Beatrice Gachenge
Kenyan strategic communicator Beatrice Gichenge has spent the past 13 years translating boardroom strategy into stories that resonate from Cape Town to Khartoum. Today, as Head of Communications for Sub-Saharan Africa at Novartis, she steers reputation, policy engagement, and crisis response across 46 countries work that has underpinned drug-access roll-outs reaching millions of patients while positioning the Swiss pharma giant as a partner in regional health-system reform. Gichenge earned her narrative chops managing External Relations for Africa at McKinsey & Company and earlier led reputation agendas at IBM and Deloitte East Africa, experiences that sharpened her instinct for blending data, diplomacy, and digital channels in markets where one viral tweet can reset stakeholder trust.
Armed with an MBA from USIU-Africa and a postgraduate marketing diploma from the UK’s Chartered Institute of Marketing, she anchors her craft in commercial rigor while championing women’s leadership. A Business Daily Top 40 Under 40 alumna, she runs a mentorship circle that has placed dozens of young professionals in communications roles across the continent. Next up: launching a pan-African leadership fellowship that couples storytelling skills with health-equity advocacy, proving that powerful messages and the women who craft them can accelerate better outcomes as surely as any medicine.