Car­ol Quash

As the woman at the helm of the Com­mon­wealth Telecom­mu­ni­ca­tions Or­ga­ni­za­tion (CTO), Bernadette Lewis must stay ahead of tech­no­log­i­cal in­no­va­tion and rapid change. She and her team are re­spon­si­ble for help­ing Com­mon­wealth mem­ber coun­tries nav­i­gate the evolv­ing dig­i­tal land­scape.

The CTO is the old­est and largest Com­mon­wealth body that serves as an in­ter­na­tion­al part­ner­ship, as­sist­ing mem­bers in bridg­ing the dig­i­tal di­vide through tech­ni­cal sup­port, ca­pac­i­ty build­ing, and re­search. It fo­cus­es on bring­ing gov­ern­ments, busi­ness­es, and civ­il so­ci­ety to­geth­er through In­for­ma­tion and Com­mu­ni­ca­tion Tech­nolo­gies (ICT) to sup­port so­cio-eco­nom­ic growth via dig­i­tal trans­for­ma­tion.

“The pace of tech­no­log­i­cal in­no­va­tion is phe­nom­e­nal, and the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic in­creased the ur­gency. We alert mem­bers to emerg­ing tech­nolo­gies, their im­pli­ca­tions for pol­i­cy, leg­is­la­tion, reg­u­la­tions, and na­tion­al de­vel­op­ment, and we help with im­ple­men­ta­tion,” Lewis told WE.

Lewis is the first fe­male Sec­re­tary-Gen­er­al of the CTO—a role she takes pride in, de­spite the added chal­lenges that of­ten ac­com­pa­ny lead­er­ship as a woman.

“Women in lead­er­ship po­si­tions al­ways face greater scruti­ny. I en­coun­tered a lot of re­sis­tance; it’s not an easy path to walk,” she said.

Her deep knowl­edge of the field has been a key fac­tor in hold­ing her own. Lewis holds a BSc in Physics and Nat­ur­al Sci­ences from the Uni­ver­si­ty of the West In­dies and an MSc in Telecom­mu­ni­ca­tions Tech­nol­o­gy from As­ton Uni­ver­si­ty in the UK.

“To women as­pir­ing to lead­er­ship po­si­tions: know your craft. What­ev­er the or­gan­i­sa­tion, know your craft, be­cause you will be chal­lenged at every step,” she ad­vised.

Lewis en­tered the telecom­mu­ni­ca­tions in­dus­try at Tel­co in 1983, a time when women were few and far be­tween in the field.

“Now, I see so many women par­tic­i­pat­ing, mak­ing them­selves known, and putting forth their ideas,” she said.

She as­sumed the CTO po­si­tion in 2020, dur­ing the pan­dem­ic, work­ing re­mote­ly for the first two years. In Au­gust 2022, she re­lo­cat­ed to Ham­mer­smith, Lon­don, to re­sume in-per­son du­ties.

“In those ear­ly days, much of my time was spent up­dat­ing the foun­da­tion­al doc­u­ments and frame­works of the or­gan­i­sa­tion, en­sur­ing they were rel­e­vant to the rapid pace of tech­no­log­i­cal in­no­va­tion,” she ex­plained.

The CTO, en­ter­ing its 125th year, is plan­ning a year-long, mul­ti-coun­try cel­e­bra­tion to mark the mile­stone.

Re­flect­ing on the or­gan­i­sa­tion’s his­to­ry, Lewis said, “Over the past 20 to 25 years, we’ve seen phe­nom­e­nal changes. We start­ed with the tele­graph; now we are in the age of ar­ti­fi­cial in­tel­li­gence and the fourth in­dus­tri­al rev­o­lu­tion, where the phys­i­cal, dig­i­tal, and bi­o­log­i­cal worlds co­a­lesce.”

She not­ed that cli­mate change and geopol­i­tics are dri­ving fur­ther trans­for­ma­tion in the in­dus­try. “Or­gan­i­sa­tions that do not adapt be­come di­nosaurs.”

A for­mer Sec­re­tary-Gen­er­al of the Caribbean Telecom­mu­ni­ca­tions Union, Lewis brings valu­able ex­pe­ri­ence work­ing with de­vel­op­ing coun­tries and emerg­ing economies. Now, at the CTO, she ap­plies this knowl­edge glob­al­ly, en­gag­ing with the Caribbean, Eu­rope, Asia, Africa, and the Pa­cif­ic.

“Where­as be­fore I fo­cused on the Caribbean, now the CTO al­lows me to make a mea­sur­able im­pact across mem­ber na­tions world­wide,” she said.

Giv­en the di­ver­si­ty of its mem­ber­ship, the CTO em­pha­sis­es cus­tomised ICT strate­gies. “A stand­alone plan may sound won­der­ful, but if it doesn’t match the re­al­i­ties on the ground, it can­not be im­ple­ment­ed ef­fec­tive­ly. We must com­mu­ni­cate ap­pro­pri­ate­ly to min­is­ters, the pri­vate sec­tor, and the pub­lic. Lan­guage and cul­ture mat­ter,” Lewis ex­plained.

She added that gen­er­a­tional dif­fer­ences play a key role in tech­nol­o­gy adop­tion.

“Young peo­ple are born in­to this dig­i­tal world, while my gen­er­a­tion had to learn it. Tech­nol­o­gy has changed dra­mat­i­cal­ly—from the first desk­top in my of­fice to de­vices now far more pow­er­ful. It’s in­cred­i­ble that any­one can just ‘Google’ any­thing.”

How­ev­er, she cau­tioned that rapid tech­no­log­i­cal changes car­ry risks, es­pe­cial­ly when leg­is­la­tion lags be­hind. “Tech­nol­o­gy has tremen­dous po­ten­tial for good, but there are al­so bad ac­tors. We must be proac­tive and craft ap­pro­pri­ate pol­i­cy, leg­is­la­tion, and reg­u­la­tions.”

De­spite the de­mands of fre­quent trav­el and a busy sched­ule, Lewis finds her work im­mense­ly re­ward­ing.

“The ben­e­fits are su­perla­tive and in­tan­gi­ble. It gives a tremen­dous sense of sat­is­fac­tion.”

She en­cour­ages women to bring their skills to in­dus­tries that re­main male-dom­i­nat­ed.

“Women have the right to be at the ta­ble. They must stand strong, state their case, and con­tribute to shap­ing the fu­ture.”