Initiative Startup Volunteer Work

Non-Profit Alumni Association for North America – CEPT AAA

A non-profit alumni organization was recently registered for professional and social networking of members. As a part of the core team, I helped initiate ideas in the formation of the organization. Some of the responsibilities included designing website concept and content, event flyer design, ideation of online event themes, organizing events, facilitating panel discussions, hosting fireside chats, social media marketing, and post event technical work.

From Her Perspective Launch Event – March 7, 2021

My Role: Concept Developer and Moderator

A new initiative “From Her Perspective: Fearlessly Resilient” launch event received an overwhelming response with 145 registrants and 90 participants across the US, Canada, and UK.

The new initiative hopes to bring together all alumni in the Americas, who choose to challenge stereotypes and biases toward creating a diverse, equitable, and inclusive world. The key objective of the initiative is to connect, support and empower Women Alumni in the Americas! The idea is to share the inspiring stories of unapologetically resilient women who achieved their personal and professional goals, took the roads less traveled, explored uncharted territories, and challenged cultural norms while contributing significantly to the field. The intent here is to bring different women’s voices to the table and share unheard stories. The initiative will provide an opportunity to bring women and men together for enhanced gender awareness and sensitization with an aim to create an open dialogue and safe space for discussing various issues faced by women and finding common solutions to those challenges. The initiative will serve as a platform for exchanging experiences of women in the workplace and at home, how they prevailed over the barriers, and the kind of support they received from family and friends. In the same vein, the initiative will also highlight the male counterparts’ critical role have in building an inclusive world by inviting men to share their stories.

The event covered four Get Inspired Stories of women! Often events on International Women’s Day focus on the success stories of career achievements of women but rarely focus on the stories behind the success. We aimed at talking about those unheard stories of women who achieved goals despite challenges, barriers, failures and unconscious gender biases. These are real life emotional stories that have the power to touch hearts and change minds.

Four Get Inspired Stories:

1 – Love & Hope: Reaching out and seeking advice from peers

2 – Sharing the Seat at the Table: Navigating professional space

3 – Cognizant Life Choices: Navigating life and restarting a career

4 – Care & Career: Reinventing the parenting roles

All four stories had a different theme including various sub-themes and related topics. Each story highlighted women’s challenges, barriers and struggles to achieve their personal and professional goals. It was not about glamorizing the speakers but it was about focusing on the stories and the takeaways for everyone. The poll questions taken during the event provided insightful answers. The majority of the participants opted for the initiative to be a continual activity rather than one time event celebrated once a year. This is a significant step forward in building this discourse and making an impact as a community. A very positive highlight was the gentlemen on board who supported these efforts and shared their views on the critical role of men. A key to advancing gender equality is an active engagement by men and women together. With each step taken forward, we can hope for a day we no longer will need to celebrate women’s day. That’s the ultimate goal. Both women and men have their uniqueness and beautiful differences and both should be celebrated and achieve gender equality! Same is not equal Equal. Gender equality is about equal access to opportunities and equal rights to make those choices which often require questioning our unconscious biases and norms that become barriers and pose challenges for women. So, let’s accept and celebrate the differences and achieve equality. But there is still a lot of work ahead until we reach there, so let’s continue to work in this direction. A change is complete only when we no longer see the change happening!

On Demand Video: Courtesy CEPT AAA

Musings Over Chai with Prof. Rahul Mehrotra

Invited Guest: Rahul Mehrotra is Professor of Urban Design and Planning at the Harvard Graduate School of Design. His firm RMA Architects is based in Mumbai & Boston. He has a wide range of contributions in the field of Architecture, Urban Design and Planning.

Great Conversation over many interesting topics! I had the pleasure to facilitate the discussion.