Sara Razavi is CEO of Working Solutions CDFI, a role she assumed in 2017 when she succeeded the organization’s founder. Sara joined Working Solutions in 2013 and served as COO prior to becoming CEO. She brings over 20 years of experience in the social sector to the role, with expertise in operations, strategy, finance, small business, and partnership management.

Under Sara’s leadership, Working Solutions has scaled significantly in capital deployment, asset size, and impact. In 2019, Sara led the development of an ambitious five-year strategic plan to reach $50 million deployed to small businesses by 2024. Working Solutions has since increased capital deployment from less than $1 million annually to over $12 million annually, with a total deployment goal of over $100 million to close to 5,000 small businesses in loans and grants by 2029. The majority of funds thus far have been deployed to entrepreneurs of color, women, and low-income individuals. Most recently, Sara led the organization’s expansion in both geographic footprint and loan size, with the organization now providing loans of up to $100,000 throughout California.

Since joining Working Solutions, Sara has also helped build the organization’s assets from $5 million to more than $20 million, with aims to increase that in multiples by 2029.

Sara serves on the Board of Directors of the Opportunity Finance Network (OFN), the national CDFI industry association; the Board of Directors of the Scale Link, a financial intermediary for CDFI microlenders; and the Advisory Board of the Center for Impact Finance at the UNH Carsey School of Public Policy. Previously she was a founding Executive Committee member of the California Coalition for Community Investment (CCCI), a statewide coalition of CDFIs.

Prior to joining Working Solutions, Sara was Executive Director of Honoring Emancipated Youth, a subsidiary of United Way of the Bay Area focused on advocacy for former foster youth. Over the years, Sara has worked at multiple social sector entities specifically focused on under-resourced communities, including immigrant and low-income children, youth, and families.

Sara has a BA in Sociology and Theatre from UC Davis and an MBA from the University of San Francisco, where she focused on the intersection of social impact and finance. She is also active in her other passion, the arts, through the San Francisco Bay Area theatre community, primarily as a past board member and current advisor to Golden Thread Productions. Sara lives in Oakland with her wife and two young children.