Throughout March, we're sitting down with Reubenite women, past and present, to talk about how they're going to be #MakingHistory.
Today, we're focusing on Sonal Raj. She's an MBA student (2024), Laidlaw Scholar and Co-Head at the Oxford Women in Leadership Alliance (OWLA).
She's going to contribute to a business world where investing in women's health is the norm, not the exception.
Social impact is my passion
I’m Sonal, an MBA Reubenite at Saïd Business School, where I'm learning how to drive change at the intersection of business and social impact.
My experience is working in impact investing back home in India, primarily supporting women’s health start-ups. Because of this passion, I've been studying the general first principles of business, but with a very strong focus on understanding how markets can work for social good.
Women's health is an underserved area
I began my career in management consulting for a pharmaceutical firm but made a career pivot sometime around COVID. Contributing to social impact just made more sense to me. Now, I've been lucky enough to work on projects and within organisations that have a very strong focus on making healthcare more accessible to women and economically empowering them. This is also what led me to impact investing.
The shift from consulting to social impact felt like a daring choice: I don't come from a family of economic privilege; when you work in social impact, you’re going to be taking pay cuts and your growth is going to be slower than other, more commercial, roles. But my choice was correct.
Women's health is an underserved area in investment and that seems to be constantly swept under the carpet. Working in that space has made me more eager to move the needle by playing my role as an impact investor, be it back home in India or in the global landscape.
Women's spaces and opportunities
Heading the Oxford Women in Leadership Alliance (OWLA)
I came to Oxford because the Saïd Business School is very intentional when it comes to gender equality; for me, it was very important to see women like me represented in the spaces that I'm in. This is also why I'm a Co-Head of OWLA. I’m working with some very inspiring women to build a more nourishing environment for other women business leaders.
OWLA builds a safe space for women to be heard and to have a nice community, and that's been the most exciting part. We get to discuss things which are traditionally considered ‘feminine’. It's very wholesome to be with groups of women who can talk about 'power dressing’, or the role that make-up can play in important business meetings. We're also very diverse: some members are business founders, some are investors, and many are mothers who are doing the MBA as well, which is extremely challenging. It’s great to be around women who are individually different, but still maintain a sense of community.
The Laidlaw Scholarship changed my life
It's uncommon to get an education abroad where I'm from, so I needed to find a business school that supported women like me.
Oxford has a great reputation, but what stood out was the association with the Laidlaw Foundation. The Laidlaw Scholarship is specifically for supporting women who are working in the space of gender empowerment - women who are meritorious, but who might not be able to afford the MBA otherwise.
If not for the Laidlaw Foundation, I wouldn’t have made it to Oxford. Being here, I'm surrounded by such a diverse community of inspiring people. I’ll forever be grateful.
How I'm #MakingHistory
I'm going to make history by championing investments in women's health, bridging the gap when it comes to investing in (and supporting) women-led, women-focused innovations. Keeping women at the forefront of market decisions is not just something that you do for 'EDI purposes'. It does make economic sense for businesses as well!
In India, women's health - especially aspects like reproductive and sexual health - is a very, very underserved space. There's still such a long way to go. But being part of this moment where you're working on investments that accelerate that progress? That's the kind of history that I want to make.
