Learning from Entrepreneurs with Huong Dang

Huong Dang is a social entrepreneur and the founder of HopeBox, a social enterprise based in Vietnam that provides employment, training, and opportunities to victims of gender-based violence. Her mission is to empower victims of domestic violence and help lift them out of volatile situations. Prior to this, she worked as the Director of Partnerships and Strategy at KOTO, an organisation that aids and empowers at-risk and disadvantaged youth in Vietnam.

From humble beginnings as a street kid, Huong made her way to Melbourne on a scholarship and was honoured as Victoria's International Student of the Year, receiving a $20,000 scholarship. She completed a Master of Entrepreneurship and Innovation at Swinburne University of Technology. After graduating, she worked for InfraRisk IT in Melbourne. In 2017, she was recognised as one of the ten young leaders representing Vietnam during the Australia-Vietnam Leadership Dialogue and was selected as a Fellow of the YSEALI professional program.

Huong was named the winner of the Women of the Future award in the Social Entrepreneur category in 2021. In 2022, she became a Maurice R. Greenberg World Fellows Program participant at Yale University and took part in a 4-month residential program based out of Yale's Jackson School of Global Affairs. She was chosen out of an international pool of 2,000 candidates from over 175 countries to become one of the 16 global leaders to participate in this prestigious program. She used to teach Innovative Business Practices at Swinburne University Technology Vietnam.

Huong recently co-founded WExchange, an educational company that provides experiential study programs in Vietnam for overseas undergraduate and master's students. In 2023, she was chosen to participate in the Australia-ASEAN Emerging Leader program, representing social entrepreneurs from Vietnam. She currently works for Australia-Vietnam Leadership Dialogue as Program Director.