WHEELS Global Foundation traces its origin to India’s ex-president Abdul Kalam’s exhortation to the entire Pan-IIT IIT alumni community to give back and make a difference to the people & communities that have underpinned each individual’s professional & financial success. That spirit of giving back is in even greater need more than ever given the scope & magnitude of challenges that have only gotten bigger. WHEELS ecosystem of contributing communities has steadily grown beyond Pan-IIT alumni to include several other professional groups like physicians, lawyers, administrators, and engineers from other engineering colleges; all enriching diversity of talent and solutions WHEELS can help accelerate.
In the journey to drive at-scale rapid impact, no contributions are small, and there is a role for everyone to play. WHEELS invites all professionals, innovators, and doers to serve and give back in one or more ways below, starting first to learn more about our growing diversity of exciting projects first and then choosing the right option(s) that align with the individual’s time, capacity and interests. Since most WHEELS projects cover a very wide geography (so as to touch millions of people), there is a very strong likelihood for everyone to find an opportunity to align with their domain (e.g., health, education, energy, water, livelihoods) and location (e.g., village/town/state of their birth or growing up or education)interests. Opportunity to contribute comes in many flavors – whether at work or through their employer or personal time & expertise & funds or connections or simply references & pointers.
WHEELS depends upon its global network of leaders and contributors, especially those with extensive on-the-ground knowledge, to select the right projects, field entities (NGOs, Social Enterprises), and innovations to select. These introductions are vital for our vibrant ecosystem, capacity, and diverse portfolio of projects to support. By referring, not only do you help bring the promising candidates to WHEELS, but also get a chance to influence that work by further participation and ongoing involvement in its eventual impact.
Please provide the following information to help us respond to the opportunity in a timely manner and with full justice, including your details so we can recognize & celebrate your contributions and engage you for further participation toward successful collaboration with the recommended entity
Each promising project takes WHEELS closer to its mission (‘Impacting 20% of India’s RurbanPopluation by 2030”). And right projects more often than not come from the engaged WHEELS family of leaders & contributors. Projects can benefit from WHEELS involvement in many ways such as leverage of technologies, business expertise from its alumni & ecosystem community (of professionals & leaders who have risen to CxO roles in hundreds of well-known corporations, and innovators with dozens of patents), access to products & relationships, and financial & other resources. Currently, the Pan-IIT alumni network alone is 400,000+ strong, and several folds more experts in WHEELS extended ecosystem of leaders and professionals. Please provide the following information to help us respond to the project opportunity in a timely manner and with full justice, including your details so we can recognize & celebrate your contributions and engage you for further participation in the successful growth/acceleration of recommended Project.
Given that technology is the core DNA of WHEELS alumni and extended community, leverage of promising innovations is natural for WHEELS. In general, these innovations would need to be ready for application now and could make a huge social impact in the domains WHEELS is focused on. Often the innovations can also help fill a critical gap in an existing promising project that is otherwise struggling to scale. And some of the innovations can be further expanded through WHEELS deep relationships with 23 IITs and other premier institutions in the world. Please provide the following information to help us respond to the Innovation opportunity in a timely manner and with full justice, including your details so we can recognize & celebrate your contributions and engage you for further participation towards full leverage of the recommended Innovation.
One of the main pillars of WHEELS strength & capacity to make a huge impact is its ecosystem of worldwide alumni and other professionals. Please help us make that potential a powerful reality through your contributions. There is no one fixed way to contribute. Everyone has different affinities and capacities at any given time. WHEELS have almost limitless options to give you the best chance to maximize your intent to give back. Following are some of the popular ways. However, please use the ‘Other’ option to let us know your preferences beyond the below-described options so we can respond in a timely fashion.
Our project teams are often involving people with passion & commitment but relatively far less expertise & experience than our well-resourced ecosystem community has. Hence, there is plenty of opportunities for advising & mentoring project teams. Your time involvement will be per your preference and the project’s needs. Please share the following information to enable us to align your interest, capacity & availability with your desired mentoring needs:
There is often no better way to get that real ‘feeling’ of an impact than being an active member (in some capacity) of the project that touches you deeply in some ways (because of its location or domain or technology or nature of impact or just the sheer hurdles that project needs to overcome). Volunteering with WHEELS can be in all different flavors – whether on the ground with a project implementation team or remote participation or in many key business functions (e.g., outreach & communications, fund-raising, operations). Please share the following information to enable us to align your interest, capacity & availability with your desired volunteering needs:
Youth participation is vital to WHEELS sustained growth, leadership capacity, and relevance. Internships with WHEELS are available during summer as well as during regular school/college/university calendar. What WHEELS interns can expect is an opportunity to get an amazing experience of learning across a wide variety of areas (whether business functions or technologies or geographies or impact models or cultures) along with a deep sense of purpose and impact. An opportunity to see and play a vital part in the transition of the old world of pure-profit drives corporations and pure philanthropy to business models that bring the best of both worlds through modern social enterprise structures. Please share the following information to enable us to align your interest, capacity & availability with your desired internship needs:
Not only individuals in WHEELS family can make a direct impact, but there may also be an even bigger opportunity through the leverage of resources an individual’s employer has. These resources could be many different types, e.g., products & solutions that can augment existing WHEELS projects, innovations that can fill in critical gaps, distribution channels, or delivery capacity. Often corporations encourage their employees to take time off to work on social impact projects and/or contribute in other ways. The corporate world is far bigger in its capacity, resources, reach, and innovations and hence bigger the opportunities for leverage. IIT alumni are almost in sizable numbers in almost every medium to large corporation in the world, especially those that are technology-driven. Please share the following information to enable us to leverage your proposal involving your employer’s resources:
CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility) programs are rapidly becoming commonplace in most corporations worldwide due to their strategic value (e.g., attracting & retaining talent, brand image, community engagement). While CSR pool of funds is optional in some countries, in others (e.g., India) they are a regulatory requirement, and thus present a powerful opportunity to drive WHEELS mission. WHEELS alumni and the ecosystem community are the best channels to tap into these funds in the best way possible. These CSR funds will often be the anchor resource that makes it possible to attract other sources. Please share your recommendations to tap into the CSR funds for WHEELS mission:
Many corporations have matching programs to encourage their employees to contribute and impact their favorite social causes. Further, some of the corporations also support fund-raising campaigns within the corporation to support worthy causes. Both of these are important opportunities for WHEELS alumni & ecosystem members to inquire and leverage at their employers. Please share your recommendations to tap into the Corporate Giving programs for WHEELS success:
