Manisha has more than 10 years of diverse professional experience in the social startups, strategy consulting (development sector), & BFSI domain. At Mphasis, she leads the Impact Funding arm of CSR, where she manages funding and mentoring support to social enterprises through government approved social incubators. In her past roles, she has provided strategy consulting within the Impact Investment space and has headed the India operations of an international social enterprise. Manisha is an MBA from IIM Indore & a B.Tech from NSIT, Delhi. She also completed the Executive Leadership program in JM Katz Business School, University of Pittsburgh, USA.

Commencing the conversation with describing the vision of Mphasis, Ms. Manisha said that the CSR activity is aligned with the business ethos of the firm which is focused on technology and innovation. The company supports disruptive technology-based solutions in social space as it is necessary for any solution to be sustainable and scalable so to make an impact in the long run.

Talking about the Flagship initiatives, Ms. Manisha explained that they primarily focus on three areas- i.e., Education, Skill Development and Inclusion of people with disability. In the Education sector, their flagship program “Arivu Disha “ – an intervention at primary school level is aimed at improving the learning outcomes of school students from 3rd to 10th grade in English comprehension and Mathematics.

In the domain of skills, the company runs two flagship programmes- 1. Skill Train – a social enterprise which is an android app based skilling solution; 2. A program in partnership with Nudge Foundation for skilling of young dropouts from rural and urban areas at many locations in the country.

Commenting on the “Evolution of social incubation sector in CSR ecosystem”, Ms. Singh states that they are 4 years mature in this space. In the beginning, they undertook the ad-hoc approach which involved picking up a social enterprise and finding an incubator. But now the method has changed. They have tied up with NSRCEL IIM Bangalore and they are involved in every step- starting from inviting call for applications for greatest ideas in social sector to selecting few of the enterprises to go through pre-acceleration program to PITCH event to select top 3 enterprises aligning with Mphasis' 3 key focus areas for long-term incubation support and seed funding.

According to Ms. Manisha, India CSR Summit hosted by NGOBOX and CSRBOX is the amalgamation of all the players in the CSR ecosystem. A perfect place to meet CSR heads, Entrepreneurs, Incubators, etc. It keeps them updated about what is going on in the CSR space and also helps with future tie-ups.

Impact-Talk is a series of views and interviews of CSR heads, impact leaders and change-makers, addressing development challenges in India. If you have an impact-maker in your network, please suggest/share details at csr@ngobox.org