Pro bono consulting

While earning my master’s degree at the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE), I got the chance to work at two pro bono consultancies. One was the LSE Innovation Co-Creation Lab, where I advised an Ashoka social enterprise on a project to distribute organic fertilizer in Kenya as a way to ameliorate poverty and enhance agricultural productivity. I got to collaborate with some extraordinary people in Kenya and experience what it takes to create social impact through strategy.

 

Traveling the world

I love to travel. In 2016 alone, I’ve been to seven new countries. I love to understand and explore places whose histories, societies, economies, politics and landscapes are nothing like what I know at home.

 

Thriving on the unknown

At Innosight, we thrive on answering challenging, ambiguous and exciting questions. For example, how can business model innovation improve the lives of people with type 1 diabetes? How can digital technology transform the chemicals industry? How can a client reinvent, organize and govern itself to achieve €500 million of new growth in just a few years? At the start of a project, we usually have no idea what the answer might look like, which makes us fundamentally different from most other consulting firms, which tend to look in the rearview mirror. Here, we create the future and have to be comfortable navigating without a map. Where others get lost, we take control, bring order to chaos and shape the path forward.

 

My team in Europe

We have an exceptional team in our Europe office [located in Switzerland]. All of my teammates here are incredibly bright, perceptive and committed. We work in a very collaborative way, always looking for opportunities to support each other and achieve the best outcomes possible. More so than in any other work environment I’ve experienced, there’s a shared belief that each individual’s success is dependent on everyone pulling together as a team.

 

Making an impact

All of Innosight’s values resonate very strongly with me, but if I had to pick one as being most important, it would be “impact.” That’s truly at the heart of what we do each day. On every case, we strive not only to make sure our clients are happy, but that the work we do together with them fundamentally impacts their organizations and markets for the better. We’re passionate about our work and the impact it should have in the world.

 

Taking deep dives

In 2013 I was living in Dubai near the beach. My dad had recently started scuba diving, and that inspired me to take it up. I’d go out on a boat into the Persian Gulf and explore shipwrecks. Scuba diving appeals to my nature as an explorer. It’s amazing to see another world, to be in the middle of nowhere. At times it can be scary and risky, too. The deepest I’ve been is 30 meters, but I’ve done plenty of shallow dives — even at just a few meters, there’s still so much to see, like reefs, turtles and cuttlefish. It’s a bit more relaxing.