The genesis of Upasana’s keen interest in environment and developmental issues lies in her upbringing in the lush green surroundings of the beautiful hill station of Nainital. Her mother being an entrepreneur herself, business was always in her genes. In pursuance of her interest towards environment, she acquired a Bachelor in Forestry from G.B Pant University of Agriculture and Technology, for which she was awarded University Gold medal for her excellent academic performance during the degree program. Thereafter, Upasana pursued a Masters degree in Environment Science from TERI University, learning the various aspects of Environment.
Having worked both in International and Domestic NGOs for over 7 years now, Upasana is quite adept and have gained insights into the process of working and implementing socially relevant projects at different scales and in different parts of the country. While working with these leading organizations, she got the opportunity to interact with several small domestic NGOs in Uttarakhand, Uttarpradesh, Gujarat, Odisha and Haryana.
Working with these grass-root agencies, Upasana realized that despite the excellent work they were doing on ground, they were struggling to sustain their efforts primarily due to paucity of funds. Having worked in the social sector, she truly feels that NGOs around the world face serious challenges in resource mobilization and sustaining their projects. Despite possessing outstanding field experience and local knowledge these agencies are unable to mobilize funds due to poor visibility and unprofessional fund raising strategies.
For the last 3 year, Upasana was providing advisory and consultancy services to these grass root agencies in project development, project implementation and resource mobilization. During this period she has written many proposals for various donor agencies (both International and Domestic) and has gained considerable experience in donor mapping, donor cultivation, developing fundraising strategy and strategic planning. So, it is here that Upasana realised, that NGO services boutique would address the need in the market and would also utilise her skills to the optimum.
The launch of Social Resource Venture (SRV), has helped Upasana in expanding her consultancies to a much larger business, for example fundraising, strategic and effective implementation.
Social Resource Venture (SRV) is a social enterprise that offers professional advisory to NGOs, for bridging the gap between grass root NGOs and funding agencies. This is accomplished by enhancing the efficiency of the NGO clients, through customized solutions and services. From raising funds to enhancing their visibility, SRV is an one stop solution for all the needs of the NGOs. SRV positions itself as the first NGO boutique dedicated to provide customized development solutions for NGOs.
In Upasana’s words,
“ Its been a great journey so far.. even though I come from a business family, I never tried to understand the nuances associated it with, We Can taught me these… Getting selected in the top 26 is definitely the highest point of the journey so far..Guidance provided during the workshop and the mentoring sessions also helped me in clearing my doubts. Another high point was getting to know the stories of other women entrepreneurs and learning from them. “
