Title

Group CEO and Co-Founder, Africa Communications Media Group

Bio

Mimi Kalinda is a global communications expert with 27+ years of experience in developing, implementing and measuring impactful strategies across Africa, Europe and the United States.

In 2012, Mimi co-founded Africa Communications Media Group (ACG), Africa’s leading, pan-African public relations and communications agency headquartered in Johannesburg, South Africa, supporting clients across Sub-Saharan Africa. ACG clients include MTN Group, the Global Alliance for People and Planet, Roche Pharmaceuticals and Diagnostics, Wikimedia Foundation, ONE Campaign, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the African Development Bank, Ethiopian Airlines, Barloworld, IFC/The World Bank, Mastercard Foundation, HID Global (China), the African Innovation Summit, Western Union, Lloyds (London), Dalberg Advisors, AFIG Funds, USAID, Nesta, the African Union and Mercedes. She also led the global communications team for Innovations for Poverty Action, the Bezos Earth Fund (energy portfolio) and the Global Development Incubator, headquartered in Washington, DC.

Mimi is passionate about developing communications and marketing strategies that yield results and move stakeholders, both internally and externally, to concrete action. As an award-winning communications and marketing consultant, she was part of the country branding efforts for Ethiopia and the Invest in Morocco campaigns. Previously, as FleishmanHillard’s Africa Lead, Mimi was part of the team that won PRISM Awards for the Barclays Africa “Prosper” campaign as well as the African Union’s campaign against Ebola, for which her team raised USD$51 million. Mimi led her agency’s efforts to manage crisis issues for MTN across 45 markets. She also worked for Weber Shandwick, where she managed social impact accounts, such as the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the Innovation Prize for Africa. As the Global Director of Communications for the African Institute for Mathematical Sciences, she was an integral part of the historic launch of the Next Einstein Forum.

From 2003 to 2006, Mimi worked in New York City for 40 Acres and a Mule Filmworks, specifically on the film Inside Man, directed by Spike Lee, as well as across various marketing roles for some of the biggest networks in the US, including HBO, Showtime, Lifetime and Oxygen. She was the recipient of the One World Media Award for Rien Que La Verite, a television program advocating the prevention of HIV/AIDS and an end to violence against women in the DRC.

As the visionary founder of Storytelling and Leadership—a skills development platform specializing in equipping business leaders with storytelling mastery to influence and empower those around them—Mimi’s upcoming book, Echoes of Influence, is for leaders at all levels, entrepreneurs, and anyone who manages a team and wants to master storytelling to drive transformation and achieve impactful outcomes in their organization.

Mimi is passionate about supporting leaders as they strive to achieve exceptional results. She frequently coaches and leads workshops on Storytelling and Leadership for the Obama Foundation Leaders: Africa program, LinkedIn, Absa Bank, as well as for the Gordon Institute of Business Science and the University of Cape Town Graduate School of Business. She is also an Adjunct Professor at IE University in Madrid.

Mimi joined The Hunger Project’s Global Board of Directors in 2025. She also sits on the board of the AKO Caine Prize and Catalyst for Growth, a solution launched by JP Morgan and Dalberg to support entrepreneurs across Africa. She serves on the advisory board of Africa Works Ventures, a Hong Kong-based consultancy which facilitates investment from China for promising African companies. She is also a member of the Africa Brand Counsel, and advises policymakers and private sector leaders on Africa’s reputation and how the continent’s brand equity can be leveraged for its economic development. In 2024, Mimi became an Executive Board Member for The African Capacity Building Foundation, a specialized agency of the African Union that focuses on capacity development and building across the African continent.