Breaking Barriers One Pad At A Time
Kristin Kagetsu is the co-founder and chief executive officer of Saathi, a social enterprise dedicated to providing an end-to-end solution for sanitary protection to women in India. Saathi aims to empower local communities via a local supply chain, give girls and women access to safe feminine hygiene products, and find a solution for upcycling pads into compost, biogas, and biodigesters to reduce carbon emissions. Saathi has won the HBS New Venture Competition, Asia Society’s Action Lab Grant, Asia Social Innovation Challenge, 3M Young Innovators Challenge, and participated in MassChallenge.
Kristin has a passion for engineering design that makes a direct impact on people’s lives. As an undergraduate student, she worked on multiple projects with the MIT Design Lab (D-Lab) in Brazil, Nicaragua, and India. Her first product launch was of a set of natural dye crayons that she developed with an NGO in Uttarakhand where she fell in love with India. Kristin also volunteered with the Society of Asian Scientists and Engineers (SASE), working to structure and expand the national collegiate team to better support over 60 collegiate chapters, as well as to develop SASE leadership in the Northeast. She was an MIT DLab ScaleUps Fellow, TEDx speaker, and currently resides in India. Kristin received her Bachelor’s Degree in Mechanical Engineering from MIT.
For our final installment on #BreakingBarriers, SASE had the opportunity to speak with Kristin as she discussed her personal journey and lessons learned throughout the way.
How have your experiences influenced you to be where you are now?
For my entire life, my parents always pushed me to do the best I could and taught me that with everything, there could always be a way to improve. I think that has made me very thoughtful in my approach to problems and challenges so that I always try to find the best solution, and I’m always willing to tweak the results based on feedback. SASE taught me and gave me the confidence I needed to know that I could make an impact if I put my mind to it as well. In college, working at DLab and MIT additionally gave me a lot of context for what it’s like to work in the complex field of development and taught me about resourcefulness and system thinking. I also knew that I had a strong interest in women’s empowerment, sustainability, and applying my engineering skills, so Saathi was well suited to my personal interests.
What obstacles did you anticipate in taking the step to move forward with Saathi?
I didn’t really think too much about the obstacles. I feel like it’s daunting to think of all the negatives. Rather, I thought about how to best prepare myself for the journey. Specifically, I worked to build my network in India before arriving to work in order to obtain insight from those who had gone through a similar process. Admittedly, I could have done more to prepare my network, but I definitely expanded it a lot more once I arrived in India.
I did find communication to be a bit difficult as well as how business practices differ. Once thing I hadn’t known about the business culture was that it is much more common for people to communicate in person or through a phone call versus over email. For example, I’d send an email out and wait days, weeks without hearing anything. I’d then follow up through a phone call and easily get a hold of the person and information I needed. As far as other challenges, I feel like SASE spoils you in a way — through SASE, you get to work with some of the most self-motivated, passionate people in the network. When you get out there, though, not every person you meet may have that enthusiasm, so that has been an interesting challenge.
Saathi brings to the forefront an issue that is not only overlooked, but often taboo. How do you think being a woman has influenced your voice on this topic?
I have been surprised at reactions of male judges in some of the competitions Saathi has participated in. Even in competitions in the US, where we tend to think the culture is more progressive, the reaction is similar to what you may expect in “conservative” societies. We’ve had people doubt that the issues we discuss [about women’s health and education] are truly problems. I’ve had people tell me “I know this market and this won’t sell in this market”, and my reaction now is “Well, people bought it, so I don’t know what to tell you.” Overall, I’m glad that Saathi has a diverse staff and diverse input for our product.
We’ve had people doubt that the issues we discuss [about women’s health and education] are truly problems.
Overall in business, there may be disadvantages encountered based on who you are, but sometimes those unique aspects also help you stand out. I happen to be a woman, a foreigner, and I’m young, so it’s sometimes hard to discern what has been the biggest factor here. However, you never know how people will react until you’re there and give it your best shot, so it’s important to seize those opportunities and make the most of them.
First off, think critically about what impact you want to make and how you can make the most of it.
What advice would you give those looking to become entrepreneurs?
For those looking to start their own enterprise and go down the entrepreneurial path, I admit my advice is very personal. First off, think critically about what impact you want to make and how you can make the most of it. What problem can you solve, whether it is a universal issue or one that is specific to your local community? In my opinion the most important item is to understand what the purpose of the endeavor is. Do you need to pay the bills? Are you able to apply something that you greatly enjoy or have a lot of talent for? Regardless, it is important to have a strong driving force behind your enterprise, as that passion is what will get you through the inevitable hard parts along your journey.
To learn more about Saathi, visit their site here.
If you’d like to contribute to Saathi, visit their crowdfunding site here.
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