Meet Fadwa Mohanna, CEO and Founder of One37 ID

Fadwa Mohanna is the founder and CEO of One37 ID, which delivers the building blocks of Web3 enabling businesses and users to connect, exchange and verify data. Fadwa’s vision is to usher the next iteration of digital transformation enabling businesses to be Web3-Ready in 24 hours or less by providing ready-to-deploy solutions designed to work with One37 decentralized digital wallet; a mobile application that allows the storage and sharing of verifiable credentials, such as a digital identity, medical and financial records, and others.

My first job ever was… a telecom site engineer, installing the first telecom towers and infrastructure across North African villages and cities, driving hundreds of kilometers every day, climbing many towers, and connecting people in remote areas, villages, and cities together to provide everyone with the basic human right to communicate. I would be often met with surprise and a nervous laughter for being the only woman on site and for doing “a man’s job”. 

I decided to be an entrepreneur… because I am a firm believer that the bigger the challenge you solve, the deeper the impact your work will have and the more lives you can touch. Having travelled extensively, I have experienced, firsthand, the difficulty of proving your identity and getting the needed paperwork to work and travel. That led me to re-think digital identity at large and wanting to solve its current limitations and making everyone’s life easier.

My proudest accomplishment is… shattering many glass ceilings regarding what it means to be a woman in tech, in various parts of the world, opening the gates for a new generation of women engineers. Being the only woman in the room was an eye-opening, challenging, and empowering experience.

My boldest move to date was… never resting in one place, long enough, to feel comfortable or complacent and constantly seeking new challenges both on the personal and professional levels.

I surprise people when I tell them… I am a passionate collector of antique jewelry and love collecting historical pieces with great stories and creating new ways to preserve this heritage for the future generation. 

I knew it was time to launch my business when… I felt it was the only way to be true to myself. I had developed the habit of evaluating what I was doing from the perspective of my “older self”. It allowed me to “zoom out” and evaluate my life with some detachment and perspective. When my assessment was not satisfactory for an extended period, I knew it was time to answer my calling and launch my own business.

My best advice for aspiring entrepreneurs is… It will never be easy, will never happen as planned and will never be perfect. Plus, “The way to eat a bicycle is one piece at a time.” No matter how big the problem is, break it down into small manageable pieces and make small cumulative achievements, every single day. 

My best advice from a mentor was… “Are you willing to take one hundred percent responsibility for your life?” 

Some of the deepest changes in my life came after attending a retreat with my mentor “Jack Canfield”, author of “The Success Principles”. “If you want to be successful, you must take 100% responsibility for everything that you experience in your life. This includes the level of your achievements, the results you produce, the quality of your relationships, the state of your health and physical fitness, your income, your debts, your feelings-everything!”

When the going gets tough, I tell myself… “Rome wasn’t built in a day”. Success takes time, years of grind, frustration, failure, self-doubt. It also takes a lot of hard work, patience, grit, consistency, and perseverance. However, if you keep your eyes on the prize, you can make it. Be flexible and keep adapting until you figure it out.

If I had an extra hour in the day, I would… spend it with my family and my community. Their light and wisdom are all the motivation I need to keep believing and building a better world. 

I stay inspired,,, by being a lifelong learner; always reading, watching documentaries, learning new skills, and taking on new challenges.

The future excites me because… I choose to believe in humanity! Despite all the negative news, there has never been a better time in history to be an entrepreneur, to have hope, a dream, a vision, and then move to execution. Every indication from the past shows that whenever we faced major hurdles, we always came together, adapted, and evolved.

My next step is… to keep figuring it out, one day at a time, breathing deeply, enjoying every day, never taking anything for granted and be very thankful and appreciative of every new day.