WEE are the
Women Economic Empowerment (WEE) Program.

A program catalysed out of a partnership between Global Alliance for Mass Entrepreneurship (GAME) in collaboration with private sector platforms and community partner organisations.

GAME, as a backbone organisation, works with alliance partners to create scalable models for mass entrepreneurship. WEE is operating by collaborating with platform partners and community based organisations to create scalable gender intentional models and solutions.

Towards that, our vision is to enable economic opportunities for 2.5 lakh women entrepreneurs across the digital platform economy, across rural e-commerce, social commerce, gig, and job tech, by 2025.

We are bringing in empowerment as a process as well as an outcome by approaching the problem through the lens of a gender intentionality framework. Thereon, using gender transformative practices & models, we design interventions and plans considering gender intentional investment.

Identifying to solve

India’s digital platform economy continues to expand inexorably and is projected to reach 23.5 million by 2030¹. However, due to lack of gender intentionality as a practice, gendered divisions persist and severely limit opportunities for women, which is disempowering. There are gaps on how platform work is perceived by both female platform workers themselves and societies more broadly (consciousness), as well as norms and exclusionary practices.

¹Niti Aayog – India’s booming Gig & Platform Economy

Gender at Work Framework

Individual

Consciousness
Capabilities

Resources

Informal

Formal

Informal Norms
& Exclusionary
Practices

Formal Rules
& Policies

Systemic

By referring to the Gender at Work framework that builds on Naila Kabeer’s gender theory drawn by Andrea Cornwall, Professor of Global Development and Anthropology at King’s College London, we will be able to assess these platforms for providing livelihoods as a means for women empowerment, and gradually bridge these gaps towards economic empowerment of women.
Gender at Work Framework
By referring to the Gender at Work framework that builds on Naila Kabeer’s gender theory drawn by Andrea Cornwall, Professor of Global Development and Anthropology at King’s College London, we will be able to assess these platforms for providing livelihoods as a means for women empowerment, and gradually bridge these gaps towards economic empowerment of women.

Approach

The program approaches the issue in a very conscious and layered manner.

Conduct the Diagnosis
Conducting diagnosis to analyse the reasons behind dysfunctionality of market systems for women; identifying enablers and barriers to digital platform economy access for women.
Create a Vision
Creating a vision for how the system will look functionally and ready-to-work, post-intervention.
Design and Implement Intervention
Designing and implementing interventions to facilitate sustainable and wide-spread change in the market systems.
Assess Change and Adapt
Monitoring and measuring results to prove and adapt interventions for improved impact.

Building Together

Towards change, WEE collaborates with private platform economy players across rural e-commerce, social commerce, gig, and job tech to design & implement gender responsive models and practices. On the other hand, our community partners mobilise, upskill, recruit, and on-board women to enable digital access.

Through our approach, we are aiming:

  • to enable, elevate, and enrich women’s economic opportunities on the digital platform economy.
  • foster gender-transformative policies with private sector partners.
  • establish sustainable working models (scale & impact) that other players can replicate.

The Faces of WEE

A team of passionate individuals who are committed to scaling the platform economy for maximised participation of women.
Poulomi Pal

Poulomi Pal

Vice President – Women Entrepreneurship & Lead - WEE

Poulomi is the anchor for Women Entrepreneurship Programs in the platform economy. She manages key programs with a focus on program design, impact assessment, and solution development. Her experience in the development sector spans over two decades particularly at the interfaces of gender, livelihoods, and financial inclusion (business development, designing and implementing large scale livelihood programs & community-led initiatives) across sectoral categories.

Vanya Kaushik

Vanya Kaushik

Lead - Implementation

As WEE's Implementation Lead, Vanya connects our partners with the resources, knowledge, and networks they need to thrive.  Her leadership unlocks their potential for transformative economic growth and innovation. Vanya brings 8+ years' experience in grassroots implementation, program strategy, and consulting. Starting as a Gandhi Fellow in rural Rajasthan, she scaled CSR projects nationwide, managing multi-stakeholder collaborations and impacting informal workers and nano-enterprises.

Samikhya Nanda

Samikhsya Nanda

Manager - Program

Samikhsya focuses on program design and implementation, overseeing pilots, supporting partners in execution, leading program communication & advocacy efforts, and contributing to research endeavours. As a Young India Fellow, she has worked with impact-based organisations in gender, education & sustainability space.

Poornima Menon

Poornima Menon

Manager - Program

Poornima is responsible for managing key implementation partners under rural commerce, gig and job tech. A dedicated development sector professional with over 6 years of experience, she has been working on gender issues and projects enabling the economic empowerment of women through access to finance and enterprise development. An India Fellow and One Future Fellow, Poornima pioneered the establishment of Kala Maitri, a women’s collective enterprise, empowering small-scale women entrepreneurs in Maheshwar, MP, through skill-building and access to markets.

Inisa Guha

Inisa Guha

Lead - Research, Data, and Documentation

Inisa leads research efforts for the WEE program, coordinating studies on women's experiences and the digital platform economy. Additionally, she manages outreach to relevant brands as part of WEE’s collaboration with Amazon. Inisa comes with 8 years of experience working as a researcher and consultant in the domains of gender, education and governance across research institutes and government organisations. She has worked with clients ranging from government ministries to multi-lateral organisations.

Inisa Guha

Rashika Chaurasia

Manager - Partner Engagement

Rashika coordinates partnership opportunities for platform partners and manages daily coordination of social media growth and engagement. With over 6 years of experience in the social development sector, she brings a myriad of experience across program management, team leadership, partnership building, and event organisation in education, infrastructure, livelihood, and CSR volunteer engagement activities.