Iffat Khan – The One Behind Building a Safe and Supportive Ecosystem for Women
Iffat Khan, a TEDx Speaker, Author, and a Breakfree Coach. She has been inspiring and transforming thousands of individuals to kick start and unleash the entrepreneur in them. A woman who founded Femipreneur and Breakfree Millions had her first stint with entrepreneurship at the age of six by her viable thought of selling things, the time when at school her friends admired her stationery and toys that were brought by her uncle from abroad. As Iffat’s uncle helped her by sourcing more imported stationery and toys, she continued to do the sales as her business was bringing around 200 percent profit until was told that, “Children of your age don’t do business, you must study”. She had to put a stop to her first entrepreneurship as she remembers failing her first standard exams.
After so many years that have passed, she has not let her passion for entrepreneurship go like that. Iffat is now a successful entrepreneur and a break free coach who is helping thousands of individuals and companies with her startup Femipreneur which is a YouTube channel that is named after herself, a podcast that is titled Breakfree Millions with Iffat Khan.
Last year, a book was published by Iffat, Break-Free – 30 ways to Break-Free into a life and business you want, in the book she shares the strategies to become an entrepreneur, describing it with her own experiences. Now she is into writing her second book which is focused on the role of failure in life.
The moment of hitting the restart button
After the completion of her Bachelor’s Degree in Commerce from the University of Calcutta in 2010, Iffat walked through a comfortable corporate life where she was performing well professionally, handling major global projects, but there came a moment when she felt like she was not meant for corporate life. In the year 2014, she founded Eccellente Solutions which is a side hustle that provided consulting-related services to young startups.
“Once, I was the only woman in a group of 20 people selected for a trip to several countries, my company informed me they would like to hold me back for safety as I was the only woman in the group. They said it was for my security but it was unfair as I was looking forward to the trip,” Iffat recalls, adding that was when she decided to quit in 2015 as she did not see any scope for growth.
In the same year, her first startup that provided consulting services to the young startups and entrepreneurs hit the ground. “I was left high and dry and didn’t know what to do. I had put in my time, my energy, everything into it, and lost all my money. I was under severe depression,” she shares.
For Iffat, this was a turning point in her life. She stayed at home in Kolkata for less than a week, then she returned to Bengaluru and decided to set up Femipreneur.
The experience she faced being treated differently as a woman made her think of building a safe and supportive ecosystem for women. She started Femipreneur despite all the odds and she was extremely satisfied with the idea as it showed results. Femipreneur was able to help the women entrepreneurs in setting up cafes and online stores for handmade goods. She instructed them on having a positive and entrepreneurial mindset.
Till date, Iffat has been successful in expanding the service to everyone, Breakfree Millions Academy has mentored over 100,000 people across five countries.
Challenges and the Path ahead
Iffat didn’t actually face many challenges in running and managing the company but building the right team who shares the same vision as hers was difficult.
Currently, Bengaluru-based Femipreneur is a team that consists of 10 employees who are working on sales, branding, and marketing.
For the future, Iffat plans on expanding her social networking that can reach a million followers. Working with nearly 100 businesses and individuals so far, she is hoping to impact 10,000 businesses by working closely with entrepreneurs and coaching them.
