Business-savvy, Ballin’ & Bridging Gaps: Meet the social business entrepreneur Ananya Sachdev
An impressive crew of 50 young people, passionate about sports, hurried quickly from the building. Yunus Sports Hub’s workshop for Global Sports Week had ended and the participants moved to make it across town to their next activity. In spite of the time crunch, Ananya Sachdev stayed behind, excited to share her appreciation and the cohesion of YSH’s work with her own entrepreneurial journey.
What impressed me then has only grown. This Indian basketball player, and Columbia University Master’s in Sports Management grad noticed a problem upon graduation. As a Columbia master’s student in New York City, unique industry connections, networking events and mentorship opportunities were available to her. Yet when she returned to her home country, hoping to network with practitioners in the country’s sports industry, an epiphany hit. The ample opportunities for her in the West were much harder to come by in the East. She noticed especially a gap between opportunities for friends and fellow athletes back home in India compared with the doors open in the West.
On one hand, she shares, “I realized how hard it was to reach out to executives in the industry. While the sports industry in India is growing, there was a lot of fragmentation and a lack of blueprint on opportunities, resource groups, and mentorship.” On the other hand, she continues, “at the same time, I was approached by a lot of students in India for questions on sports management.” The two problems together, combined with her recent experience in NYC and the network built there, Ananya noticed that she could build a solution, “I found myself in a position to be able to help individuals who may not have the option to go for a degree abroad or have the right mentorship opportunities.”
Ananya’s approach to helping? Start a social business. Here’s what she did: “I decided to bridge the gap between the West and the East by introducing sports business content to educate and engage (her Indian & US communities) and bring them together. That’s where Mabrij was born.”
She’s begun building by releasing content that applies concepts of mentorship, education, and opportunities from the West to the East, that would be great!. Simultaneously, she explains, “I began to organize events that brought people together and helped them connect with industry leaders, as a way to sustain their initiatives for Mabrij. At present, I work full-time and dedicate my weekends to scaling the reach of the content that highlights various topics on sports business education in India”.
Growing up with knowledge about Professor Yunus, having first learned about him and his work in her 5th-grade Civics books, it wasn’t until recently that the connection started to build between his movement and her passion: “My understanding and immediate experience with social entrepreneurship became stronger by coming across the Yunus Sports Hub team at Global Sports Week in Paris.”
Ananya now serves as Yunus Sports Hub’s Asia Regional Leader for our COVID-19 Sports Response initiative. She has excelled at bringing together fellow problem-solvers and sports lovers from India and neighboring countries, those for whom she is designing Mabrij. Her own work in the community sport's response directly adheres to her passion with Mabrij, educating fellow female athletes (basketball players and track & field athletes), who have lost their source of income following COVID. Many of these women are from poor rural families and received athletic training through a nonprofit organization Ananya has partnered with. Their loss of income faces many of them with a need to return to their villages and arranged marriages, despite their young age. Ananya and her peers are helping them through video training while serving as a sports business strategist herself for Rakuten in Tokyo.
Like Ananya, you can take your passion, skills, and drive to solve problems that matter to you. We believe you can make the difference — if you are motivated to try, we have a community dedicated to helping you achieve the solutions you dream of. You can learn more about the community and register here.
