Mercy Tyra: Even when they call you bossy, keep leading

Mercy Tyra, an award-winning journalist, firmly believes that leadership is not a person or a position. It is about making others better as a result of your presence and making sure that impact lasts in your absence. She owes this perception to the Women in News Accelerator training programme, which she completed in December 2020.

The programme aims to increase women’s leadership and voices in the news. They do so by equipping women journalists and editors with the skills, strategies, and support networks to take on greater leadership positions within their organisations. It's currently open for applications.

Mercy became a WINner after three trials in 2017, 2018 and 2019. 

At the time, Mercy worked as the only woman at a radio station. She had bagged many journalism awards from the Media Council of Kenya but was nagged by patriarchal attitudes towards her. 

“They felt some sort of inferiority complex, wondering why it had to be, me, the only lady, capable of winning all these awards. I was very frustrated and ended up depressed. As a result, I was later diagnosed with subarachnoid haemorrhage. This was a condition that made my brain bleed. And immediately after the diagnosis, I knew I had to get help. Now my aim was to best position myself as a woman in this industry and still be able to achieve greatness,” she says.

There was some resistance from her employer when she applied for the programme at first, as they wondered how she would balance that with her daily duties at the station. 

“Women are multitaskers, and I managed to convince my boss as much,” she adds. 

“I never knew one could be a woman, and still be a leader in media. This was empowering to me and I could not wait to get back to work and implement all these skills I had learnt,” she says of the programme. Each cohort member was assigned a career coach which helped propel her to achieve her career goals. 

“Nothing great comes easy, and nothing easy can ever equate to greatness. It was for this reason that I quit my job recently. I had to re-strategise  my priorities once more. I knew I would not be able to achieve my goals as listed on my career road map. When I go back to work, because I would not be able to fully administer the skills acquired in that working environment. So with the greatness bestowed in me, just like the Israelites were assigned, Canaan was for sure my next and only destination. And at this point, Canaan for me, was registering to go back to school, that was my holy grail,” she adds.

Mercy gained a scholarship out of the networking she did during the training sessions, and, currently, she is doing an online Master’s Class course for journalists and writing about social economic and health issues. She was also the first runners up in the African Women in Media (AWIM)-Story Pitch Zone Awards, 2020. Additionally, she won first place in the Merck More than a Mother East African Media Awards, 2021- radio category. She had pitched a story about infertility in men. 

Her leadership journey has been filled with challenges, but she counts each experience as worthy and necessary. Her mantra? Even if they call you bossy, keep leading.