JAMIE PUJARA

Entrepreneur and 11-year EO member Jamie Pujara serves as Interim Executive Director for the Entrepreneurs’ Organization, leading a professional team of more than 150 full-time staff in 20 countries who serve nearly 20,000 members around the world with learning, leadership training, and connection experiences. In May 2025, Jamie was appointed to the Interim role by his Global Board peers after completing his own three-year term as a Director and one year leading that body as Chair. Since first joining EO through its Kenya chapter in 2015, Jamie has been highly engaged in the membership network, serving in progressively influential leadership positions from the chapter, regional and global levels.

Born and raised in Nairobi but of Indian and Chinese descent, initially pursued careers in teaching in Tokyo, then film production in New York. His entrepreneurial journey began when he returned home to Nairobi to run the oldest Chinese restaurant in the city, Tin Tin, founded by his grandfather. The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on Jamie’s business, which lost 90 percent of its revenue, motivated him to take a greater leadership role in EO so he could support fellow entrepreneurs across the region. As regional chair from 2019-2021, he helped unite disparate chapters across a vast geographical and cultural landscape and built cohesiveness that fostered pride and a sense of belonging. His dedication to helping fellow EO members through the pandemic earned Jamie EO’s prestigious Mark Lincoln Volunteer of the Year Award in 2021.

In his own business, Jamie made multiple pivots to adjust to changing times: first, transforming his family’s restaurant fledgling catering division into its core offering, then turning his attention toward real estate. In 2012, he founded buyrentkenya.com and grew it into Kenya’s number one property portal before selling it in 2017. Buoyed by his success, he ventured into real estate development, breaking ground on his first project in 2020. Despite the pandemic, Aspire Heights, a 65-apartment building aimed at Nairobi’s growing middle class, was completed in 2023.

Jamie points to participation in EO’s Regional Leadership Academy as pivotal in his own growth journey, as it inspired him to volunteer for progressively influential leadership positions in the organization. He says EO has helped him become not only a better entrepreneur, but a better father and husband to his wife and their two sons. He is enthusiastic about food, sports and education and the belief that an entrepreneur’s role is to help change the world for the better.