Taking REDF to Los Angeles
Samra Haider began her relationship with REDF as a Farber intern in 2007. After completing her MBA at the Wharton School, she returned to our San Francisco office as an Enterprise Development Manager. Since October 2008, Samra has been a main point person for our portfolio organizations. She’s provided hands-on business assistance in a variety of capacities, including market research, financial and operational analysis, business mentoring, and portfolio pipeline development. Recently, Samra relocated from San Francisco to Los Angeles. But while she’s left the Bay Area, she hasn’t left REDF.
She took it with her.
Samra is the advance party for REDF’s establishment of a new office in Southern California. “I’m excited to be REDF’s ambassador to Los Angeles,” she said. “I’ll be on the ground getting to know funders and government officials, as well as other nonprofits. Los Angeles is so much bigger than San Francisco, with a different dynamic and many more players. It’s an exciting step for both REDF and for me. I’m happy to be in on the ground floor. I’m looking forward to a whole new set of challenges.”
Advice ranges from brass tacks to outside the box
Samra uses her expertise to do everything from analyzing a social enterprise’s books to identifying new business opportunities (in addition to her degree from Wharton, she holds a BA in Economics from Columbia University, and an MSc in Human Rights from the London School of Economics). “I might look at a financial statement and see that this month a certain enterprise ran at a loss. I’ll go back through each month with the person in charge and try to determine the cause. Or we might get creative with marketing and try to grow the business by expanding the customer base. I might develop a business model, mentor the people who are running the social enterprise, or work out strategies for lowering costs - whatever’s needed.”
One of Samra’s current projects is a business that would provide locally-grown fresh-cut produce to institutional customers such as schools and hospitals. “A child is five times more likely to eat an apple if it’s sliced,” she said. “By triangulating and talking to a lot of people we discovered there’s a niche that isn’t being met in the local market. It’s exciting because we found it through a lot of detective work. We have high hopes about launching this enterprise. If it’s successful, we might branch out into more customer segments, like grocery stores. We’d also like to bring it to L.A.”
The measure of success
Having worked primarily as a management consultant prior to attending business school, Samra decided that she wanted to move toward a career that was business oriented, with an analytical component, and with the ultimate goal of benefiting society in a broad way. “Working at REDF has affirmed that there are a lot of really innovative things to do with a business degree that help people,” Samra said.
Now she works behind the scenes to ensure the success of the clients she serves. “It’s all about giving people jobs that are challenging, interesting, and that work for them. My job is to make sure as many people as possible have jobs, that they keep their jobs, and that they learn at their jobs. They might not know I exist, but that’s not the point. I just want them - and the social enterprises to succeed, and that takes a lot of work. There’s a lot of risk inherent in business,” she said, and added with a laugh, “But big risk, big reward.”
