Nov 19, 2009 12:00 pm US/Pacific
Empowering Immigrants to Be New Entrepreneurs
Jefferson Award Winner: Farhana Huq
OAKLAND (CBS 5) ―
Adela Orucuta has gone from a housekeeping job to starting her own home daycare within a year. And she credits the nonprofit C.E.O. Women (Creating Economic Opportunities for Women) and its founder Farhana Huq.
Farhana explains, "I started C.E.O. Women because I was passionate about seeing women stand on their own two feet."
C.E.O. Women in Oakland trains immigrant women as entrepreneurs in six months. Adela improved her English, learned leadership skills, and developed a business plan. She received $2500 in seed money and other help, including a volunteer business coach.
"I'm so happy," Adela says, "I learned so, so much things."
Farhana, a former Americorp Vista member, founded C.E.O. Women in the year 2000. But the idea took root years earlier, when, as a teenager, she watched her aunt, originally from Pakistan, go through an arranged marriage at 17 that ended in divorce.
"She ended up on public welfare system with three children to raise by herself," Farhana remembers. "She eventually got training in beauty therapy from a local community college. And before we knew it, she was starting a salon from the front of her home."
Inspired by her aunt, Farhana wanted to empower other immigrant women to become self sufficient. Now C.E.O. Women has trained more than 1600 women in Oakland and San Jose.
And today, Farhana is using a new teaching tool to supplement its business curriculum in the classroom: C.E.O. Women produces its own soap opera called Grand Cafe. The story centers on four women entrepreneurs.
C.E.O. Women nonprofit says more than half the women either started or grew their own business within two years of completing the program.
And a recent survey, two thirds of C.E.O. Women's alumni say they've increased their incomes by $28,000 dollars a year.
Program manager Elinor Mattern says Farhana herself is an inspiration.
"You should see the looks on people's faces when the clients say, 'You started this organization?' There's so much gratitude and emotion there as well," Elinor says.
"Oh, I love C.E.O. Women," Adela adds. "C.E.O. Women changed my life."
But Farhana adds, "We are not changing their lives. They were changing their own lives and we're just a conduit to making that happen."
For empowering women to start their own business, this week's Jefferson Award in the Bay Area goes to Farhana Huq.
(© MMX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)
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