Putting purpose at the heart of your career

Meghal Shah had always felt a strong desire to share his skills with those who could benefit from them the most. This saw him leave a career within the corporate sector to pursue a new career path built on the goal of helping purpose led organisations innovate and scale their impact.

He explains, “In many ways, innovation and scale is a far more complex nut to crack in the purpose sector than in corporate. This is because the purpose sector doesn’t have access to deep capital pools, risk appetite and doesn’t provide the same financial incentives as a corporate sector to attract a deep human resource pool”. 

Viewing this issue as both a challenge and an opportunity, Meghal set off to find solutions to issues such as global poverty, which he is particularly passionate about. “I thought it would be worth spending my time trying to solve these complex problems,” he says. 

Now, as the Regional Director (Asia) at Action on Poverty, Meghal is taking his learnings from the thriving corporate sector, and applying these to the areas, countries and communities who need them most.

Once Meghal made the decision to move into the for purpose sector, his focus quickly turned to how he could be as effective in this new space as possible. “I came across the Anstice MBA Scholarship for Community Leadership at the University of Sydney Business School, and it really resonated with me because it was targeting people like me,” he said. “Receiving the scholarship made the choice of studying the MBA really straight forward.”

At the beginning of 2020, Meghal kicked-off his MBA, studying part-time while working full-time and coming to grips with the beginning of the pandemic. 

While Meghal was in a leadership role and trying to juggle study, life, and pandemic all at once – he was committed to completing his MBA no matter what. “The MBA affirmed a few things I intuitively knew and was already doing, but it also illuminated certain things that were unknown unknowns,” he says. “For me, the combination of those two things has been quite powerful because one improves your confidence, and the other improves your competence.”

Meghal’s peers were all in different industries and it was this diversity that he enjoyed the most about his cohort.  “We had people from medical backgrounds, the corporate sector, we had police officers, and we had people involved in the for purpose sector and academics – it was quite a rich learning environment,” he said.

While Meghal has remained in the same organisation since completing his MBA, he’s keen to point out that changing organisations was never on the agenda. “My goal was not to pivot my career – it was to build confidence and competence,” he says. “A lot of what I had as assumed knowledge was either reaffirmed or challenged, and the pivotal changes for me were internal.”

Since graduating, Meghal has been given the opportunity to take on the role of Program Director of International Programs at Action on Poverty, along with his current COO role. In early 2024, Meghal also started a secondment at the organisation’s Hanoi office, where he is leading some transformation projects.

“The positive changes brought about in my approach, in part due to the MBA, have allowed more stakeholders to trust me with solving complex and ambiguous problems that are not necessarily in my direct technical domain of expertise," he explains. “It’s about how I take people on the journey and get resources aligned towards the best chance of success.”

Meghal has had the opportunity and privilege to travel to 12 countries across Asia, Africa and the Pacific to support projects and partners of his organisation. His focus however remains on increasing the amount of resources going towards ending poverty globally and increasing the effectiveness of interventions within the for purpose sector.

This includes the launch of Voluntasker, which is the first platform of its kind. “These are the things that give me a lot of joy, when we’re introducing new innovations to the marketplace that bring additionality to the sector and grow the set of resources available to end global poverty.” he explains. “You no longer need money to help people living in extreme poverty – instead you can do micro tasks in your neighbourhood and at the same time, help someone living in poverty overseas.” 

While the challenges and demands of the for purpose sector can’t be ignored, Meghal feels privileged to play a role in the innovation of the space.