I met Pierre Mutambwe relatively early in my career.

Within months, he became “Papa Pierre” to me.

He was about five years from mandatory retirement when we first worked together — a community relations manager with the kind of quiet authority that does not announce itself. Most people noticed his smile first. Many underestimated the depth of knowledge behind it.

It was through Pierre that I first began to understand the daily reality of artisanal and small-scale miners. The danger. The instability. The fragile economics of soil, rock and old tailings. He did not romanticise it. Nor did he condemn it.

He helped me see both sides of the coin — the peril and the grit. The hardship and the generosity. The determination of men and women who scratched out a living with whatever tools they could afford, and who still found ways to share what little they had.

Years later, I visited his home in Kipushi for the first time.

The smell of freshly baked goods greeted me at the gate. A small enterprise of women selling cakes had taken root in front of his house — organised quietly by Pierre to create income where there had been none.

Inside the yard, I had to step carefully between rows of indigenous tree seedlings covering the front and sides of the property. He explained they were for a community project — to reduce dust and increase biodiversity in the town.

When I entered the house, his wife welcomed me like family. His son appeared with a plate of pastries, eager for feedback on texture and taste.

There was no performance in any of it. Just consistency.

In the years after his retirement, Pierre has continued to support me as a subcontractor on projects in the DRC. His counsel is rarely loud. It comes in pauses. In questions. In gentle reminders of who will live longest with the consequences of our decisions.

From him I learned to slow down. To listen not only to what is said, but to what is not said. To remember small promises. To follow up on large ones.

When projects moved too fast — or stalled too long — he would quietly recalibrate the room. Not with confrontation, but with moral clarity.

Papa Pierre carries an innate sense of justice. Not the abstract kind written into policy documents, but the lived kind that measures impact in people’s daily realities.

Some leaders dominate a room.

Others steady it.

Thank you, Papa Pierre, for steadying mine.

You can learn about my project - 100 Portraits From a Sustainability Career - in the comments.

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