Lata’s work spans over more than a decade of working at the intersection of investing in the individual capacities of women & girls with a focus on social services, women’s leadership, advocacy, social entrepreneurship and nonprofit management rooted in community driven solutions. She has been in positions of leadership throughout her career bringing a varied and rich experience from her work with various non-profits and ethnic organizations in the San Francisco Bay area, while being strongly committed to the principles of social justice and collaborative solutions. Her skills combine analytical rigor with the flexibility needed for everyday implementation processes. Lata is able to handle strategic direction but also assume a hands-on role with tactical fund development, community development and administrative management.

As the Chair of the Santa Clara County Commission on the Status of Women she guided a Task Force on the UN Women’s Bill of rights – CEDAW while addressing the issues that affected women in the region. In that role, she oversaw two critical projects for the county – impact of recession and budget cuts on low-income women resulting in a report called Women’s voices: Front and Center; and a project on the general status of women in Santa Clara county with special attention to gender discrimination and economic equity called Bringing Equality Home, using the framework outlined in the Platform for Action of the 1995 Beijing conference.

Lata was one of two women from the region invited to attend the United Nations session to meet women representatives from several countries assessing their efforts on eliminating violence against women. Her most successful task as well as the most challenging was leading the County leadership to pass a Resolution supporting the UN Resolution CEDAW – the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination against Women and resolve all County activities through the gender lens.

She has held leadership positions on a variety of non-profit community organizations such as Consortium of Collaborative Solutions, Mid-Peninsula YWCA and the Cardea Center for Women. She coordinated Women’s Action Network – an online collaborative of women’s organizations on the Peninsula for advocacy and as a tool for monitoring legislative action affecting women & girls.

LP’s work has spanned grassroots activism, building women’s movements, policy advocacy and non-profit management. She has represented South-Asian Community in Policy Forums and Conferences, San Jose DV Conference; San Francisco State University DV Training Workshop for Government agencies; and the State-wide California Women’s Initiative. She has had a deep involvement with local women's rights activism across the Silicon Valley region with its diverse demographics which has been critical to both appreciating and assessing the complex issues of women and their rights everywhere.

Currently, she directs the Women’s Leadership Initiative team at a Peninsula-based organization Indians for Collective Action (icaonline.org)

She is passionate about promoting a dialog about justice and equity for women and has led resilience and self-esteem building workshops based on techniques acquired during the course of a 15-year engagement with underserved women exploring structuring and strategizing at the grass roots level. Currently Lata serves as an advisor to women focused organization in the SF Bay area as well as NGOs in India, designing and conducting leadership training for women & girls on livelihood and leadership empowerment with the belief that investing in the individual capacities of women will result in societal transformation.

As an extension of her goal of supporting women to thrive, she is also a founding Limited Partner in How Women Invest, a venture fund in the San Francisco Bay area that is a game changer for women founders and funders.