What can we learn about resilience from street vendors? Just about everything, says Harish Hande of SELCO, an organization that delivers decentralized solar energy to the poor in India. Tackling both poverty and the energy crisis at once, Harish’s pioneering work relies on the belief that every individual offers their own expertise, and you don’t need a PhD to solve the world’s toughest problems.
Harish says our obsession with pedigree causes us to overlook the expertise of individuals on the ground, especially when it comes to poverty alleviation and social innovation. He’s using sustainable energy to uplift street vendors in India who are already equipped with solutions to the problems threatening their livelihoods—they just need additional resources to spring into action. Drawing on his experience growing up under the caste system in a steel state in India, he shares with Courtney what it’s like to unlearn “untouchability.” They talk about SELCO’s mission-based hiring model—he rolls his eyes at the idea of hiring based on degrees and résumés—and the ways in which his work carries into his personal life as a father.
Learn more about SELCO and watch this video of Harish’s 2018 Skoll Award-winning work. You can also read this profile on Harish’s innovative sustainable business model.
For a more forward-looking lens, check out Harish’s interview in Forbes: The Path to the Covid Recovery is Paved with Renewable Energy. And finally, read Arundhati Roy’s Financial Times piece that Courtney mentions: The Pandemic is a Portal. View the episode transcript here.
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