From lawyer to entrepreneur – learn more about Milbank alum Amina Akram’s path from Milbank litigation associate to becoming the Founder & CEO of Ouraan (which means to “soar high” in Urdu). Ouraan is a subscription book club for children of parents who aspire to have deeper relationships and more meaningful conversations with their children through books.
Launched earlier this year, Ouraan delivers age-appropriate books, carefully curated by a panel of professionals, including book specialists, educators, parents and even children who work to identify, curate, read and recommend books that foster a love of reading, promote diversity and most importantly, use storytelling to speak to common themes in today’s world. Learn more about Amina’s inspiration for launching the business and how the culture, mentorship and support at Milbank helped her journey and her aspirations for success. Amina was a litigation associate with Milbank from 2016 to 2020. Before Milbank, Amina was legal counsel at a preeminent Brazilian law firm.
What was your inspiration behind the idea for Ouraan?
I grew up in Pakistan and, for most of my childhood, read whatever limited content was available to me in school and at the local library. In my first act of teenage rebellion at age 16, I read Midnight’s Children by Salman Rushdie, the most controversial author at the time in Pakistan. And from there on I began to have friends bring me books from outside Pakistan. These stories enabled me to imagine a life beyond the constraints of the society I grew up in and to come into my own; with each new author came a more expansive worldview and an ability to leap intellectual chasms and form meaningful connections through books.
When did you decide to pursue your idea for launching the business?
The idea came to me in 2019. Working in the corporate world, I struggled amidst the daily grind to truly engage with my two children, especially as they sped from their baby-toddler years into their tween-teenage phase. When they had been younger, bedtime was a peaceful time to connect over age-appropriate stories that touched on topics such as sharing toys, sleeping by themselves and parental love. But as they grew older and we stopped reading together, it became harder and harder to recreate those moments, bond over stories and have deeper discussions about the more complex issues they were starting to face. The books became more and more dense, and I simply didn’t have time to read them.
I subscribed to a service that promised perfect children's books, but the burden was still on me to ascertain and understand their content, so I could decide if they were appropriate for my kids or not. Hence, the idea for Ouraan was born.
What do you hope to achieve with Ouraan?
Ouraan was founded with a single goal in mind: to bring people closer through stories based on universal truths and shared experiences. At Ouraan, we believe that better stories lead to better conversations, which in turn lead to better relationships. Simply put, the Ouraan Promise is to strengthen existing and new relationships through stories, both within our homes and outside in our children’s social environs.
What have the highlights and challenges been so far?
Leaving an institution like Milbank, with a teaching culture and support framework developed over more than a century, to start something absolutely new is like going from solid ground to a tightrope 100 feet in the air. At the outset, as I was trying to get my balance, I had a couple of glitches and ended up losing time and money. With time, I’ve learned to distinguish between talkers and doers and build a stellar team.
But the most joyous part of this journey is building a product that brings people together and strengthens relationships with the support of my family, including my Milbank family, and friends. Without them, Ouraan would still just be a concept.
Was there anything about your experience at Milbank, or as a lawyer generally, that helped you in your business venture?
Frankly, I believe that the seeds for Ouraan were planted during one of the sessions at Milbank@Harvard. The program played an instrumental role in shaping my thinking, introducing us to the world of business and stories of wildly successful and impactful leaders. Even after leaving Milbank, the program and professors from Harvard Law School (HLS) continue to be a tremendous resource for Ouraan. From the inception, Scott Westfahl, the Director of HLS Executive Education, has been a key advisor. In fact, Ouraan’s System of Curation resulted from one of our product development brainstorming sessions with Scott.
How has mentorship/mentoring made a difference in your professional/personal life?
I’m incredibly lucky to have mentors both in my personal and professional life who guide and support me through highs and lows, challenge and affirm my ideas, and give me much-needed objective perspective. In my experience, real mentors pass on what they’ve learned from their experiences and readily come up with practical solutions on how they can help their mentee excel.
At Milbank, I often reached out to Antonia Apps, who never hesitated to carve out time to discuss my career in and outside the legal world. When I expressed my desire to teach law in Pakistan to her, she immediately went above and beyond by sharing with me her experiences at HLS. On other occasions, she has offered to make introductions to people. Dan Perry, the head of Litigation, has also been a tremendous source of support from the conception of the idea for Ouraan to its execution. His encouragement in the early days gave me crucial motivation for persevering through those beginning stages.
