have reached the goals that we have until today and to be able to reach the objectives that we want to reach, um, we've had to really diversify ourselves, right? We are a seasonal material, which is rafia, and therefore um there's a seasonality that is embedded in that. And so, how can we as a company diversify ourselves so that even if you know we're we diversify, we're able to keep going and keep growing and keep investing in the projects that we want to invest. And so from the beginning, I was really able to diversify um in in different sectors, but also with different companies, so that our cash flow could really follow up and support the work that we're doing.

SPEAKER_03 21:19

Do you know what comes to mind when you when you when you were talking there is that buyer choice um and just how important buyer choice is in in driving this. I love living system, that's great. Um and and that's but that's part of that living system, isn't it? It's it's choosing where people are able um to be part of the living system as opposed to the fast fast fashion system.

SPEAKER_01 21:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 21:45

Yeah. So what you're doing is hard, right? Um rewarding hard. Uh like So where where where is this gonna break if it's gonna break? And like What what do you do about shoring that part up?

SPEAKER_01 22:03

I don't allow it to break in the sense that if I feel like, you know, we've the idea is to be able to create a pattern and see how the pattern works. If I see no more consistency in that pattern, I decide to change. So I decide to diversify myself. I feel like there are so many opportunities of growth here that you can't break, right? I don't know if it's because I grew up in Africa. I feel like when you grew up in Africa, there is no limit to anything because you gotta create everything, right? And so it's super motivating compared to a lot of my friends who grew up in Europe, unfortunately, and feel like they're limited due to bureaucracy or administration, or you know, it's just like I really, you know, I also grew up with a father who's an entrepreneur and who's delusional. So maybe that also helps, but I was wondering about your child, and you were the children. But yeah, I just I cannot understand where it would break. I think the moment it breaks is the moment where you haven't you haven't been able to create so many different monetizing streams and to diversify yourself so much, it just like it can't break, right? Maybe a few things won't work out, but if you're able to put in place structures and strategies that support that core value, so the foundation of what you are, it's like it's an unstoppable. You you keep going on and on. And I think today, thanks to social media, it's even more democratize. Democratized, is that how you said it in English?

SPEAKER_03 23:45

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 23:45

I feel like, you know, we don't need to follow certain structures the way they used to work, right? You know, especially in fashion. I remember when I started, I was 25, you know, and a lot of people in fashion think that they know it all. So it's uh it's it's pretty, it's it's pretty impressive how they think they're so god similar, like. And so there's like these structures you have to follow. Well, you gotta go to fairs and you gotta meet up, meet up with showrooms, and you gotta do this, and you cannot do this, and you have to be like this, and you cannot use African models, and you don't, you can't use the word ethnic, and you cannot do this. I'm like, whoa, there's so much of things that I feel like I'm limiting myself and and I'm not being able to use and be my full potential. And now with social media, the fact that maybe it's too much. It is true, there is a lot of information out there, but I feel like you can kind of create a version of yourself that you want without feeling judged or limited, and you will always find an audience who is interested in that, right? Because you're reaching 8 billion people.

SPEAKER_03 24:57

Right? I mean those imagined walls. So I I was I was gonna ask you a question about, you know, do you ever wish you would you had done this the conventional way? But I think you've just told me the answer there. I've just ignored everything that everyone ever told me and done it my own way.

SPEAKER_01 25:16

I mean, I try to listen to them sometimes, but I think when you have such a strong soul calling, or when you're very intuitive or very sensitive, it's like it's really annoying because you can't go against it. And sometimes I'm just like, shut up. Like, I don't want to listen to you. Let me like, you know, follow people, let me do what everyone else is doing because it looks safe. And there's something inside of you, it's like, no, this is not your way, this is not how it's gonna work. Um, and so yeah, I've really had to listen to my voice a lot more throughout the years.

SPEAKER_03 25:52

Yeah. I mean, sense J but brave and driven. I mean, you've got to have some backbone to go out there and say, I'm just gonna ignore all the advice you gave me, and I'm just gonna do this because I know in my heart that it's right.

SPEAKER_02 26:05

Hi, I'm Karen Sutton, founder of the Global Good Awards, and we're thrilled to be partnering with Paradigm Norton to bring you this podcast. We exist to celebrate the people and organizations out there creating real lasting change in the world, and we'd love you to be part of it. If you think you've delivered something special, then find Global Good Awards online and consider putting in an entry or two. Now enjoy the rest of the podcast.

SPEAKER_03 26:27

You spoke about the fashion industry being broken. What would it look like if your model was the norm rather than what is it currently the norm?

SPEAKER_01 26:40

Well, first of all, everything that happens throughout the supply chain wouldn't be invisible, right? You know, we're we're we're creating these beautiful products, but everything behind it isn't beautiful. You know, we're working around, so this is how fashion works today. Um, brands have designers that produce beautiful products according to what society thinks is beautiful or whatever. Um, and then they receive these products, and then there's a whole communication marketing team that invests millions on creating unrealistic dreams around these products. That's exactly what's happening, and that's what's driving the values of our society today, right? And this is where this scarcity mindset is created. Oh, I don't have enough of this, I don't look enough like that, I am not enough. Uh, when I will have these products, I will feel better. But in reality, we know it doesn't actually bring you to actually feeling better, right? So today that is what fashion is, when there is so much invisible beauty that can be redistributed in terms of budget, um, reallocating budgets throughout the supply chain. I feel like if fashion companies really sat back for an instant and re-reevalued their values and the foundations of who they are, right? Of who the designers created these brands, like you know, all of these big brands were created by geniuses of art, of creativity. I doubt they would be happy with the way their companies went towards, which is only profit-driven, right? And so when you're only profit-driven, you create very confused individuals who are always going to be unhappy and confused about their surroundings and about themselves. And so it's really important to be able to create a system that supports these tangible products, but in a more sustainable manner. And that is why, you know, a big part of the work that we're doing today is how can we change consumer behavior? How can we allow consumers to feel part of something greater than just themselves, right? Because you know, you go in a store and you buy a product and it's beautiful and it's great, and you feel great around it. And sometimes you buy an expensive product because it tells you a dream that they've created around it, and you feel part of that dream. But it limits you there. If you engage consumers, and consumers can feel part of the supply chain, can feel like they're part of the development of a product or of anything around the industry, they will have a completely different relationship to fashion itself. Because they're not the things that they own, you mean. And the things that they own, because there's no more separation. They are part of something. And so when you are separated, it's so easy for you not to care about what you buy and what you own. When you start having a more direct emotional connection to that, and you see that what you're buying has a bigger impact than just of your instant desires, you start shifting the way you see things, the way things work, the the things that you value, and it's it's continuous. And that's how, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 30:34

Yeah, yeah. I um uh I've been looking at this question of self-perception and how and and it's into relationship with um cognitive dissonance. So we all have this self-perception of ourselves, and generally people will go around thinking, well, I'm a good person, uh, I'm trustworthy, I'm ethical, I, you know, I'm a nice person, I try and do good in the world. And when we don't, uh we we fall then into this cognitive dissonance where we fall into justification and rationalization or moral distancing, um, where we're not asking the questions, where we're not um we're not asking ourselves, what if this was a child that was making this in a third world? Would I be happy to wear that? Um, and so I think I love what you're saying there around, well, let's just bring that to the forefront. Like let's have that conversation, let's make sure that people who are buying things know where it's come from so they can make those decisions according to their own values, and everybody has values. And I arguably I think we all have a bit of work to do on our values to try and um actually be able to articulate them so that when we come up against them, we're able to say, Oh gosh, one of my values is treating other people fairly, and I'm not sure I am, and I have to ask myself why. So I love that sort of let's be really honest about this stuff and bring these stories, um bring these stories out to the consumer. And actually, for you, the consumer, I guess, are the brands that you're perhaps working with or brands who were putting um clothes into shops or onto you know online um environments for people to buy. So we talked about values a little bit there. Have your values been tested? I mean, when when they must have been tested at some point. When give us an example of when your values have been tested.

SPEAKER_01 32:31

So my values have been tested. Not as much as I think they'd be, but that's because I do a lot of work on myself. Like the majority of the time I do that because I want to lead responsibly. And so like I do a lot of, I'm a very responsible person. I don't know what that means about me or what issues I have, but um I try to be very responsible in the way I do things. But yeah, my values have been tested specifically at the beginning, where I, you know, people were very drawn to the project and my passion. And there was a huge like trend and hit around raffia and raffia products. And I remember that I had been approached by different, you know, experienced individuals who wanted to work with me and who wanted to design with me and who wanted to bring me to the best showrooms. And and I remember at first I'd be like super excited and be like, oh my God, she used to work at like, I don't know, Yves Saint Laurent, and now she wants to work with me, and this is incredible. Like, wow. And I would start working with the person, and and small things about the person would show me that we we're just not compatible at a at a more deeper level, right? And so I remember at the beginning it was really, really hard for me, first of all, to I have I had a problem with confrontation in general. I've always had that, being grown up in a specific environment. So I hated confrontation. Um and I would become a bit passive aggressive. And so um, and I remember I would have to make choices. I'd be like, okay, well, if I continue working with people like this, I know that they will be open doors for us here, here, here, here. And I know that we will be able to be known faster, or that's what I thought was possible. Yeah. And every single time I said no, that I was not going to be able to do that, even if it was going to take me longer to succeed or get me where I want to get. Um, there are many times, you know, clients would tell me that our pricing was too high. I could have lowered our pricing. Um, I could have, you know, worked with these people, I could have made all these choices that, you know, would give us the faster success, but I decided not to because I saw the long-term vision that came along with what I wanted to do. And it just didn't fit together.

SPEAKER_03 35:08

So you you spoke there. I mean, so there's some tough choices there. I mean, realistically, actually, there are you you I can see how that sort of rationalization of, well, for the greater good, I'm gonna, you know, get in bed with this, you know, company that actually doesn't quite fit my values, but you know, maybe I can change them from within or or whatever. You talked about doing work on yourself. What does that look like?

SPEAKER_01 35:33

Yeah, I think a lot of it at the beginning came from like I I grew up being extremely insecure. I wasn't great at school. So I think school drove a lot of insecurities in who I was. And so I wanted to make sure that what I was doing didn't just come from, you know, personal just ego, right? Like I wanted success, I wanted to prove to others that I was capable, admiration. I I just wanted to know the reasons why I was doing what I was doing, and if there were insecurities, where they came from and why they existed, and do the work so that I could, you know, be a better example to the people that I work with and my team, um, and keep inspiring them. Because at the end of the day, when you're the founder of a company, you have a bunch of things you got to deal with, but you need to make sure that you inspire the people that you work with because you know that's all that matters. If they're not inspired, it's done. So, did that involve working with a coach, with a psychotherapist? So a lot of um a lot of courses, I have a few mentors that I follow and I do their work. Um, I have unconventional therapists that I've worked with, either like an at an energetic level. Um, I'm very I'm very connect, like the dolphins I was telling you about. I do a lot of, I have a weird connection with dolphins. So I've done a lot of like um dolphin meditation. So the meditating at the frequency of what dolphins and whales. So I do a lot of weird stuff.

SPEAKER_03 37:18

I mean, I could keep talking about that, but let's move on. That's yeah, I'm glad I asked. That's really interesting. I mean, just but just to expose yourself to that stuff and say, is this working for me? Is this not working for me? Can I do this by myself? No, I can't do this by myself. And if I need to know myself, it's sort of the false jihari window, isn't it? You know, the bit of me that I don't know and and no one else knows, and how do I find that part of me? Um, so moving on to kind of um, you know, the people listening to this may well be on boards, they may well, they will be almost certainly working in companies, uh, they may be running companies. I if you could change one thing about how business operates globally, what you know, here's your magic wand. What what what would it be?

SPEAKER_01 38:06

I think we have a very strange relationship to money. Um our society has a very uh strange relationship to money. And if we were able to have a different relationship with money and understand that, you know, just like anything else, money is energy, you know, I feel like a lot of people don't really understand our full potential, right? You know, when you look into quantum physics and when you start studying a little bit and who we are and how we fit in this universe as frequencies, as energies, and how you know, when you start kind of understanding how this whole process really works, you start realizing that everything you attract and everything that you are is a reflection of how you feel internally, right? And so one of my mentors does mention that when you have a business or whatever you have, like 80% of the work is internal and 20% is external, and it's true because we are what we see, and it took me a very long time to fully understand that, but I completely see it and I've realized that it's true. And so if people actually realize their full potential, which is very different from what society wants us to see ourselves as, because as we can tell, you know, we're structured to fit into consultancy companies that execute. We're brought up in schools that limit us and prepare us to work at very average jobs. Um, it doesn't really go work and understand and remind you of what you're capable of doing. And because of that, you know, we're we're limited and we start thinking that if you know, I need to, if I need to live properly, I need to make more money. But it's all very matter to matter, right? It's like very, I need to work really hard or I need to do this to get the money that I want, to then live the life that I want, to get the affirmations that I need from other people and the external validations, and and this way of working isn't true.

SPEAKER_03 40:22

It's fake, it's a fake belief. Yeah, I mean, the stories we tell ourselves. I've I'll I'll just I'll just make another million and then I'll be fine and then I'll be happy.

SPEAKER_01 40:34

Exactly. These belief systems are fake. We need to change our belief systems. We really need to redefine that.

SPEAKER_03 40:41

Yeah. Yeah. Well, the um the Harvard Adult Development Study that's been as the longest uh longitudinal study, I think, ever. So it started back in the 30s. I don't know if you've there's a book called The Good Life, um, where they they they interviewed people and then they interviewed their their children, and I think they're now interviewing their grandchildren. So it's been going about 80 years, I think. And the conclusion, spoiler for anyone on the book, the conclusion they came to is that the good life um is about relationships, it's about good quality relationships. And I think the antidote to consumerism, the antidote to individualism is community. I really, really strongly believe that. Uh and that is the antidote, you know, so people are happier when they spend time with other people, they're not happier when they buy stuff. I mean, there have been numerous reports and numerous pieces of research about materialism and actually how damaging that is for life satisfaction. So I think the science absolutely backs up what you're saying then. A paradigm Norton, we believe money matters, but life matters more. That's why we put people, purpose, and long-term impact at the heart of financial planning. As an employee-owned B-Cork business, sustainability is central to how we think about wealth, helping you invest in ways that support responsible business practices. So by working with us, you can feel confident that your money is working for your future and the world you want to live in. But what about for made for a woman? What does what does the future for you look like? I mean, what's the future of fashion? Um, you know, what what does that look like?

SPEAKER_01 42:31

Um, so you know, we've we've been able to the supplier job for a while, we've sort of got into the made for a woman brand, but I find it kind of limiting. And so right now we're really um working on, you know, three different pillars, and these pillars include um traceability. So we're putting in place the first traceable supply chain in Madagascar regarding raw material as our pilot project through blockchain AI. And so that will give us the opportunity to first of all control our supply chain, but also be able to fully understand, you know, every step of the way. Um, starting 2027-28, if I'm not wrong, there are regulations in the EU that are changing around DDPs, the digital passports, that they will be like needed. And so that's a huge step forward, in my opinion, and we're starting ahead. Um, this will give us the possibility to also work on a platform where we want to co-create with consumers and really get uh create a dialogue between the people behind the scene and the consumers. I think that's really lacking, you know. A lot of time consumers are the ones that buy, but they have zero decision making in product making, you know? And so being able to create a relationship. Between artisan and consumer is really going to change a lot of things around behaviors and relationship and transparency and dialogue. I think that's essential. And also, we're working on a replication model. So today our business model uh works pretty well in Madagascar. So as I mentioned, the shape model, and we want to be able to replicate this in different areas around the world. So we're starting with Brazil. We've brought this project to Brazil with an NGO, and we're going to start doing the same thing. So work locally with raw materials, implement social impact projects for the communities, and then create more traceable supply chains in those areas. Therefore, you know, we we can start actually see how and if you know this concept actually works and what is the feedback we get from the people working on the products, uh, but also the people who are interested in in being part of this community.

SPEAKER_03 45:07

Amazing. Well, I would love to have you back on uh once you've got that up and running and to hear more about that. That's really exciting. Okay, we are gonna finish up this podcast with just a few quick fire, a bit more fun questions. Um, okay, so I want you to finish this sentence. Luxury is.

SPEAKER_01 45:30

Luxury is authentic.

SPEAKER_03 45:34

Oh, okay. No, you're gonna have to tell me more. Or luxury should be authentic. Why'd you say that? Why'd you that's it? I wasn't expecting you to say that word.

SPEAKER_01 45:47

Uh authentic? Yeah. Um, because if you really go and analyze luxury, like the term luxury, right? Luxury is about putting in value, right? It's something that should put in value the essence of handwork, the essence of quality. And all of that, if you're gonna look at the highest potential of anything in this world, and when we're talking about luxury, that's what we're we're focusing on. It should always be authentic.

SPEAKER_03 46:22

Yeah. Okay. I love how the way your brain works, Hadith. All right. Best piece of advice you have ever received. Trust yourself.

SPEAKER_01 46:38

Yeah, and you are you are the epitome of that, aren't you? Yeah. Don't be so hard on yourself, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 46:46

Oh, right. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, because if you're beating yourself up, um yeah, if you're beating yourself up, you can't do stuff because you are telling yourself a story again about what you can't do. Um, and finally, I just want a moment that made you think this is what I do it.

SPEAKER_01 47:07

The lives of the people that I work with. I mean, I I've worked with certain individuals that came from nothing, that came from like disastrous backgrounds, and in less than six months, I saw a completely new person. And that's the most beautiful feeling in the world. Yeah, most beautiful.

SPEAKER_03 47:31

Eileen, thank you so much. You have been a wonderful podcast guest. I feel so inspired by you. I love the words that you use. They speak to me, the community, impact, flourishing, and you know, changing lives. It really is um and I I certainly feel inspired by you, and I and I hope our listeners do too. As always, thank you everybody for joining us. Um, if you have enjoyed this podcast, please do tell your friends, subscribe, send it to somebody else, and as always, keep asking good questions.

SPEAKER_00 48:11

This podcast is intended to be of a general nature, will not be suitable for everyone, and should not be treated as a specific recommendation. We recommend taking professional advice before entering into any obligation or transaction. Paradigm Norton Financial Planning Limited is authorized and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority.