New Entrepreneurs

Michael Grifka

Social Edge — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 08:07:28 -0700

Interview with Michael Grifka, Arizona Pedal Cab Company

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Michael Grifka's path to a social business began with an antique show in Japan where he decided to invest $4,000 in an online antiques start up. He ran the business successfully out of his apartment in Kobe, Japan until the events of September 11 prompted him to go deeper into business by enrolling in an MBA program at Thunderbird School of Global Management in Arizona.

It was there that he discovered the field of international development. He soon realized that the majority of potential clients in this field were small businesses in developing countries. He joined MBAs Without Borders and one of his first clients was Proyecto Titi, part of an NGO in Colombia, which makes the ‘Eco Mochila,’ a shoulder bag woven from recycled plastic bags.

The product, which is sold on the internet, provides a livelihood and micro investment capital for women in the villages served by Proyecto Titi. It also cleans up an environmental problem and helps protect the habitat of local monkeys known as "Titi".

His current project is the Arizona Pedal Cab Company - the oldest human powered cab company in Arizone – providing carbon free transportation and jobs for hard working, customer-service oriented individuals who do not fit the corporate 9-to-5 mold. He even gets out in the Arizona burning sun and pedals himself.

His advice to social entrepreneurs: “You don't have to abandon your social aspirations to make money. And after you are successful, share your skills with younger entrepreneurs.”

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Nicole Barnao

Social Edge — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 08:25:40 -0700

Interview with Nicole Barnao

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Nicole Barnao is talking with us on a mobile phone from Sydney, Australia. She just got back home after working in Ecuador on an assignment for MBAs Without Borders helping a local food processing company launch a new brand.

She notes that a business education is a portable skill because small business owners around the world face similar problems, including being "professionally lonely" (they have no one to discuss problems with). The company she advised wanted to launch fresh salads in grocery stores, but the community did not buy fresh salads. She advised the company that they first needed to train the market about fresh salads and why consumers would want to buy them.

She also has a strong environmental background and her current employer, the Macquarie Bank, supports environmental groups worldwide. But she feels that the environment is not yet a priority –neither for business nor the general population. It may take a while before we all recognize the need to see the environment as a priority. She thinks that oil prices will cause a fundamental shift to this recognition – one positive aspect of high gas prices – although it won't happen overnight.

She has worked in both the not-for-profit and the for-profit worlds. Her advice to new MBAs who want to be social entrepreneurs: “There is a great deal of opportunity now in environmental work and you should not underestimate what you can do in a career in environmental work.”

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Robert Mittelman

Social Edge — Tue, 15 Jul 2008 08:17:38 -0700

Interview with Robert Mittelman

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Exit West contracts with companies to send their employees to developing countries for team building exercises and volunteer development work. The experience of international volunteer work opens their eyes to challenges around the world and gives them a level of satisfaction that sitting in a hotel conference room in classes can't match. It also helps companies retain their best employees and expand their own horizons.

Exit West's clients are larger companies with sizeable workforces and budgets. A typical project can be fixing roofs on hurricane shelters or knowledge transfer. Exit West plans to donate 10% of its profits to the villages it has helped. It is capitalized with internal investment and an angel investor.

Rob's advice for other social entrepreneurs: “Keep an open mind – combine areas that have not been previously linked, in our case employee retention and international volunteer work. Combine the familiar with the social innovation as to gradually introduce new concepts to a corporate audience.”

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Petra Hoskovec

Social Edge — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 06:29:12 -0700

Interview with Petra Hoskovec

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Petra Hoskovec, an independent business consultant, was recently in East Africa on a USAID/Eastern Central Africa Trade Hub project to support local businesses in the cosmetics industry. She consulted with companies in Kenya, Rwanda and Uganda about entering the US market with their products.

She was in Kenya during the 2008 election violence, but she was mostly in Nairobi where the problem areas were confined to the slums. She thinks that the news reports often overemphasize the shocking side of the news and rarely give an accurate picture of the actual situation, so she set right to work. She was never in danger, although she did feel uneasy in some areas.

She has a diverse business background: a corporate experience in addition to consulting assignments with large multinational companies and smaller organizations. Therefore, her biggest adjustment was not working with small companies, but working in the African environment where things do not move as quickly or as efficiently as in the western world – dealing with people face-to-face is still key to getting things done.

Petra found that being flexible is an absolute must when working in Africa – since you constantly have to adjust the plans you may have had originally. She likes to work in Africa because she believes that strengthening the economies in the developing world is a crucial and probably the only sustainable way to diminishing poverty in that part of the world.

Her advice for other MBAs and aspiring social entrepreneurs: “Be ready to be flexible! No matter how well you plan, it will rarely go according to plan, so be ready for that.”

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Ari Sznajder

Social Edge — Tue, 24 Jun 2008 08:02:03 -0700

Interview with Ari Sznajder

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Ari Sznajder received a dual MBA/MPP degree from the Ross School of Business and Ford School of Public Policy at the University of Michigan.

Prior to graduate school he directed a documentary film entitled "Rivers, Wats and Riots" and consulted for USAID in Cambodia. He has also worked for the Chicago Tribune in China, conducted a renewable energy feasibility assessment for a mining company in Mozambique, and worked as a Marketing Associate for GlaxoSmithKline.

He is now working for LEAP Africa in Lagos, where he trains future leaders for Nigeria.

He has expanded from film making to writing and business development because he realized that if film making is very good at showing the problems and needs, it often has no call to action, while business development gets things done.

His advice to fellow MBAs and social entrepreneurs: “Be a fly on the wall – understand what people are saying and what they need!”

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Omar Yaqub

Social Edge — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 09:13:49 -0700

Interview with Omar Yaqub

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Omar Yaqub helped start the Social Enterprise Fund in Canada, an $11 million investment fund that helps non-profit organizations take advantage of business thinking, and social entrepreneurs take control of their own mission. He is also co-founder of Patronus, a software company developing innovative software focused on human centered design principles. Additionally, he works on the staff of MBAs Without Borders – a very busy fellow indeed!

Omar Yaqub is currently pursuing Social Return on Investment (SROI) and "blended value" methodologies. Blended value uses lines of questioning that empirically explore how a project or business has improved people’s lives or the environment for the better. Rather than looking at activities undertaken, it focuses on impact – i.e., how much has income increased, as opposed to how many projects have been started.

Omar Yaqub has also worked for "Nollywood," the Nigerian movie industry. He used film to promote the acceptance of mosquito nets and prevent malaria. Bed nets are highly stigmatized in Nigeria and are associated with poverty. To counter this perception, he worked with high profile film producers to rebrand the product and cut through a heavily saturated media market.

Omar Yaqub has a page on his website dedicated to food because it is a universal way to share with people of different cultures. His advice to other social entrepreneurs: “Listen – that is where great ideas come from!”

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Tal Dehtiar

Social Edge — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Interview with Tal Dehtiar who started MBAs Without Borders with co-founder Michael Brown

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MBAs Without Borders posts projects on over 350 websites worldwide for MBAs to apply for. Then it selects one volunteer from as many as 100 candidates from around the world who apply for each project.

After some basic training and vaccinations, MWB sends volunteers around the world with video equipment, a laptop and a monthly stipend to start or help businesses in developing countries. The average MBA is around 33, but one as young as 25 and another as old as 51 have recently been selected for projects.

An example: an MWB volunteer created 35 fair trade certified cooperatives in Ethiopia, which brought in $100,000 for 10,000 farmers.

Tal Dehtiar is dedicated to MWB because he sees the impact his MBA volunteers are having in the field as social entrepreneurs. He understands the shift in business toward social outputs and he passionately believes that business is a key to alleviating poverty.

His advice to fellow MBAs: “If you are an MBA, you will be OK financially- the world literally is open to anything you want to do. So take a risk, as you have nothing to lose. Give it a shot to build a small business in Africa, or Asia or Latin America. Be a social entrepreneur!”

Mardie Oakes

Social Edge — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 14:00:00 -0700

Interview with Mardie Oakes, Executive Director of Hallmark Community Solutions

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Mardie Oakes combines experience in architecture, development and finance with a passion for making the places people live places to thrive.

After earning her architecture degree from Rice University, she spent five years building affordable housing and commercial buildings to revitalize the Fifth Ward, Houston’s lowest income neighborhood.

Through her architectural projects, Mardie recognized the need for creative financing solutions – and for building bridges across disciplines - to make cutting-edge projects a reality. This led her to Harvard Business School where she earned her MBA and to the San Francisco Bay Area to become the Director of Real Estate Lending for Lenders for Community Development (LCD). She invested $20 million in lending capital in affordable housing and community facilities projects throughout Silicon Valley.

Mardie Oakes founded Hallmark Community Solutions when an asylum in San Jose (California) closed and many of those who were released needed homes to live in the community. Even though her homes look like normal homes, they have hundreds of design details – drawn from Universal Design Principles - such as the height of counters and wheelchair ramps that make them comfortable for the disabled and for people who want to stay in their homes into their old age.

She believes that the American "baby boomer" population will create a demand for this kind of housing as they age, so she is creating the model now. Although she was raised in an academic family that considered "business a dirty word", she is also skilled in assembling financing that leads to socially responsible buildings.

Her advice to fellow social entrepreneurs: “Do what you love and jump in with both feet.”

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Emily Arnold-Fernandez

Social Edge — Tue, 27 May 2008 09:07:42 -0700

Interview with Emily Arnold-Fernandez, Executive Director, Asylum Access

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Emily Arnold-Fernandez’s journey form Pomona College in California to global refugee rights work began in high school when she joined Amnesty International.

She is now focused on refugee rights because she sees an opportunity to change the system. The international community has only focused on needs, not rights. Asylum Access helps refugees in Africa, Asia and Latin America assert their rights in their country of refuge by fostering legal aid with lawyers on the ground and volunteer law students to help with the legal steps required to attain refugee status. Asylum Access also engages in advocacy and strategic litigation.

Emily has learned that law can be a healing force. She discovered that when you tell someone that they are entitled to protection and jobs and schools, it restores their dignity and self-respect. That has shown her how the law is a living thing.

Her advice to social entrepreneurs: “Have a solid business plan! Find out how the change you want to see will occur and understand that it won't happen quickly. And then circulate your plan and answer the hard questions others will ask of you.”

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Laurie Parise

Social Edge — Tue, 20 May 2008 09:36:06 -0700

Interview with Laurie Parise, Executive Director and Founder of Youth Represent

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Laurie Parise founded Youth Represent to provide legal representation to young people in the New York Juvenile Justice system as it treats youth as adults when they reach 16 (as a result, youths' misdemeanors remain on the record for life, jeopardizing their chances for a job).

Laurie realized that the children in this system needed legal help because the Public Defenders did not have the expertise needed to protect young people. She decided to go to law school after serving as Executive Director of the Rainforest Foundation where she saw first-hand how powerful a tool the law could be. In a way, going to law school was her personal mid-life gift.

Shifting from the rainforest to youth justice was a natural move for her – she loved working with street kids in Brazil while protecting forests, and she found that working with young people in New York was her new passion. The problems in the NY system are systemic, and she works to drive policy changes while she and her team fights for individual youths.

The Echoing Green Fellowship gave her the funds she needed to start up and credibility with other foundations, but also help with branding, marketing and recruiting.

Her advice to fellow social entrepreneurs: “Never give up - just keep trying and believe in what you are doing!”

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Gary Kosman

Social Edge — Tue, 13 May 2008 11:57:00 -0700

Interview with Gary Kosman, Founder & CEO of America Learns

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Gary Kosman launched America Learns as a non-profit organization, and it struggled like many NPOs. But when Gary realized that people and institutions were ready to pay for his technology, he switched to a for-profit model and America Learns is now selling products and services to schools and universities in 14 countries.

America Learns helps school districts and universities track, evaluate and provide ongoing guidance and training to tutors, mentors and student teachers. Clients include Berkeley, Yale, Georgetown University and Harvard.

Gary Kosman tracks his social impact through constant interviews with his clients, and he asks his customers to provide case studies of good practice. His standard is the accomplishment of four goals:
- To insure that educators and mentors get the support and guidance they need to do their job
- To help educators and mentors capture innovative strategies occurring on the ground and in the classroom and share them among their staff
- To ensure that organizations spend just the right amount of money and time on evaluations and reports
- To help the central offices of education organizations run smoothly by knowing what is going on on the ground.

America Learns is now profitable. Gary says it is incredibly liberating to know he can meet these goals while no longer depending on foundations for support.

His advice for fellow social entrepreneurs: “Care for your hands!” He worked so much at a keyboard that he could not touch anything for a period, as he explains in this video.

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Chris Asch

Social Edge — Tue, 06 May 2008 08:51:00 -0700

Interview with Chris Asch, founder, US Public Service Academy

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Chris Myers Asch has taught elementary and middle school for three years in Sunflower, Mississippi, as part of Teach for America/AmeriCorps and one year in Taejon, South Korea, with the William J. Fulbright program.

He co-founded the Sunflower County Freedom Project in 1998 and received an Echoing Green fellowship in 2007 to launch the US Public Service Academy.

The Academy doesn't exist yet - Chris is currently petitioning the US Congress to fund the launch of the Academy so it can matriculate its first class in 2011.

The Academy will be a civilian counterpart to WestPoint and the US military academies -- a four-year college that provides a free education in return for students’ commitment to serve in the public sector for five years after graduation. Chris sees a need for the US to reinvest in civilian leadership. Shortages are developing in the public sector from the local to Federal levels as the current generation of leaders retires. And there is a huge desire on the part of the post 9/11 generation to serve their country but needs choices beyond the military.

The US Public service Academy will be different from other leadership programs in that the entire college will be focused on public service leadership. Its graduates will help change the image of America in the world and will send a message to young people that civilian public service is noble and honorable.

Chris Asch's advice to other social entrepreneurs: “Have adaptive persistence – adapt as necessary to conditions, but stay determined and move ahead.”

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Toni Blackman

Social Edge — Tue, 29 Apr 2008 11:51:55 -0700

Interview with Toni Blackman

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Toni Blackman is America's Hip Hop Ambassador – the first hip-hop artist chosen to represent the United States around the world.

She works for the US Department of State as a cultural ambassador to change the mainstream media's negative picture of the hip-hop culture and to emphasize how it can be used for social change. She also serves as an American cultural specialist and a musical ambassador in several US State Department programs, taking her music and poetry around the world to show the diversity of American culture.

Her most recent assignment was to go the Democratic Republic of the Congo to work with other musicians to celebrate International Stop Violence Against Women Day. While there, she organized local artists to develop musical Public Service Announcements to promote respect for women.

Another of Toni's projects is the Lyrical Embassy, an umbrella organization that includes her ambassadorship, her music, her poetry and her book. Her most recent book, Inner Course: A Plea for Real Love, is a collection of poetry currently available on her website and on Amazon. She is working on two new books and three albums.

Toni's advice to social entrepreneurs: “Stay true to your original idea and don’t be deflected - sometimes it is important to sit still and just listen to your own heart.”

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Maile Broccoli-Hickey

Social Edge — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 10:25:21 -0700

Interview with Maile Broccoli-Hickey, Founder and Executive Director of English at Work

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Maile Broccoli-Hickey left her job as a waitress when a nearby English-language school moved away from her restaurant’s neighborhood and she saw her fellow employees lose their source of English instruction. Being a volunteer English as a Second Language instructor, she decided to start teaching English at the restaurant. That grew into English at Work, now in hotels and restaurants and factories throughout Austin, Texas.

Maile applied twice for an Echoing Green Fellowship – she was rejected the first time, but suggestions for improvement from the judges enabled her to earn the award on the second try. The Fellowship has enabled her to expand English at Work across the city of Austin.

English at Work conducts English classes for immigrants at their workplaces. Employers and employees both love it for the convenience it offers and the valuable new skills it confers.

Her students are immigrants, 80% from Latin America, and others from Myanmar, West Africa and Eastern Europe. Her students’ average age is 35. They work hard to learn English, as it is their path to success in America. Their employers love English at Work because it increases the value of their employees at no cost.

Her advice to entrepreneurs: “If you have a crazy idea to help people, pursue it no matter what others tell you. Chances are you are right!”

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Lucas Welch

Social Edge — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Interview with Lucas Welch, President & Founder of Soliya

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Lucas Welch is the President & Founder of Soliya, an NGO that uses online technology to enable thousands of university students in the Middle East, North Africa, Europe and the United States to communicate online in real-time and collaboratively produce media.

Lucas left his job as an ABC news producer to start Soliya with his business partner, Liza Chambers. Liza had worked for many years as a facilitator, bringing people together across conflict lines for intensive dialogue. Soliya uses social media and web conferencing technology to connect young people in the “West” and the “Arab & Muslim World.” The program, called the Connect Program, works within an accredited university course to link students in over 20 countries.

Once online, they collaborate in projects that deepen their understanding one another’s cultures, beliefs and political circumstances.

Soliya uses before-and-after participant surveys to measure the Connect Program’s impact by determining how much the participating students have changed in their perception of what they have in common with their peers on the other side of the computer screen and the world.

Soliya has built a volunteer network of facilitators from over 20 countries who enable the online dialogue to take place. Many of the facilitators were Connect Program participants – a kind of positive feedback loop.

Lucas’s advice to fellow social entrepreneurs: “It’s a tricky balance to maintain your dreams and have a real practical understanding of your constraints. Make contingency plans for when your dreams don’t come through as you expected, but that doesn’t mean letting go of them.”

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