On May 2nd, 2009 I decided to leave my current place of employment, Deloitte Consulting, where I worked as a Consultant in their Technology Practice over the past 2 and a half years. There I served in the Technology Strategy and Architecture Group concentrating in next generation data center technology and IT operations optimization. There I worked to redesign existing systems, and utilize technologies, to reduce the overall operational cost to host enterprise level applications. At the same time I worked to streamline and and create organizational structure to IT operations, through my ITIL certified techniques. This was a daunting challenge over the course of my first two years out of college, but I took on the challenge with great respect, and vigor to succeed in what was presented in front of me.

Deloitte is a great organization and I wouldn’t change my time there for a second. It provided me with great company, great experiences, and great challenges. But along came an offer that made my head turn. It was Sarvajal.

Sarvajal is a social venture (not an NGO) that strives to make clean and pure drinking water accessible and affordable for everyone. It is developing a scalable model that empowers rural entrepreneurs to participate in the growth of their community while providing a socially beneficial and economically viable solution for all.

On August 1st I will take on a new life. I have rejected the life style of Orange County, CA and will accept the lifestyle of Gujurat, India. I don’t see this as a sacrifice, I see this as an opportunity. No opportunity comes without risk, and there is plenty to be had here. This opportunity will utilize my business skills to grow an organization so that it is self sustainable and profitable enough to not only sustain itself, but its community – empowering the entrepreneurs it creates through its work. This is a completely different model from what the western world knows of large profit margins and small populations. This is targeted to have small profit margins, but vast populations.

This opportunity is right for me. I’m young, I’m skilled, and I have a sense to contribute socially. I am giving up a lot to do this, but when I think about it, everything I am leaving is material. Yes, family and friends are irreplaceable, but in today’s world technology allows us to easily keep in touch – therefore I’m not leaving them. The rat race of seeking greater fortune has its benefits, it creates competition, and incentive for greater growth, but what is growth if you are just a consumer of prosperity? I’m leaving my life of consumption to lead a life of production. I know I can execute, and I can succeed – but to do so in a country I barely know, where they speak I language I cannot understand, and in a field I am not accustomed to is a daunting challenge.

I cannot sit aside and pay little attention to the world that I do not know. It is so easy to see poverty through a car door window, or the tv screen, but life wasn’t supposed to be easy. I was once a person who could sit there and understand, but not appreciate the scale of poverty issues. I can no longer sit idle. I cannot consume the media of poverty apathy, instead I must find my way of combating poverty.

My skill set and attitude is that of someone who loves to empower people, espescially to empower leaders. In the capitalistic world no one is more chesished than entrepreneurs. What better way to both combat poverty and spur entrepreneurship than to work in the social enterprise space. Sarvajal does that – it creates entrepreneurs through franchising. It fights a major poverty issue – the water crisis. It does so in a country where there is a huge poverty gap – the infrastructure is there, but its not there for everyone. To solve these difficult crises is what I tackled in the techology world of consulting, now its time to tackle it in the world of poverty.