Nish Acharya is a senior advisor to Northeastern University, a senior fellow for the Center for American Progress and a columnist for Forbes Media. He also manages a consulting firm working with universities, governments, foundations and companies to assist them with innovation, entrepreneurship and globalization strategies. Until recently he was with the Obama administration as the director of innovation and entrepreneurship, and senior advisor to the secretary of commerce. Prior to these positions, he was executive director of the Deshpande Foundation, a prominent American philanthropy group focused on innovation, entrepreneurship, and scalability around the world. Nish currently serves on the advisory board of The Economist Higher Education Forum and was previously a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, the Bretton Woods Committee, the Indus Entrepreneurs, and the Clinton Global Initiative. He was also a board member of Akshaya Patra USA and the United Way Worldwide Global Advisory Board