Q. Can you tell me something about yourself?
I am Saanya Khunger and I am a second year BCom Hons student from Hansraj College. I've always been intrigued towards entrepreneurship and my interest also lies in branding, marketing and writing.
Q. What is Kavach about?
Kavach is an edu-management and career consulting startup that caters to the needs of high school students and their dilemmas about academics, college and career. We at Kavach, provide mentorship to students and help them pave their way to college.
Q. How did you come up with the idea of Kavach?
This all started when I was transitioning from high school to college and had a tough time deciding which college to be a part of. At that point, I sought guidance from my acquaintances and decided where I wanted to go. That is when the co-founder of Kavach, Shrest Gupta and I discussed the issue and realized that many students go through the same dilemma every year, given that 17-18 years of age is pretty young to make such life-changing decisions. Thus, we decided to build a platform that could be a one-stop solution for all academic and career problems.
Q. Do you have professionals on board kavach as well?
At Kavach, we definitely have professionals on board. We work directly with professionals, student mentors from top-tier colleges, and experienced researchers and mentors from the team itself. The team mentors are also trained by the professionals so there is no lack of top-notch guidance. The professionals and certified counsellors help students in areas that other mentors might not be able to help with fully. The student mentors from top-tier colleges are currently students themselves but play a huge role since they know the ins and outs about the curriculum, course, college and the culture.
Q. Can you tell us about your team?
Our team of 35, is an integral part of Kavach. I respect the fact that even after having other commitments, they are always diligently working since all of us are college undergraduates. I am grateful to them because they are the ones who have taken the ideas forward that the co-founders had and helped us build Kavach up to where it is today. So, it’s definitely not just the core team but everyone who has been a part of the family at Kavach.
Q. Who is your inspiration?
I don't seek inspiration from any famous personalities because their stories are different compared to mine. Definitely a few people around me motivate me and a few entrepreneurs I look upto. Majorly, I feel that my team is my biggest motivator and I believe together we get through all possible hurdles together. Shrest, the co-founder, has been a great pillar of support for me during some tough days and this support keeps me going.
Q. What are your career plans?
Seeing young students under our guidance reach their dream colleges and achieve their career goals makes me very proud and elated about the work we have been doing. So my vision, for now, includes seeing these numbers grow at an even faster rate and helping many more students in achieving their dream. Further, I have plans of doing my masters but the timeline of which depends solely on the coming years of Kavach. I do wish to explore all my options to be sure since that’s what we promote at Kavach too.
Q. Being a college student and an entrepreneur, how do you manage your time?
My way of managing time is planning the next day. So before sleeping, I keep a note of all that is to be done the next day and accordingly I make time for everything. Given that I have classes in the morning, I try to keep my schedule clear till then. After which I would schedule meetings and other work. Lastly, taking breaks in between is really important and it definitely helps me manage my time better.
Q. What message would you like to leave for your peers?
If you think of starting any startup, be clear about what and why you want to do it, so that on days that you are feeling low, you can remind yourself that you started doing this for a reason. This proves to be a very important motivation later. Also, learn to prioritize all that you wish to do and take care of how much you are taking on by yourself.
Inspiring ✨🙌