A Radiating Persona with a Positive Attitude
Harpal Sandhu is a global phenomenon who is helping and shaping athletes, leaders, businesspersons and more to lead an impactful life that radiates and energises others like a domino effect. He is life-affirming, unfiltered and inspiring and these qualities are integrated into his ventures called The Coach Harp Organization and Coach Harp the influencer. Having recently won the Indian Achievers Award for business leadership in 2022, he has sealed his name as an icon.
He was born in Jalandhar, India, to a family of farmers and subsequently moved to Canada at the age of 3 with his family. With Punjabi being his native language, he had to struggle with learning English as a child. In school, he was subjected to racism and bullying due to his clothes and found it challenging to fit in and find friends. He started playing American football at the age of 12, he says “American football gave me a sense of brotherhood and taught me how to deal with adversity, attention to detail, and teamwork.”
With a multitude of diplomas in travel and tourism, business development, advanced marketing and social media, these strengths have culminated in him creating Coach Harp the influencer in 2007 which was boasted by his entrepreneurship spirit. When his reach, audience and relationship grew monumentally, he created The Coach Harp Organization in 2021. He also started the non-profit, the South Asian Sports Development Association (SASDA) in 2017.
For the past 30 years, he has been working relentlessly with high-risk youth with an interminable sense of always wanting to give back to the community. Coach Harp the influencer was created as a platform for professional athletes who are currently playing or retired to have their voices heard and to connect with people locally and globally to create their legacy off the field or court. That was the initial point but now it has expanded to business leaders, cultural leaders, thought leaders and people with a zeal to make a positive impact in the world. He says, “SASDA was created to give South Asians an opportunity to achieve their goals of becoming professional athletes when they might not have other opportunities.”
Harpal describes his passion and remarks “I love helping people. My passion is to not only succeed in business and support my family, but also to make a positive impact on the world. The ability to develop youth leadership and be a part of their growth has driven me my whole life. Being able to be part of developing our future leaders is truly inspiring and it is an honour to be able to create positive change.”
He gives the readers his mantra for growth, development and success by saying, “Never give up on your dreams. Make sure you surround yourself with the right people who are loyal and who share your vision for success. Put others before yourself and don’t be afraid to fail. When you do fail, pick yourself back up and keep trying. Keep trying, learn from your failure, and once you discover your “why”, don’t let anything or anyone stop you. If you aren’t facing difficulty or struggle, then you aren’t truly succeeding. A legacy takes years to build, nothing happens overnight. Being consistent is the key to success.”
Harpal feels that the reason The Coach Harp Organization stands out in the crowd is due to their inherent ability to listen to the client’s needs and wants, and because of that, they can mentor and assist them in a more impactful manner. They have many services that the client can avail like fundraising, event planning, graphic design and website building. He remarks “We also work with athletes and businesses to facilitate partnerships both locally and globally in areas such as ambassadorship and public speaking. We stand out with our strong relationships and our ability to monetize our network to create a win for everyone involved.”
Harpal discerns that balancing personal and professional life can be challenging like keeping focused on the vision, people management, financial hardships and more. He sails through these challenges with an abundance of hope, faith and diligence. He remarks “During this journey, we have restructured our business and our most loyal staff have come together with one mind, one passion, and one goal, and that is to see TCHO succeed. Our staff all work second jobs in order to keep TCHO alive and on track to succeed.”
