An online series that highlighted about 95 women leaders in Jamaica and the diaspora has come to a close, ending with a tribute to the late Consul General Alsion Roach Wilson.

The series, Soft Power: Becoming Without Bending, was created by Dr Daren Johnson, an education and health administration practitioner and principal consultant at DJ Consulting Services, a US immigration boutique firm. It featured women leaders from both the public and private sectors, in fields ranging from education, health and law to banking, media and diplomacy.

Each post paired a portrait with a short account of the woman’s journey, published under the hashtag #SoftPower.

“For too long, women in leadership have been told they must choose,” Dr Johnson wrote when he launched the series. “Be strong or be gracious. Be respected or be liked. Be heard or be gentle. I don’t believe that choice is real.”

The series was inspired by Dr Taneisha Ingleton, whose quote, Becoming is a beautiful thing”, became the foundation of the series and its tagline, “Becoming without bending.”

“Women have influenced so much of what we have achieved at a national level. In their own spheres of work and in the community, these women make a difference,” Dr Johnson said. “Men and women alike have benefited from the mentorship of women who balance so much work with family. Each year, we feature women in Jamaica who achieve in their work, in their community, in volunteerism, or in all three.”

Dr Johnson was raised by his mother, Selma Green, in a single-parent household in Middle Buxton, St Ann, an upbringing that gave him a deep respect for the women who hold families and communities together.

Soft Power is not Dr Johnson’s first series of its kind. In April 2020, at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, his Powerful Women feature on Facebook celebrated 212 successful Jamaican women around the world. He had planned to feature 100, but recommendations kept coming. Pauleen Reid and Consul General Alsion Roach Wilson were among the women honoured then, giving the late diplomat her proverbial “flowers” while she was still alive.

Those featured included Cabinet minister Ambassador Audrey Marks; Sheree Martin, the first woman to lead National Commercial Bank; and Professor Adella Campbell of the University of Technology, Jamaica, who left high school with one subject and went on to be named Global Nurse of the Year in 2024.

Also featured were Kedesha Campbell Rochester, Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Energy, Transport and Telecommunications; Karlene Segre, Regional Director for Region 3 in the Ministry of Education; Rashana McLeggon, Senior Manager, CIBC Caribbean Bank; and Nicole McLaren Campbell, chair of the Jamaica Library Board.

Dr Caithlin Williams-Beecher, Consultant Endodontist with the Ministry of Health and Wellness, was recognised as the first Diplomate of the American Board of Endodontics in Jamaica. Twin sisters Dr Tamika Henry and Dr Tamara Henry Gilpin, Medical Officers of Health for St Ann and St Mary, were also featured.

The series also reached the diaspora in the United States, with features on American attorney and philanthropist Dionnie Wynter and US immigration consultant Nordia Barrett-Lewis, who recently donated an ultrasound machine to the Hugh Wynter Institute for Reproductive Healthcare and Endoscopic Surgery at The University of the West Indies.

Soft Power closed in honour of the late Alsion Roach Wilson, Jamaica’s Consul General to New York from 2019 until her passing on November 8, 2025. Dr Johnson chose to end the series with her as a tribute to a life of service, and to a woman he had celebrated in his first series six years earlier.

Born in Redwood, St Catherine, she built a celebrated career on Wall Street before leading Jamaica’s largest diplomatic jurisdiction, where she championed the diaspora and carried the nation’s flag with grace. The tribute said it simply: “She gave more than she took.”

For Dr Johnson, the work has always been about more than recognition. He believes that one woman’s rise should never come at the cost of another’s, and that success means the most when it is shared.

Novia McDonald-Whyte, one of the women featured, put it simply: “When you arrive, be prepared to send the elevator back down. The view is so much better when you’re able to share it.”

“In a world defined by constant change and uncertainty, a woman’s greatest strength lies in her ability to remain incandescent, adapting without losing herself, evolving without compromising her values, and shining without seeking permission,” Dr Johnson said.

It is the same charge he gave in 2020, when he urged women to use their voice, influence and expertise to lift each other. Two series and more than 300 women later, that message has not changed.

As one of the women featured in 2020 put it, “Let the revolution start with us. We are better together.”

Dr Johnson says readers should look out for extensions of the series throughout the region and in the diaspora.