Amani Nabil Arafa is an Egyptian engineer and business pioneer who broke through the field of energy engineering to become the first Egyptian woman to work as an energy contractor, responsible for managing the installation and supplies for energy stations, and the first woman business owner of a private energy contracting company in Egypt. In this interview, Amani talks about her exceptional journey in the public domain, her successful career that spanned over twenty years in a male-dominated work sphere, and her efforts to mentor young business entrepreneurs.

Amani commenced the interview by tracing her first steps into energy engineering. She earned her university degree in Structural Engineering, from Ain Shams University, then worked for two years in the field, before receiving her first job offer from a natural gas company in the year 2000. Since then, Amani has worked in energy and natural gas engineering, offering technical and executive solutions to projects in Egypt and abroad. She also holds an MBA, a diploma in project management, and a corporate organization and management certificate, among her other qualifications.

On her experience as a woman working in energy engineering, Amani stressed that the early stages of her career were very challenging, since the number of women engineers in the energy sector was very limited, which she attributed to the harsh working conditions, and the deliberate exclusion of women. Amani recounted her experience with rejection and exclusion in the workplace, which was directed at her for no other reason but for being a woman. She started her career as an employed engineer in a major natural gas company, where she proved her aptitude and proficiency, and earned the trust of the company’s executive leadership. However, some of her colleagues and managers saw that there was definitely a man who could take her place no matter how competent she was, because for them there was no actual need for a woman in this job. They talked about replacing her with a man engineer as to offer a job opportunity to a man who was more worthy of the good pay than Amani the young woman who, then, lived under the care of her rich father.

When Amani earned a promotion into a leadership role in the company as the General Manager of Missions, the rejection escalated into exclusion, by subjecting her to financial violence in the form of temporarily withholding her salary. She described her perseverance under such conditions as a declaration that she had the “upper hand” in determining the course of her professional life, and in defending her right to leadership. Her resistance did not only secure her new post, but also urged the executive leadership to compensate her financially for the injustices and discrimination she endured.

Amani noted during the interview that male dominance in the energy sector is a global phenomenon that manifests itself in how only men occupy leadership roles. She added that the rejection she faced in Egypt was less severe than the exclusionary practices she experienced in other countries, as a direct response to her being a young woman in a leadership position. Even the communities with powerful economic entities, and advanced high-tech industries suffer from the absence of women in energy business.

Amani recounted her visit to one of the international factories in South Korea to close a business deal in 2002, when all the factory workers declined to work under the management and supervision of a woman, and threatened to discontinue the factory’s operations, since it was impossible for them as men to accept “being watched” and evaluated by a woman. The factory managers had no solution to offer but to suggest removing Amani, the manager assigned to inspect the contractual terms of the work, from the factory floor. For them, women worked only in service sectors; they did not work as engineers, and they most definitely did not hold leadership positions that allow them to oversee men’s labor. Amani resisted the attempts to exclude her, and threatened to call off the deal. Under her supervision, the factory workers completed the required tasks for contracting.

Amani also recalled a business visit to a company in Germany, and everyone’s astonishment at her managerial title, and the scale of responsibilities entrusted to her as a woman. She was especially stunned when they wondered about the salary of a man with the same title, and their conviction that the sex of the employee was a determining factor in setting wages, so that if a woman was to hold a position like hers, she could not possibly get paid the same as a male counterpart with her qualifications and expertise.

Amani remarked that it was the early 2000s, and women were still excluded and discriminated against in the global energy sector, in which the glass ceiling, vertical segregation, and the gender pay gap were normalized as shared standard practices that deny women access to equal pay, and the same managerial and leadership opportunities granted to their male counterpart. Amani added that, in order for her to reach the top management positions, she had to work twice as hard as any man to prove her eligibility, and to collect the qualifications and expertise that would justify her competence to lead. While her male counterparts were granted the same positions as a natural step in the course of their careers and without any particular requirements to attest for their leadership capability, she had to constantly prove she deserves a seat on the table.

These were among the key reasons that motivated Amani to start her own business. She launched her energy contracting and supplies company in 2005, at the age of 31, as a young business entrepreneur. Despite her family’s relentless support for her work and education, they were rattled by her decision. Her father was worried about the evident male dominance in the field, which entailed that Amani would be left out of the business alliances and partnerships. Her mother’s concern stemmed from social pressures and misconceptions about the implications of a woman’s independence and equality with men in the public domain. For the mother, her unmarried daughter was not only risking her success in a stable and financially rewarding job, but she was also starting her private business to compete head-to-head against men as their equal, which means eliminating all her chances of finding a husband.

Amani explained that the social pressures she experienced as a young entrepreneur derived from three major issues. First, she was too young for the tough market competition and the significant financing required for energy businesses. Second, there was no precedence for a woman who made it in the energy industry. The third issue was her decision to start her own independent business on her own, for which she has full control and total authority. Over the years, Amani managed to prove herself, by effectively running the technical and administrative operations of the business on her own, and expanding the scope of her business to include natural gas and solar energy stations. By the year 2017, Amani became the business owner of an energy solutions and supplies company that operates in a number of Arab and African countries, handles contracting and dealership for various international European manufacturers, and competes in the business market for international tenders.

Amani is the only woman to break through the energy supplies industry. She spoke about how being the only woman in the business used to make her very proud to have achieved such unique success, but by time, she wondered why women were still reluctant to enter the field. She started her own business determined to break the glass ceiling that holds women back from going into the energy business, and to open the door for more women to join. However, until now, Amani is still the only woman working in energy contracting. Nonetheless, Amani stressed that her experience in the global energy sector reveals that the Egyptian woman is in a better position from the energy business and industry than her counterparts in Africa and Europe.

Amani’s involvement in the public domain does not stop at her entrepreneurial work in the energy industry, and appears distinctly in her dedication to social responsibility, through her commitment to offering coaching and mentorship to young entrepreneurs, and her support to women empowerment practices and organizations. Amani collaborated with non-profit organizations for youth empowerment in several countries in Africa, in addition to her active efforts towards offering work and training opportunities to young people with intellectual disabilities in factories and companies, as part of her role as a board member in the Egyptian Federation Association for Intellectual Disabilities. Amani also collaborated with UNESCO to deliver coaching sessions to women business entrepreneurs in Cameron, in addition to being an active member in a number of women organizations, including TheBoardroom Africa, which is the region’s largest alliance of women in executive and managerial positions. Amani participates in the networking events held by the organization among the most influential women in the region to exchange their experiences, and analyze the challenges women face in their journey towards corporate leadership.