26 CEO MONTHLY / GLOBAL CEO EXCELLENCE AWARDS 2021 CEO MONTHLY / GLOBAL CEO EXCELLENCE AWARDS 2021 27 , , May21242 Female Hospitality Entrepreneur of the Year (UK): Roomana Nasir Every café has its niche, and the niche for Social BrewCafé has been its incredible ability to cater tomost dietary requirements. If you have a specific need that might not be met in the mainstream, this is the place for you. Roomana Nasir is Founder and CEO, and has great plans for her rapidly growing brand. We take a closer look to see howher leadership has brought about such tremendous success in the Global CEO Excellence Awards 2021. When Roomana Nasir started Social Brew, it was on the back of a successful catering company. Mad Hatters Tea Room had been her first hospitality venture, growing from a small company into the go-to place for many when they wanted inclusive catering. The demand for her services saw her tackling parties ranging from two people to over a hundred. Here she learnt the need for efficiency, quality and time management, running this business while being Head of HR at a leading Leasing company and running a children’s play centre. When she had the chance to take over Social Brew Café, Roomana quickly saw an opportunity that would allow her to use all of the skills she had developed in all of these roles to make a real difference to people. The café was designed to accommodate the breadth of people’s tastes and palates. Since taking over, Roomana has reinvented what is offered to customers, creating a reflection of who she is and what she wants to provide. The challenge of taking over an established business, with Most Innovative Workforce Development CEO 2021: Ahmar Abbas With learners worldwide, fromNamibia to the Seychelles and Pakistan to Spain, XtremeLabs LLC has become a worldwide training and hands-on lab technology provider of choice across various industry verticals. Led by an expert in his field, Ahmar Abbas, who finds it deeply fulfilling to consistently helpmodern professionals continue their personal career development, acquiring new skills and partaking in a bold new educational paradigm. XtremeLabs LLC is an education-focused technology company offering workforce development solutions that have notoriety for their excellence. Learners can use its products and services to educate, upskill, and develop themselves to benefit their personal career growth and their employers. Its customers can benefit from its services across 150 different countries. Its core platform provides digital hands-on lab-based learning that allows students to explore and learn technologies that will help prepare them for new roles, grow in existing positions, or allow them to switch careers entirely. The XtremeLabs award-winning platform includes a set of tools and features to adapt training for different learner styles. Instructors have tools to guide students in real-time as they complete various exercises. All learners need is an Internet connection and a web browser, and they can gain access to 12,000+ hands-on activities covering a wide array of technologies. As virtual and hybrid learning becomes more mainstream, the XtremeLabs platform will be the dominant platform of choice. XtremeLabs strives to be the educational training provider staff and customers came in the form of adjusting its approach to become the success that Social Brew is today. Roomana is very hands-on, being part of the team’s daily workload and making sure that she is familiar with any problems that might arise. Similarly, the team has come to see her not just as CEO and owner, but someone who they can turn to in times of crisis. The staff are involved in most decision making, because their opinions matter greatly to Roomana. The café has quickly grown into a community hub, with regular customers who can be greeted by name mingling with new visitors who have heard of this establishment by reputation. No matter how well a customer is known, every single one is important and treated accordingly. This approach has been key to Roomana’s hospitality success, because everyone who walks through the doors believes that the café is here, just for them. In short order, Social Brew has become known for its hearty and healthy food. This ranges from brunch options to specialised and signature Acai bowls and Smoothies. The team are proud to make everything in house, with every single recipe under the firm’s ownership. The success of this venture has inspired Roomana to look further afield, and in the coming months and years, she would like to elevate Social Brew to the level where it becomes a household name for healthy yet delicious eating. One of her aims is to begin to explore the possibility of more outlets within the UK, before looking to open on an international level. The pandemic has hit the hospitality industry harder than most, with people not able to come to cafes or unwilling to spend money eating out. It is a credit to the tenacity and dedication of Roomana that the business has continued to thrive despite these challenges. Her success is something to be celebrated now, now and long into the future. Company: Social Brew Cafe Name: Roomana Nasir Email:
[email protected] Web: www.socialbrewcafe.co.uk May21223 giving the workforce the hands- on experience to excel at their roles. The company continues to innovate aggressively and drive the future of learning with interactive, engaging digital hands-on labs that complement instructor-led and video-based training —the CEO’s depth and breath of experience are instrumental in driving the vision for the company. Ahmar Abbas, over the years, has worked in investment banking on Wall Street, Internet start-ups in Washington DC, optical networking start-ups in Silicon Valley, and another education technology-focused start-up back in Washington DC. After the latter went public, Ahmar Abbas spent 15 years in the technology consulting space, helping companies build better products and use technology to optimize their operations. Ahmar learned firsthand the challenges companies face when their workforce is not keeping up with rapid technology shifts. Ahmar applies all those insights in leading XtremeLabs to become a key player in the workforce development space. XtremeLabs wasn’t a guaranteed success, but with the dedication and tenacity of the CEO and staff, the company has been innovating at a rapid pace, gaining recognition from customers and industry players alike. Ahmar Abbas’s vast experience in problem-solving and inclusive management approach has helped the company remain steadfast in facing challenges such as the pandemic. Under the leadership of the CEO, XtremeLabs rapidly added new features to its product. It successfully adapted its service delivery model to ensure that its customers remain viable and successful as they managed the pandemic. While several revenue streams completely shut down because of the pandemic, XtremeLabs’ rapid pivot allowed it to open up new opportunities and maintain tremendous customer loyalty. It achieved record- breaking usage of its products in the later months of 2020. Ahmar Abbas believes that XtremeLabs role as a provider of workforce development solutions is not just limited to creating a great and innovative product but also constitutes giving back to the community at large. XtremeLabs provides free services and recognition to instructors and recently developed and conducted a global thought leadership conference, eXL 2021 - Experiential Learning for All. The forum was free for all attendees. Well on its way to serve the 3 billion learners that will need digital skills in the coming years, XtremeLabs will continue to innovate and become the world’s leading provider of digital online hands-on labs and experiential learning. Company: XtremeLabs LLC Contact: Sana Rehmat Website: www.xtremelabs.io