A warm welcome to my cozy, virtual space. 

Hi there, it’s me, Manpreet! I am so glad you are here. Let’s call this little space I occupy on the interwebs my living room, mostly because that is literally where I do most of my writing – while sitting on the sofa next to my sweet forever-young little 14-year-old dog, Bobo. 

Rewritten is a newsletter that came out of my work as an entrepreneur, educator, and social impact and equity advisor. I started my company, Art of Citizenry, years ago to help impact-driven businesses create sustainable systems for growth. Fast forward to now, I have had the opportunity to collaborate with + educate dozens (I feel weird saying hundreds, but that is likely more accurate) of businesses and social entrepreneurs over the years and am excited to share all that I have learned, observed, and experienced so we can continue to work towards collaborative models for social, environmental, and economic change.

Weaving ESG with DEIA

In short, I work as a Chief of Impact, an advisor, and a consultant for impact-driven businesses. I help businesses drive “transformative change” (overused? maaaybe) by strategically integrating social and climate considerations into how they operate (for my fellow acronym enthusiasts: ESG [environmental, social and corporate governance] meets DEIA [diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility]). 

Leveraging my expertise, I guide the development and implementation of initiatives that address pressing societal challenges while also enhancing an organization's reputation and long-term viability. I collaborate with teams, founders, and business leaders to create strategies that are both values-aligned and consistently achievable - combining team goals with sustainability, social responsibility, and ethical practices. 

Too much of how companies and organizations have historically approached impact is through a colonialist lens inevitably tinted with white supremacy. My goal is to decolonize these approaches by weaving together education and strategy. We can’t undo unequal power structures without first creating space to unlearn and relearn. I am an experienced digital marketer and corporate PR professional, which allows me to build strategies that help create and share a greater social impact. In a sense, my work is like behavioral economics for impact. 

I love what I do because it allows me to weave purpose and conscious decision-making into a business's DNA, nurturing a culture of intention-driven innovation and contributing to a more equitable and sustainable world.

In addition to running Art of Citizenry, I am currently pursuing a Master of Jurisprudence (legal studies) degree in Sustainable International Development at the University of Washington School of Law. That means I am writing and researching all the time about really important things — from the history of policing in the United States to the impact of industrialized agriculture on women farmers. I am currently working on my master’s thesis on corporate accountability within the context of globalization. 

So what does any of this have to do with this newsletter? Well, this newsletter is a place where I continue to share my work, except unfiltered. It is a bit of everything: conversations with brilliant friends and humans doing amazing things to change the world, books I am currently reading and need to talk to someone about, articles I think you should bookmark, and all else that goes on in my brain. My hope is that, through the rambles, you will leave each newsletter with either a laugh, a nugget of learning, or if nothing else, something that helped you spend a few moments away from your task list (or Instagram, TikTok, LinkedIn…all of the above?). 

Why subscribe?

I believe the only way we can make the world and our relationships within it more restorative is by deconstructing the systems we each navigate on a daily basis. The world we are currently navigating is built on structural inequities. From international development to social entrepreneurship to DEI initiatives, often our approach to “fixing” causes more harm than good. To create sustainable change and build more just global economies, we need to have an intersectional approach built on deconstructing and rebuilding.

Join my independent newsletter for nuanced and unfiltered insights exploring how we can together build a more just and equitable future. You won’t have to worry about missing anything. Every new edition of the newsletter goes directly to your inbox.

About Manpreet 

For starters, I have dedicated my career to the practice of social entrepreneurship and business, and am now building on my field knowledge with formal theoretical frameworks rooted in research. Regardless, I am really proud of this bio, so I will let it do the talking– 

Manpreet Kaur Kalra (she/her) is a social impact + equity advisor, anti-racism educator, writer, and podcaster working to decolonize storytelling. Her work focuses on the interconnectivity of economic, social, and climate justice within sustainable development initiatives. She collaborates with impact-driven organizations to co-create solutions that promote equitable, anti-racist and innovative work environments by rethinking how businesses approach and communicate impact.

Having worked in venture capital and startups, Manpreet founded Art of Citizenry to support impact-driven brands prioritizing people and the planet. She collaborates with businesses to address inclusion in all aspects, from business development to marketing strategy. She educates using a variety of mediums, including the Art of Citizenry Podcast, where she shares her nuanced and unfiltered insights on building a more just and equitable future. Her work unpacks history and addresses systemic power structures.

As a highly acclaimed speaker, Manpreet has led workshops, lectured at universities, and delivered keynotes at universities and organizations around the world including Cornell University, University of Southern California Global Policy Institute, University of Arts London, and the World Fair Trade Organization. Her powerful talks range from Ethical Storytelling to Anti-racism in Global Development. 

With a passion for creative storytelling as a tool for social change, she created a photo and poetry series called Artisans of Punjab that explores the trauma of Partition through the evolution of Phulkari textiles. She is also a contributing author on ethical storytelling in The Fashion Designer Survival Guide (3rd Edition, 2021). 

She is a founding member of the Fair Trade Federation’s Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion (JEDI) Committee. Featured in Forbes, she co-founded Reclaim Collaborative, an online community dedicated to nurturing justice and equity across the sustainable fashion and lifestyle ecosystem. She also provides pro bono consulting and mentorship to impact-driven businesses around the globe as a Nest Professional Fellow. She served as the Chief of Impact for MINNA Goods, and sat on the board of the New York City Fair Trade Coalition and Dasvandh Network. 

Hailing from the heart of Silicon Valley, Manpreet currently resides in Seattle. She studied at Boston University College of Communication, where she founded Kaurista, the first online lifestyle magazine that provided Sikh women with a platform to feel represented and heard. 

As the granddaughter of refugees displaced during the partition of Punjab in the 1940s and the daughter of immigrants who survived the 1984 Sikh Genocide, Manpreet speaks to the complexity of identity and generational trauma through her work. While studying at BU, she dedicated her academic interests around further uncovering the deep-seated history of genocide and its impact on economic development. 

Manpreet is currently pursuing a Masters of Jurisprudence with a focus on Sustainable International Development at the University of Washington School of Law. Her research focuses on corporate accountability, human rights, and globalization through an intersectional feminist lens. 

Her organizing work and fearless leadership has always focused on creating safe spaces for underrepresented communities to thrive. Manpreet seeks to make the world a little more equitable every day.