Asif is the Director of Communications and Head of the Social Innovation Lab at BRAC and BRAC International, the world's largest development organization.
He served as an Executive Director at Goldman, Sachs until 2008 until he decided to return to Bangladesh and work in the development sector and started DriVen partnership, a social enterprise, that worked with Microenterprises. Over a career span of 12 years with Goldman, Sachs in New York and London, he served in various management roles in the Equities and Asset Management Division of Goldman, Sachs. His previous work experiences were in Glaxo Wellcome, NorTel and IBM. Asif is also the founder of Drishtipat, a global organization focusing on the human and economic rights of Bangldeshis. In 2001, he started the then Internet-based Drishtipat (Take Notice) which became an umbrella of concerned diaspora expatriates working on social development. Currently it has nine chapters in the USA, Australia, the UK, Canada and Bangladesh.
Asif is the co-founder of Drishtipat Writers' Collective. He writes regularly for leading dailies in Bangladesh and in international magazines on society, politics, development, entrepreneurship and diaspora-centric issues. His write-ups have been published in The Guardian, Himal, Daily Star, New Age, etc. He has also been featured on CNN and Al Jazeera English. He also occasionally hosts the Road to Democracy show on RTV.
In his most recent role, he served as a policy specialist for the UNDP-funded project Access to Information Program (A2i) based at the Prime Minister's Office and facilitated various ICT initiatives in the education and finance sector. Some of the notable policy initiatives included facilitation of partnership between government and the banks on branchless banking, nationwide broadband connectivity, and the introduction of multimedia classrooms in all the secondary schools.
In 2008, Asif was recognized for his work by Asia Society through their Asia 21 program, a program to recognize young leaders from Asian countries, and also by the Bangladeshi-American Foundation.