We often discuss the future of work as if it will unfold on its own. The truth is, we are shaping it through the choices we make now—in how to invest, hire, train, and educate. The COVID-19 pandemic is forcing to accelerate these choices, and is an opportunity design a future for inclusion and resilience. Africa, the world’s youngest continent—and soon, its largest workforce—has promising, and sometimes surprising, answers. With the African continent at the cusp of great change, it is also emerging as a crucible of innovation. What are some of its leading systems-shapers doing to build the largest and most inclusive workforce? What global lessons does it hold? Join a discussion with these Afro-global innovators to find out.
This session was curated in partnership with Harambee Youth Employment Accelerator.
Sharmi Surianarain serves as the Chief Impact Officer, Harambee Youth Accelerator, Sharmi is a fierce advocate for opportunity and social justice for young people and women across the African continent, and is a keen analyst and thinker on the future of work. Sharmi leads on Harambee’s impact and systems change agendas, including our key funder partnerships, research and learning agenda. Sharmi is the chair of the Rwanda Global Business Services Growth Initiative advisory board, an initiative incubated by Harambee to drive GBS job growth in Rwanda. Sharmi is the Founder of Making Caring Count, a social enterprise that aims to build impactful solutions around care work in Africa and has launched a TED talk on the subject of care work. Sharmi is an Aspen African Leadership Initiative Fellow, Class of 2020 and an RSA Fellow, and has a BA and MEd from Harvard University. Sharmi is also a singer-songwriter and jazz musician, with a debut EP titled Lost. She lives in Nairobi, Kenya.
Ambassador, United States Mission to the African Union
Ambassador Jessica Lapenn is a career member of the Senior Foreign Service and
currently serves as the U.S. Ambassador to the African Union and the U.S. Permanent
Representative to the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa. Just prior to this
assignment, 2016-2019, she was the Chargé d’Affaires in South Africa. Previous leadership
roles include Chief of Staff to the Under Secretary of State for Civilian Security and Deputy
Chief of Mission in Kigali.
Ambassador Lapenn joined the Foreign Service in 1994 and has served overseas in
Jeddah, Riyadh, Paris, Tbilisi, Baghdad, and Jerusalem. In Washington, she worked for the
Under Secretary for Political Affairs, as the desk officer for Libya and Tunisia, and as the
director of the Office of Human Rights and Humanitarian Affairs in the Bureau of International
Organizations. She was an advisor on Security Council matters at the U.S. Mission to the UN in
New York and spent a year as a fellow in a Congressional office.
Ambassador Lapenn was born and raised in New York City. She received a BA in
Women’s Studies from Harvard College and an M.Phil in International Development from
Cambridge University. Her twelve-year old son has been along for all her most recent
adventures.
Fred Swaniker is the Founder and CEO of Sand Technologies, a global technology company that builds enterprise-grade artificial intelligence applications for companies and governments worldwide.
Fred began his career at McKinsey & Company and has an MBA from Stanford University, where he was named an Arjay Miller Scholar, a distinction awarded to the top 10% of each graduating class. He has been recognized as a Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum; as a TED Fellow, and as an Aspen Institute Fellow. He sits on the board of the Rhodes Trust (which awards the prestigious Rhodes Scholarship at Oxford University) and is a member of the International Advisory Board of Waterloo University (Canada).
Fred was recognized in 2019 as one of the “100 Most Influential People in the World” by Time Magazine and again in 2023 with a “Time 100 Impact Award” for his work. He also received Stanford University’s 2024 President’s Award for the Advancement of the Common Good.
I am the CEO of the Wikimedia Foundation, the non-profit that operates Wikipedia. I spent a decade as the CEO of Harambee Youth Employment Accelerator, a social enterprise building African solutions to tackle the global crisis of youth unemployment. Previously, I served as Chief Operating Officer of Planned Parenthood Federation of America and as the Advisor to the President of Rice University. I earned a B.A. magna cum laude from Rice University, a M.Sc. from Oxford University as a Rhodes Scholar, and a J.D. from Yale Law School. I am a Trustee of Yale University, the Mellon Foundation, Co-Impact, and a member of the Aspen Global Leadership Network.
Ann Mei Chang is a leading expert on social innovation and author of Lean Impact: How to Innovate for Radically Greater Social Good. Ann Mei served as the Chief Innovation Officer at USAID and first Executive Director of the US Global Development Lab, engaging the best practices for innovation from Silicon Valley to accelerate the impact and scale of solutions to the world’s most intractable challenges. In addition, she was Chief Innovation Officer for Pete for America, Chief Innovation Officer at Mercy Corps, and Senior Advisor for Women and Technology at the U.S. Department of State.
Prior to her pivot to the public and social sector, Ann Mei was a seasoned technology executive, with more than 20 years’ experience at such leading companies as Google, Apple, and Intuit, as well as at a range of startups. As Senior Engineering Director at Google, she led worldwide engineering for mobile applications and services, delivering 20x growth to $1 billion in annual revenues in just three years.
Ann Mei earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Computer Science from Stanford University and is a member of the Aspen Institute’s Henry Crown Fellows’ class of 2011. She has been recognized as one of the “Women In the World: 125 Women of Impact” by Newsweek/The Daily Beast in 2013, "23 most powerful LGBTQ+ people in tech" by Business Insider in 2019, and "20 Top LGBTQ+ Entrepreneurs, Executives and Thought Leaders" by Global Shakers in 2019.
