Laura Parkin

Over the past thirty years, Laura has led and invested in both for-profit and non-profit high-growth organizations, as entrepreneur and social entrepreneur, head of a private foundation, and venture capitalist.

Most recently, Laura has worked with philanthropists to design workforce development initiatives, with a special focus on growing a diverse workforce for the transition to clean energy.

As Chief Strategy and Finanicial Officer at Results for America (RFA), Laura partnered with the CEO to spin the organization out of an incubator, develop its growth strategy, and create business plans that raised over thirty million dollars of grant funding.

Prior to joining RFA, Laura was concurrently the Executive Director of the Wadhwani Foundation and Co-founder and CEO of the National Entrepreneurship Network (NEN), the Wadhwani Foundation’s largest initiative at the time. Over ten years, Laura led NEN from concept to national scale, partnering with over 600 colleges and institutes across India to help them build comprehensive entrepreneurship programs. Under Laura’s leadership, NEN was instrumental in shaping the high-growth entrepreneurship ecosystem in India. NEN continues to grow internationally as Wadhwani NEN.

Laura earned her AB from Harvard College, and her MPA from Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government.

Laura is an active volunteer: she currently serves as the Treasurer of the Harvard Alumni for Climate and the Environment, a shared interest group of the Harvard Alumni Association, and as a Board Member and Chair of the Fundraising Committee of the nonprofit Friends of Herring River in Wellfleet, MA. Laura is the immediate past Co-President of the Stuyvesant High School Parents’ Association in New York City.