Poonam Ahluwalia

Early years

Poonam Ahluwalia was born and raised in an affluent family in Jaipur, India on February 14, 1957. Living in an affluent family, she was encouraged to get married and have a family. However, Ahluwalia had the desire to do her own work and make a difference. After she graduated from high school Ahluwalia taught basic hygiene in small schools and neighborhoods. As she began working, Ahluwalia realized that through a collaborative effort, she could make a difference. Following her mother’s words, she wanted to leave every place that she worked in better than she found it. This soon became her philosophy in every project she has undertaken for the world.

Early career

After receiving her M.A. in political science from Rajasthan University in Jaipur, India, Ahluwalia continued to pursue her interest in the movement against poverty. In her 20s she worked as the marketing manager of a chain of pizzerias called “Pizza King”.

Ahluwalia moved to the United States in 1985 and began providing household help for a family in Brookline in order to pay for her education at Boston University. She attended Boston University in pursuit of a master’s in mass communications, which she received in 1989.

Ahluwalia began working for The Hunger Project in 1984. She became involved when she was introduced to Werner Erhad, the Founder of The Hunger Project, when he came to India to launch the organization. She was instantly enrolled and continues to be a member. During her work with The Hunger Project, Ahluwalia raised funds and awareness of the issue, as well as helped launch Ending the Subjugation of Women as a Critical Step to Ending Hunger. For about three to four years she helped raise over $100,000 a year through an annual event that they held – many times at Ahluwalia’s own home. Ahluwalia also organized a dance with Jothi Raghawan and two walkathons in Lexington to raise funds.

By the late 1980s Ahluwalia also began to work for Welfare-to-Work programs under the administration of Massachusetts governor Michael S. Dukakis.

In 1997 Ahluwalia began to work with the Education Development Center (EDC) based in Newton, MA. With funding from USAID she was able to create work force development workshops with the purpose of promoting global learning, health, and education. In association with EDC Ahulwalia ran workshops in Peru, India, and Namibia. While the workshops were hugely successful, Poonam became aware of the issue of youth unemployment based on the feedback she received directly from participants. With this feedback in mind, Ahluwalia founded YES in 1998.

During her work with EDC Ahluwalia also had some contact with SEWA (All Indian Federation of Self-Employed Women’s Association)

Work with YES

As the founder and director of YES, Ahluwalia launched a 10-year campaign in 2002 with the purpose of creating accessible education and opportunities to youth around the world. She held the hope that these youth could build productive and sustainable livelihoods. The initiative was launched in Alexandria, Egypt in the world’s first international summit on youth employment sponsored by United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO). The summit was co-chaired by former president Bill Clinton, and first lady of the Arab Republic of Egypt, Suzanne Mubarak.

To build her vision to empower youth globally, Poonam helped start YES country networks in 55 countries with the goal of building the national capacity to ensure that 2 million youth become entrepreneurs by 2012. The way that YES manifests itself is different in each country network based on the conditions for growth. What is consistent throughout the country networks is the support given to youth leaders while they work towards learning how to use their resources and opportunities. Her vision is specifically focused on the triple bottom line (people, planet, profits) enterprises. In total she has organized five YES international summits in Alexandria, Egypt (2002), Veracruz, Mexico (2004), Nairobi, Kenya (2006), Baku, Azerbaijan (2008), and Leksand, Sweden (2010) and three YES Regional Summits in Hyderabad, India (2003), Asunción, Paraguay (2005), Dominican Republic (2006) and Panama City, Panama (2008).

These summits had the purpose of applying Ahluwalia’s dual approach of providing training and capacity building programs coupled with creating networks that enable youth to create sustainable job opportunities. To bring together the many different cultures represented at the summits, Ahluwalia employs three basic tenets for growth: renewal and replenishment, risk, and perseverance. Ahluwalia has worked to create markets and opportunities for entrepreneurship that are driven by the youth themselves. YES’ empowering approach has proven successful, as after the summits there have been more than 400 youth employment projects worldwide.

Ahluwalia has been recognized by the California Legislature and the Indian-American Trade and Commerce Council for her work as “an outstanding youth community leader”. In 2003 she was nominated for the South Asian Woman of the Year Award by the India New England News.

Ahluwalia’s innovative approach to creating youth employment opportunities has proved greatly successful. She believes that youth should be empowered and have ownership of these efforts. Ahluwalia also encourages collaborative relationships between YES and its country networks. The collaborative approach that YES employs, combined with the system of country networks and action-oriented methodology, has allowed YES to put youth employment at the forefront of the global agenda. With the idea to inspire creative action in mind, Ahluwalia plans to employ new and different initiatives to create opportunities for youth all over the world.

Under the leadership of Ahluwalia, YES currently focuses on encouraging the use of renewable energy, the implementation of information and communication technology, campaigns against HIV and AIDS, the growth of rural development and development of water sanitation. Ahluwalia is also planning an international summit in Kansas City, USA to take place in 2012.

YouthTrade and Present

In 2012, Ahluwalia launched YouthTrade, an organization aimed at promoting entrepreneurship and combatting unemployment by aligning conscious premium retailers with young, mission-driven entrepreneurs. YouthTrade has certified over 50 entrepreneurs. These entrepreneurs have gained access to shelf space in stores across the United States by participating in YouthTrade trade shows, where entrepreneurs meet one on one with buying teams from Whole Foods Markets to present their products. As of November 2013, the trade shows have led to YouthTrade entrepreneur's products being placed in the Mid-Atlantic, North Atlantic, Northeast, South, Southwest, Pacific Northwest, Northern California, and Southern Pacific regions of Whole Foods Markets.

YouthTrade is partnered with Whole Foods Markets and Babson College, and operates out of Lexington, MA, and Wellesley, MA.

In June 2013, Poonam was given the 2013 India New England Woman of The Year Award, in recognition of her work towards ending youth unemployment. On October 19, 2013, Ahluwalia delivered the keynote address at the 7th Annual Forum for Social Entrepreneurship. In November 2013, she participated in the World Economic Forum's 2013 Summit on the Global Agenda in Abu Dhabi, serving on the Global Youth Unemployment Council.

In 2014 she was awarded in Harvard, and she is now colaborating in Humanitarian Projects in World Wide.

Ahluwalia currently resides in Lexington, MA with her husband and two kids.