The Catalyst

Founder and Execute Director of the sustainable gemstone company, INONGE ZITA, Patricia splits her time between Denmark and Zambia where she employs her innovative framework, “Design Thinking for Extractive Communities," to add value to Zambia's natural resources. In doing so, Patricia plays a major hand in creating economically viable value chains that lead to sustainable job creation for the you...

Arielle Patrick, a young Wall Street executive shares her advice on career development, personal brand building and the importance of relationships over transactions.

An architect by trade and an artist by birthright, Oana Stănescu is a multi-hyphenate whose work inspires musings of community and play. Raised in Romania amidst the revolution that ousted Nicolae Ceausescu, Oana grew up understanding a fundamental truth: worlds can, and do, change—often when you least expect. This reality taught her to create her own world. Utilizing architecture as her domain, O...

Before The World Ended, I took a course on the economic life of women which demonstrated to me that, historically, marriage has been an economic booster for all parties involved but especially for women (many reasons for this but consider the system of primogeniture as well as the cultural and economic consequences of patriarchy and their adverse effects on the economic lives of women). Curious to...

Do you know those people who laugh easily, put you at ease and who seem to recognize you, not as who you necessarily are, but as who you could be? For Episode 009 of The Catalyst, I had the honor of sitting down with such a person: United States Ambassador Swanee Hunt. In conversation with her, one notices that Ambassador Hunt is a woman with a wealth of wisdom and a sense of humor that is clever...

"I can raise a million dollars in ten minutes." These were the words the ladies of The Synergist and myself heard as we listened, intently, to everything The Most Powerful Woman in the Room had to say. Well, it was a Zoom room, but, alas, this is our new reality. When I finally got the opportunity to tell Lydia Fenet how powerful I found her statement to be and inquired on how she could possibly r...

As a lover of art myself, I was delighted to have the opportunity to speak Kim Heirston, a Yale-educated international art advisor whose love for art is just as profound as her desire to share it with the masses. Speaking with her on a host of topics, from the Culture Wars of the 1980s to the importance of nature to the need to take time and give art the viewership it begs, this episode of The Cat...

“Impact is multifaceted," Zemedeneh Negatu said as he passionately spoke of the ripple effects that home-grown Ethiopian Airlines has had, not only in Africa but beyond the continent as well. In this episode of The Catalyst, Audrey Dilgarde spoke with Zemedeneh Negatu about all the moments of impact he's been able to catalyze while at the helm of his global private equity firm, Fairfax Africa Fund...

"Nearly 50 years after coming into this world, I began my life for a second time." This profound reflection is how Anne Devereux-Mills begins her new book, The Parlay Effect : How Female Connection Can Change the World. For this episode of The Catalyst, Audrey Dilgarde spoke with Anne Devereux-Mills, Founder and Chief Instigator of Parlay House, a series of salons that have created a global commun...

"Medicine is not exclusively biological." This nuanced statement intrigued me as Dr. Joia Mukherjee spoke of her years in global health during a guest lecture in a recent class I took, Infectious Diseases and Social Injustice. Beyond being a professor at Harvard Medical School, Dr. Joia also spends her time as the Chief Medical Officer of Partners in Health––a Boston based international nonprofit...

I first encountered Marie Griffin during the annual Harvard Undergraduate Women in Business Intercollegiate Business Convention, where she was delivering a keynote speech. During her speech, Marie spoke of her journey from being an editor at Seventeen Magazine, to working in Paris, to starting her own namesake company and working with clients that range from Hermes to Dior Beauty to the Wall Stree...

When I first met Evan Wesley, I was running an election to become an International Trustee for Key Club International—the world’s largest and oldest high school service organization. It was during my time and extensive involvment in Key Club International that Evan and I bonded over our mutual love and passion for public service, activism and our belief that young people are key in solving some of...

Before the start of my second semester, I participated in a mindfulness program with fellow Harvard classmates where the dean of our college, Dean Rakesh Khurana, spoke to us during an intimate group conversation. A moment that stuck out to me the most from the conversation was when Dean Khurana said, “focus on doing things that will lead to a worthy obituary rather than resume-building.”