About Us
My name is Sharon Hedges and I have recently set up Believe In Kind with a mission to help empower the women of Uganda through skilled craft work.
I grew up near Bristol in the UK. My dad was a carpenter, my brother too and my mum was my lovely mum. Our family was happy and life was pretty simple and down to earth.
I grew up always feeling safe; secure in the knowledge that I would always be fed, loved and kept from harm. I was lucky and took it for granted.
I knew I would have clean water, healthy food, an education and the opportunities that the resulting physical, mental and emotional stability brings.
Such simple things to expect, right?
Not really.
My family values were centred around seeing when another needed help and stepping in, around honesty, thought, care and kindness; all were a part of the fabric of my childhood. Everybody is like this right?
Sadly, not really.
The more I have moved through my career in marketing up into senior management positions the more I noticed just how much simple human values were missing.
And this combination of seemingly simple things drove me not only to explore the ways I could do something in the world that would have a positive impact - in particular on the empowerment of women but also to explore how I could incorporate my personal values of kindness, honesty, humanity, respect, care, fairness, integrity into a new business idea.
Believe In Kind draws on kindness as a currency in its own right. It centres around being decent but still proud to make money, around leveraging the power of empathy and compassion and putting them to work throughout the business.
The pandemic has only served to emphasise the importance and increasing interest in this business approach.
It is time for change. Time to act. Never before have these values been so vital to progress. Kindness has become a necessity to be able to both survive and to thrive.