by Jason Boudreau
CREATING IMPACT Candid Conversations with Leaders in Life, Business and Philanthropy
his university years in India, graduating with the top GPA at Agra University and decided to pursue his MBA. He accepted a $1,000 scholarship from UBC and left Madhu, Praveen and Peeyush in Modinagar to get his MBA going and set up the family’s new life in Canada. “At this time,” Praveen shared, ”my dad was really missing his family. He wanted us to be there with him and worked for hours as a busboy in the UBC cafeteria while doing his MBA to try and earn enough money to bring us over from India.” Eventually, Hari decided not to complete the program and left to pursue his Chartered Accountant designation. He began articling with Arthur Andersen as he knew he could make good money doing so and eventually, have the opportunity to bring his family to be with him. Two years later, Praveen was now five years old, he, his mother Madhu and brother Peeyush were finally able to move to Vancouver to join Hari for their new life. Shortly thereafter, Praveen’s sister, Vandana was born. “We grew up very modestly in East Vancouver,” shared Praveen, “I went to Killarney High School in my younger years and then as things got better with my dad’s work, we moved to the West Side and I ended up graduating from Magee High School”.
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PRAVEEN VARSHNEY | FCPA, FCA | VARSHNEY CAPITAL
WELCOME BACK TO A NEW ISSUE AND A NEW YEAR! With hindsight literally being 2020, here’s to a 2021 filled with abundance in all areas of life for you and your family. To kick off a fresh season of Creating Impact, I am excited to share the story of another amazing entrepreneur whom I’ve had the pleasure of knowing for a number of years. He has a big heart and a deep focus on investing in growing companies that provide both a positive return for investors and the planet. Through embracing this ethos, he has proven that both “doing well” and “doing good” are not mutually exclusive. Praveen Varshney was born in October 1964 in Modinagar, a town in the state of Uttar Pradesh, India and was the first of three children of Hari and Madhu Varshney. Hari, Praveen’s father, was the main breadwinner for the family, working as a manager in a local factory. Two years after Praveen was born, his brother Peeyush came along and soon thereafter, Hari’s friend told him about the start of the MBA program being offered by only a few universities in the world, one of them being the University of British Columbia. Hari had done very well in
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ICONIC CONCIERGE
After graduating, Praveen decided to follow in his father’s footsteps, attending UBC. However, he was considering a very different path at that time, sharing that he originally wanted to become a teacher. “My parents strongly suggested I pursue other areas of study and so I decided to go into sciences which I loved, thinking I’d be an engineer. Well, it became quite the eye-opener. I failed physics and had a C+ average GPA. I knew I had to move on from sciences and thought I’d try business so I joined the Faculty of Commerce”. Praveen was loving the knowledge he was gaining and, just like his father Hari, decided to pursue the CA designation. “In the third year, I got a job at KPMG. I was learning all the different areas of accounting and was preparing for the UFE exam to get my CA. I literally failed every practice exam that I wrote but then, on the real exam where I needed 240 out of 400, I got 242 and passed!” (Despite barely passing his CA exam, Praveen would later go on to receive the FCPA, FCA (Fellow of Chartered Professional Accountants), the highest honour for CPAs in 2015, following in his father Hari’s footsteps). After graduating with his UBC BComm, Praveen began working full-time in audit at KPMG. Wanting to learn more, he decided to apply to work in the tax department but there were no spots available so it forced his hand to leave KPMG and explore other opportunities. “I had a couple of different gigs in accounting after
