Social Impact Tech: Saurav J Bansal of Develop for Good On How Their Technology Will Make An Important Positive Impact
An Interview With Jilea Hemmings
We hope to prevent as many nonprofits as we can from shutting down due to any technical capabilities that they may have. We understand the importance and prevalence of technology and are aware of the wide reach that our partners have in their respective areas of work. We want to help create as much real social impact as we can and help our nonprofit partners fulfil their respective missions.
In recent years, Big Tech has gotten a bad rep. But of course many tech companies are doing important work making monumental positive changes to society, health, and the environment. To highlight these, we started a new interview series about “Technology Making An Important Positive Social Impact”. We are interviewing leaders of tech companies who are creating or have created a tech product that is helping to make a positive change in people’s lives or the environment. As a part of this series, I had the pleasure of interviewing Saurav J Bansal.
Saurav is the Chief Marketing Officer and an Executive Board Member at Develop for Good: A US-based nonprofit organization that pairs underrepresented college students with nonprofits to help them build technical product solutions. Founded in June 2020, Develop For Good has since grown a network of over 700 volunteer designers and developers and 80 nonprofit partners including UNICEF, WHO and The World Bank.
Born in Auckland, New Zealand, Saurav studied a Bachelor of Commerce and Masters in Business Information Systems at The University of Sydney. Previously an Associate at VMware, Saurav is now working on several startups in the Workflow Management and Social Commerce space which he runs alongside his role at Develop for Good.
Thank you so much for joining us in this interview series. Before we dive in, our readers would love to learn a bit more about you. Can you tell us a bit about your childhood backstory and how you grew up?
I was born in Auckland, New Zealand in a multicultural household to immigrant parents from Tonga and India. I moved to Sydney, Australia when I was 18 to pursue my tertiary education and lived there for the last 5 years while studying and working before recently relocating back to Auckland. I have always had a deep interest and passion for technology and specifically the innovation and social transformation that new technologies can bring. In 2019 I spent some time at the London School of Economics where I did a course on Social Entrepreneurship and this course sparked my interest in social technologies and served as a fundamental ignition behind my involvement with Develop for Good.
Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you began your career?
Very much a topical situation but I was onboarded and joined my last role at VMware during our initial COVID “lockdown” in March 2020. Joining a full-time role that was intended to be done in person whilst in lockdown in a different country (I was in New Zealand and the role was in Australia) was definitely an interesting experience.
It wasn’t an ideal situation, but it really drove home the power and connectivity of technology and how adaptable the workforce had become. It’s interesting to now see how normalized and prevalent working from home has become despite the ability to return to offices and work in person.
None of us are able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story about that?
Amay Aggarwal, one of Develop for Good’s Executive Directors and Founders. He’s an old friend from high school who I have always kept in close touch with despite us now living on different sides of the world. We have always conversed and bounced different propositions for ventures and startups and it has always ignited both of our passions and creativity to pursue new ideas. He was the one who got me involved with Develop for Good and leads our executive team alongside Mary Zhu. He was working towards Develop for Good while completing his undergraduate and Masters concurrently at Stanford and seeing his ability to juggle and accomplish so much was a testament to his hardworking nature and was inspiring to see.
Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?
I have always considered passion and ambition to be some of the fundamental driving forces behind any successful venture. Steve Jobs said “You have to be burning with an idea, or a problem, or a wrong that you want to right. If you’re not passionate enough from the start, you’ll never stick it out,” and I believe his statement represents a fundamental difference between pursuing an idea for the sake of it or pursuing an idea for a true purpose and belief.
Being part of ventures that I am genuinely passionate about has always been a priority for myself and is a huge reason behind my work with Develop for Good. The work and impact Develop for Good does with other nonprofits to create real and tangible social good is something that I am deeply passionate about, and I hope to spread our work to local organizations in the New Zealand and Pacific region.
You are a successful business leader. Which three character traits do you think were most instrumental to your success? Can you please share a story or example for each?
The first I would say is all about balance and knowing how to manage your work and life effectively. Work life balance has always been an important principle but with the growing normalization of working from home and the increased connectivity of the digital workspace, there is a growing blur between being in “work mode” and “relaxation mode”. Being able to really ‘log out’ and taking time to exercise and spend time with family and friends in a manner that is not forced is an important skill to maintain a good mentality and work-ethic in the long term.
I touched upon this earlier with the quote from Steve Jobs but passion and being genuinely passionate about what you are doing is such an important thing. It’s very easy to lose hope and get burnt out without passion. With a startup, there is always work to do, people to talk to, things to organise and so on. I strongly believe that passion for what you are doing is a big differentiator between doing all of that because you have to and doing it because you want to.
There is still so much I want to do and an infinite number of things I can still learn and being able to act as a sponge to absorb what you’ve experienced in the past and what you can learn from others is an important trait to have. I think finding learning opportunities in unlikely places and always being open to learning from others is hugely underrated. Nonchalantly talking about Develop for Good and other ventures with strangers or people I meet in social situations has helped me gain so many different perspectives that many of the ideas I’ve now adopted I would never have thought of without snippets of knowledge from lots of people.
Ok super. Let’s now shift to the main part of our discussion about the tech tools that you are helping to create that can make a positive social impact on our society. To begin, what problems are you aiming to solve?
The idea behind Develop for Good stemmed from a lack of design and development opportunities for students and recent graduates which was made even more dire during the current pandemic. Additionally, there were a multitude of high-profile studies stating that at least one third of nonprofits would shut down in the next two years from financial jeopardy and their inability to keep up with technical capabilities during this COVID-19 pandemic. What blossomed from there was a platform that provides valuable and relevant experiences for volunteers through real projects with real nonprofits that create real social impact.
How do you think your technology can address this?
Develop for Good has built a network of 700+ volunteer designers and developers from around the world, 80+ nonprofit partners and a number of mentors who hold senior positions at Google, Netflix, AWS, Linkedin, Adobe and a variety of other organizations. Our people and the network we have built has become a hugely valuable resource for our community to utilize and help each other.
Develop for Good aims to solve two key issues by bringing together our main two stakeholder groups: volunteers and nonprofits. We match volunteers who want to learn certain skills with nonprofits who need certain projects completed. This stems from UX/UI designs to AI/ML data visualizations, to full stack web and mobile applications. Each project has a product manager who gains valuable leadership experience and a mentor who is there to guide and offer additional expertise. Additionally, our mentors host regular workshops to further upskill our volunteers as well as networking and other valuable opportunities. At the end of our project cycles, we have a group of up-skilled volunteers and a set of completed nonprofit projects. A win-win situation that utilizes our network and platform to help solve the issues we aimed to tackle.
Can you tell us the backstory about what inspired you to originally feel passionate about this cause?
The entire Develop for Good Executive Team are current students or recent graduates and we all have witnessed the lack of opportunities to gain valuable experience and be involved in meaningful work. That coupled with the widespread need for nonprofits to increase their technical capabilities as well as the lack of volunteering opportunities during the pandemic presented an opportunity that could solve some of the issues we were passionate about.
Giving valuable opportunities to students and graduates who then go on to gain jobs that they dreamed of was one part but also being able to help and interact with so many different nonprofits involved in so many different areas is a hugely rewarding experience. We have developed and designed tools for nonprofits working on environmental issues, health initiatives, education materials, and a variety of other fields. Seeing the impact that our work has had and the work that our partners go on to do is enough to make our volunteers deeply passionate about the work that they are doing.
How do you think this might change the world?
We hope to prevent as many nonprofits as we can from shutting down due to any technical capabilities that they may have. We understand the importance and prevalence of technology and are aware of the wide reach that our partners have in their respective areas of work. We want to help create as much real social impact as we can and help our nonprofit partners fulfil their respective missions.
We also hope that we are able to provide as many opportunities to learn, gain skills and network for our volunteers. We understand the difficulties of gaining real and hands-on technical experience as a college student and believe that our platform can help many college students be better prepared for the workforce while providing much needed volunteer work.
Keeping “Black Mirror” and the “Law of Unintended Consequences” in mind, can you see any potential drawbacks about this technology that people should think more deeply about?
We value the strength and expertise of our network and community but are aware of how our vetting process may limit the availability of opportunities for all college students. We also want to ensure that our platform provides opportunities through meaningful projects where our volunteers can truly learn from.
Our Managing Directors vet each of our volunteers as well as each of our incoming projects to ensure that each volunteer is committed and willing to learn and that each project is within our capabilities and offers real learning opportunities.
Here is the main question for our discussion. Based on your experience and success, can you please share “Five things you need to know to successfully create technology that can make a positive social impact”? (Please share a story or an example, for each.)
- Create meaningful experiences. We want to ensure that all our volunteers have a meaningful experience with Develop for Good. We endeavor to match volunteers to projects based on their interests and skills, but we know that our volunteers are also here to learn and gain new skills. Our industry mentors hold regular workshops and sessions and recently we had a series of design workshops from some of our awesome mentors on the ins and outs of Figma and other design tools. These intimate and live sessions with mentors are super valuable and it is always great to see our volunteers engaging with them.
- Listen to feedback. The great thing about technology is that it is flexible, and you can always improve. We had our first set of projects in June 2020 and the way we do things now has hugely changed based on the very valuable feedback we got. We are always looking to improve the way we do things and hugely value any feedback and comments we get.
- Spread knowledge and get to know others. When we began, volunteers would usually enter their project teams and only interact with their team and their respective nonprofit partner. We wanted to create a community for our network and now host an array of events, mixers, collaboration sessions, and other initiatives. Our volunteers have gone on to get jobs, make new friends and generally just meet new people from this and we always want to encourage the spreading of knowledge and ideas with everyone.
- Know who your market is. All our volunteers are current college students or recent graduates and the same is true for our entire Executive team. Since we’ve had the same experiences as our volunteers, we can empathize with them and cater for what they want and need. Many of the initiatives we have stemmed from what we as college students wanted and couldn’t find.
- Get funding and find partners. A lot of what we do wouldn’t be possible without our very generous partners and supporters. Adobe and Amazon Web Services are our main philanthropic sponsors and without them we would not have grown to where we are today. I mentioned before that our network is one of our fundamental strengths and this comes down to the depth and breadth of our partners. Finding partners and people who are passionate about the same causes and can add value to your technology are your best resources!
If you could tell other young people one thing about why they should consider making a positive impact on our environment or society, like you, what would you tell them?
Find something you are passionate about and just get out there! Anything you do, no matter how small, can have an impact so I encourage everyone to find a cause they truly care about and just have a go.
Is there a person in the world, or in the US with whom you would like to have a private breakfast or lunch, and why? He or she might just see this, especially if we tag them. 🙂
I’d have to say Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson. I always watched him growing up and he has had such an impact on his communities and is someone who really embodies a hardworking and humble attitude.
How can our readers further follow your work online?
You can check out Develop for Good’s work at www.developforgood.org, connect on Linkedin at https://www.linkedin.com/company/develop-for-good/ or follow us on Instagram @developforgood.
My Linkedin is https://www.linkedin.com/in/sauravjbansal123/ and I am always keen to meet new people and have a chat!
Thank you so much for joining us. This was very inspirational, and we wish you continued success in your important work.
Social Impact Tech: Saurav J Bansal of Develop for Good On How Their Technology Will Make An… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.