Pumla Maswanganyi is a South African entrepreneur, strategist, and innovator, working at the intersection of art and impact. As a global citizen having lived and worked on 5 continents, she is committed to developing systems and strategic interventions that disrupt traditional development norms, with a creative 21st-century lens.
Being a globalization and development expert, Pumla’s primary passion is to build context-based solutions to improve life chances and inclusivity for disenfranchised populations. This passion has led her to create a number of projects including using vocational training as a tool to end child marriage, to leveraging mobile technology to increase education accessibility for nomad and migrating communities in Africa.
Secondly, she is passionate about developing high-level strategies and systems to bring powerful ideas to life. Pumla currently serves as the youngest C-suite executive in two social impact-focused companies; namely, Baobab Consulting which fosters intercultural collaboration with an African focus, and Jara which is developing a solar & crank-powered IoT device to provide emergency education to children in post-disaster zones. Additionally, she also offers strategic and ‘system-building’ advice to startups and leaders within the arts, medtech, sustainable architecture, and equitable tourism industries.