Brand-Sofi

BRAND-SOFI is a micro company situated in Finland. The micro company was established by Ann-Sofi Backgren in 2013. She has a long experience as a local and regional politician. For example she was elected 20 years to the local Assembly of her home municipality Korsnäs (www.korsnas.fi) and 12 of these 20 years she was the chairwoman of the Assembly. She has also been a member of the Assembly of the Regional council of Ostrobothnia in 12 years and a member of the board (www.obotnia.fi) At the moment she is also the chairwoman of the gender committee of the Regional Council of Ostrobotnia. In this work she has been focusing on the charter of the gender equality between woman and men at the local and region level (CEMR-declaration www.ccre.org) In the European level she has been active in AEBR, Association of European border regions (www.aebr.eu). At the moment she is the I Vice President of the board. Further she has been active in political party organization. She started in the youth organization of the Swedish People´s party 30 years ago and since then she has been involved in many fields of the party organization; at local, regional and national levels. At the moment she is the Vice President of the Women´s organization of the Swedish People´s party in Finland (www.kvinnoforbundet.fi), member of the working committee and chairwoman of the international committee. Issues as gender empowerment and political leadership have been her focus in the frame of her micro company. She has shared her experience of how to be in leader positions and how to build network and cooperation coalitions, but she has also talked about suppression techniques and other challenges in leader positions or in political life such as the combination of family life-working life and political activity.