Seventeen years after leaving the Tata Group, Sushil Mungekar walked back into Bombay House. But this time, he was not returning as an employee. He was there as the Founder and CEO of ENpower, entering a strategic partnership with Tata ClassEdge to take future-skills and entrepreneurship education to schools at scale. For Sushil, the moment brought together two very different chapters of his professional journey.
His own journey had begun along a conventional path. After completing Chemical Engineering from ICT Mumbai and an MBA from JBIMS, Sushil built a career in corporate finance, strategy, mergers and acquisitions, and business development with the Tata Group. By conventional standards, he had already achieved success. Yet, over the years, he began questioning an education system that often measured intelligence through marks while giving less attention to creativity, problem-solving, resilience, and entrepreneurial thinking.
A Larger Question
Why would a successful M&A and finance professional spend the second half of his career trying to change how children learn?
The line captures the predictable path he followed as a bright student of his generation. But his professional experiences eventually led him to question whether academic achievement alone could prepare young people for a rapidly changing world or just to create a person for job ready.
He came to believe that India needed an education system that could nurture not only capable job seekers, but also innovators, creators, and change-makers.
That belief would eventually become central to his work.
The Entrepreneur Who Did Not Start in Education
Sushil did not enter education immediately after leaving the corporate world. He first immersed himself in entrepreneurship, building and scaling ventures including Chamak, an innovative on-demand laundry services company that was later acquired and featured in a Harvard Business Review article on Lean Startup principles.
These entrepreneurial experiences shaped his understanding of problem-solving, experimentation, and building solutions around real-world needs.
Over time, Sushil’s focus moved towards a larger question: how could these ways of thinking become part of a child’s education? This question led to ENpower.
Building A Movement
Today, Sushil Mungekar is the Founder and CEO of ENpower, a TEDx Speaker, entrepreneur, mentor, creator of Swajivi Maharashtra and influences millions of parents and educators. Through his talks, writing, and digital content, he has advocated for entrepreneurial mindset, design thinking, and future-ready education.
ENpower was built around the idea of bridging the gap between what schools traditionally teach and what the future of work demands.
The organisation develops integrated future-skills learning ecosystems that bring together experiential skill labs, entrepreneurship education, teacher enablement, and impact-driven partnerships. Its programmes are anchored in globally recognised frameworks and aligned with NEP 2020 and Indian education boards.
Under Sushil’s leadership, ENpower has impacted more than 200,000 students across 750+ schools in 12 states, supported by 145+ Thinking Coaches. Its work has resulted in 5,000+ student ideas, with 110+ nationally and internationally recognised innovations and more than 40 ideas implemented in the real world, according to the material provided.
ENpower’s stated mission is to nurture 1 million school children with an entrepreneurial mindset by 2030.
While speaking to The Logical Indian, Sushil’s approach to education can be understood through a simple distinction. “We are producing students who are excellent at answering questions,” he says, “but not enough who can ask them.”
For him, entrepreneurship education is therefore not limited to creating future business owners. It is about helping children identify problems, develop ideas, collaborate, innovate, and create solutions.
Bringing Future Skills into Schools
ENpower’s programmes are designed to make these skills part of the school experience.
Its Entrepreneurship Programmes help students identify real-world problems, develop solutions using design thinking, and build entrepreneurial mindsets through structured, experiential learning journeys.
The organisation also works through ATL Enhancement Programmes, I.D.E.A Labs, its Idea-To-Venture Platform, livelihood initiatives for youth aged 18 to 25, and Design Thinking for Educators programmes that help teachers become future-ready learning facilitators.
Its Future Skills Labs provide schools with an integrated learning ecosystem covering 17 future-ready skills, supported by experiential learning spaces, personalised learning goals, competency-based assessments, and Thinking Coaches.
The Composite Skill Lab model goes beyond infrastructure. It connects infrastructure, curriculum, teacher capacity, timetables, assessment, and student showcases.
For Grades 6 to 8, ENpower’s model integrates CBSE, Kaushal Bodh, and more than 110 hours of experiential learning, bringing curriculum, teacher training, assessment, and school calendars into one connected system.
A Place to Build
ENpower’s Tech Innovation Labs are designed as spaces where students can apply technology and design thinking to practical challenges.
The model brings together six technology pillars: Smart Systems, AI Studio, Coding, Robotics, Designing, and Emerging Technologies.
Students receive hands-on exposure to areas including electronics, artificial intelligence, programming, automation, product design, and emerging fields such as AR/VR, green technology, and cybersecurity.
The learning framework is supported by design thinking, enquiry-based learning, and continuous teacher training and handholding.
The Idea-To-Venture Platform extends this journey by supporting student innovators with mentorship, national showcases, and opportunities to develop problem-solving concepts into ventures with real-world impact.
The focus throughout remains on learning by doing and giving children opportunities to move from identifying a problem to exploring and developing possible solutions.
A Partnership Journey
Sushil’s journey came full circle when Tata ClassEdge has taken strategic stake in ENpower .
The aims to integrate future-focused entrepreneurship and life skills into school education, combining academic learning with practical and experiential programmes such as design thinking and problem-solving. Technology and teacher training are also part of the collaboration.
For Sushil, returning to Bombay House after nearly two decades carried a personal significance. The young engineer who had once entered the Tata Group following a conventional career path was now returning as a founder, with a mission centred on changing how children prepare for their future.
Preparing Children To Create
Sushil’s stated vision is to nurture a generation of ‘change agents’ who strive to better their lives and the world around them.
That vision extends beyond entrepreneurship as a career choice. ENpower’s work focuses on developing children who can think, question, collaborate, solve problems, and turn ideas into action.
In conversation with The Logical Indian, Sushil’s larger message is reflected in the distinction between answering questions and learning how to ask them. For him, education should create space for curiosity, creativity, resilience, problem-solving, and entrepreneurial thinking alongside academic learning.
His own journey reflects that shift. A Chemical Engineer from ICT Mumbai, an MBA from JBIMS, a former Tata Group professional, an entrepreneur, and now an education innovator, Sushil has moved from following a conventional definition of success to working towards a broader vision of what education can enable.
And at the heart of that vision is a simple idea: children should not only be prepared for the future. They should have the skills and mindset to help create it.
The Logical Indian Perspective
Education is often measured through academic performance and examination outcomes, but preparing children for an evolving world also involves helping them develop the ability to think, question, collaborate, solve problems, and turn ideas into practical solutions.
Sushil Mungekar’s work through ENpower places these capabilities at the centre of its education model, with an ambition to nurture an entrepreneurial mindset among one million school children by 2030. The approach highlights the importance of connecting classroom learning with experiential education, teacher enablement, design thinking, technology, and real-world problem-solving.
Do you think schools should place greater emphasis on creativity, problem-solving and entrepreneurial thinking alongside academic learning?
If you’d like us to feature your story, please write to us at csr@5w1h.media.
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