The world of work is shifting faster than most of us can comfortably process.

AI is changing how we write, analyse, create, hire, lead and make decisions. Traditional career ladders are disappearing. Visibility increasingly influences opportunity. The pressure to keep learning, performing and adapting has intensified, often without any corresponding reduction in the rest of women’s responsibilities.

Digital Divas: SHIFT is not a day built around telling women to be more confident, work harder or lean further into an already demanding system.

It is a day for examining how that system is changing, and helping women make smarter decisions about their place within it.

On 28 August, Digital Divas returns to Innovation City for a full day of honest, practical conversations about ambition, reinvention, AI, money, wellbeing, leadership and the future of work.

Here is why it matters in 2026.

The day begins with one of South Africa’s most influential business leaders

Digital Divas 2026 opens with a special welcome from Phuthi Mahanyele-Dabengwa, South Africa CEO of Naspers.

Her reflections on leadership, resilience and embracing change will set the tone for a day focused on the shifts affecting women’s careers, ambitions and opportunities.

At a moment when technology is rewriting the rules of business and work, her message is an important place to begin: change may be unavoidable, but women must have a meaningful role in shaping what follows.

Your job may be changing, even if your title hasn’t

AI is not only automating tasks. It is changing what organisations value, which skills command attention and how professional identities are formed.

For many women, this creates both opportunity and uncertainty. The expertise that built a successful career may no longer be enough on its own. At the same time, the rush to adopt AI can make deeply human capabilities; judgement, empathy, discernment, creativity and the ability to build trust, feel less visible than technical fluency.

In her keynote, media executive, editor and business leader Izelle Venter will explore The Human Shift: what becomes more valuable in an AI world.

Shivani Ghai will take the conversation into the reality of modern careers. Having moved through aerospace engineering, consulting, entrepreneurship, coaching, higher education and yoga teaching, she understands that reinvention is rarely a clean or linear process.

Her session, The Work Shift, asks what careers look like when traditional paths are disappearing, and why learning, unlearning and adapting may become more valuable than following a predetermined ladder.

Knowing that AI matters is not the same as knowing what to do with it

By now, most professionals have attended an AI talk, tested ChatGPT and heard that the technology will “transform everything”.

The useful question is no longer whether AI matters. It is how to use it well.

Human-centred AI strategist and Anthropic specialist Esmarie Swanepoel will lead an interactive workshop focused on tools, prompts and workflows women can begin applying immediately. The emphasis is not simply on completing more work in less time. It is on thinking more clearly, making better decisions and scaling the parts of your work that create genuine value.

Ayanda Vabaza-Mvandaba CA(SA) will bring the same practical approach to money. Her MoneySHIFT masterclass will cut through the noise surrounding AI-powered financial tools and examine how they can help women budget, understand tax, manage debt and compare financial products, without outsourcing their common sense.

You should leave Digital Divas with more than an impressive list of technologies to investigate later. You should leave with useful ideas you can apply almost immediately.

Good work does not always speak for itself

This is one of the most persistent and expensive career myths.

Excellent work can remain invisible. Expertise can be overlooked. Opportunities often go to the person whose value is easiest to understand, not necessarily the person with the most value to offer.

Yet for many women, the language of personal branding and self-promotion remains uncomfortable. Visibility can feel performative, particularly online, where every achievement appears to require a carefully constructed announcement.

Khanyisa Mhlaba, Chief Information Officer and Chief Architect at Absa Personal and Private Banking, will lead The Visibility Shift: Standing Out Without Selling Out. Her masterclass will explore how women can become more visible without turning themselves into products or losing the substance behind their work.

Tumi Ncube will make that conversation tangible with a live LinkedIn makeover. She will demonstrate how changes to positioning, storytelling and profile strategy can influence how others understand your experience, and which opportunities find you.

Visibility is not vanity. Used thoughtfully, it is a way of ensuring that your contribution can be recognised.

Your network should be more than a collection of contacts

Networking is regularly presented as something women should do, but rarely as something they should be taught how to do well.

Too many professional events leave attendees standing around with a glass in one hand and a rehearsed introduction in the other, hoping a valuable connection will happen by accident.

Digital Divas begins differently.

Celeste Stewart, founder of Bold Curiosity, will guide attendees through an interactive Networking 101 session early in the programme. The aim is to move beyond awkward introductions and help women build connections through curiosity, generosity and intentional conversation.

Those connections will continue through the day: during the coffee breaks, over lunch sponsored by Simply Asia and at the closing cocktail reception.

You will meet founders, executives, specialists, investors and women navigating many of the same professional questions you are. You may find a client, collaborator, mentor or future employer. You may simply meet someone who helps you see your next move more clearly.

Both outcomes matter.

Ambition should not require self-destruction

For too long, conversations about women and ambition have focused on how to achieve more. They have paid considerably less attention to what that achievement costs.

The Resilience Shift: Ambition That Doesn’t Cost Everything brings together Danielle Diamouangana, Ilhaam van der Schyff, Pinar Alpay and Mei Liou, moderated by Travelstart Deputy Group CEO Lori Hayley Joffe.

It will examine pressure, boundaries, burnout and performance culture without resorting to the familiar advice that women should simply become more resilient.

Tal Cook’s session, The Health Shift, will look at ambition through the realities of women’s health, hormones, stress, energy and longevity.

These are not conversations separate from professional success. They are central to it. A career that cannot be sustained is not a successful career, regardless of how impressive it appears from the outside.

You need to see women building boldly

Diva Pitch will put a curated group of women founders on stage to present their businesses and compete for a one-year Innovation City membership.

The afternoon also includes a candid fireside conversation with a South African technology founder about scaling, resilience, leadership and building something meaningful in an unpredictable environment.

Representation matters, but proximity matters too.

There is a difference between reading about successful women and sitting in a room with them. Hearing the uncertainty behind the polished outcome. Understanding the decisions, mistakes and compromises that shaped the journey. Being able to ask a question or imagine yourself doing something similar.

Come for the programme. Leave with a shift.

Digital Divas is not based on the idea that women need fixing.

It is built on the understanding that women are navigating a period of profound technological, economic and cultural change, and need better conversations, practical tools and stronger professional networks to do it well.

You will leave with sharper thinking about your career, money, visibility, health and leadership. You will gain AI tools and workflows you can begin using immediately. You will hear candid perspectives from women who have navigated reinvention, pressure and growth. And you will meet people who may become part of whatever you build next.

Bring your colleagues, leadership team, women’s network or clients. Group ticket options are available for organisations that want to experience the day together.

Digital Divas: SHIFT takes place at Innovation City in Cape Town on 28 August 2026.

The future of work is already being shaped.

The question is how you intend to shape your place within it.

Digital Divas: SHIFT is made possible with the support of our Premium Event Partners, Absa Group and Payfast by Network.

Get your Digital Divas ticket

For group ticket options, contact hello@innovationcity.co.za.