Cara Yar Khan

A former White House political appointee who served as a senior advisor on international disability rights in the U.S. Department of State, Cara Yar Khan is now CEO of a NYC-based boutique consulting firm, The Purple Practice, which brokers disability-inclusive impact partnerships and investments because no organization can afford to exclude people with disabilities, not their extraordinary talent nor the massive market share they drive.  

Cara is presently working with Global Disability Innovation Hub on the world's most ambitious scaling vehicle for accessible and assistive technology ventures, which aims to raise $100 million.

Cara began her international career in 2001 with the UN World Food Programme (WFP) in Ecuador followed by a corporate communications role in for Dell Technologies in Panama. In 2007 Cara joined UNICEF Angola in 2007 to cultivate corporate partnerships. This led to a year with UNICEF China, followed by UNICEF assignments in Madagascar, Mozambique, Thailand and finally Haiti. In 2014 Cara moved to the USA, where she continued her work in disability rights.

In December 2019 Cara was the closing guest speaker at TED Women presenting, The beautiful balance between courage and fear which has been viewed more than 2.6 million times and has been translated into 27 languages. 

Cara is the participant of the short documentary film, Facing the Falls, directed by Celia Aniskovich and executive produced by Hillary Clinton and Chelsea Clinton.  

Finally, Cara has a masters degree in International Public Policy from John Hopkins University, School of Advanced International  Studies (SAIS) in Italy and is accomplished in languages.