+Social Good

This Month in Social Good

Posted on by Case Foundation

February may be the shortest month of the year, but this February was packed with news in the world of social innovation. In particular, we saw new data, stories and perspectives brought forward in the world of Inclusive Entrepreneurship that we’d like to reflect on and use to power the movement. I spent some time rereading our weekly Case Foundation Breaking Good newsletter to gauge some of the conversation around supporting diverse entrepreneurs this month. Here are some of the articles and trends that stood out to me: 

Black History Month is a reminder to uplift Black entrepreneurs—past and present

Every day is a great day to celebrate the achievements of groundbreaking innovators in history and the people who are carrying on their legacies and building their own. But as Black History Month comes to a close, we’re given a renewed commitment to uplift the stories of Black entrepreneurs—sharing both the contributions they bring and the unique challenges they face. 

With that in mind, we were inspired by reflections from successful Black entrepreneurs on how they succeeded in a world filled with barriers designed to stifle their progress. One of the Be Fearless quotes that stood out came from Urban One founder, Cathy Hughes: 

“[Don’t] let anyone convince you that your dream, your vision to be an entrepreneur, is something that you shouldn’t do. What often happens is that people who are well meaning, who really care for us, are afraid for us and talk us out of it.” 

There’s a glaring gap for women entrepreneurs

As reports highlighting data on entrepreneurship from 2017 begin to come out, the statistics on women entrepreneurs are disheartening, to say the least. According to Pitchbook, businesses with all-women founding teams received just 2.2 percent of all venture capital in 2017. Teams with a mix of genders received just 12 percent, and a whopping 79 percent of venture capital went to all-male teams (the remaining 7 percent was unreported). 

To change these numbers, there isn’t an easy fix. We know where we can start—more women launching businesses, more women in venture capital, fewer cases of bias at the hands of investors—but none of these alone will solve the problem. Partners are stepping up across industries to build solutions together that will collectively challenge the systemic biases that affect how opportunity is distributed in our culture. Data and storytelling can play major role in that, which brings us to our next trend. 

We need to support data and storytelling on underrepresented innovators

Sherrell Dorsey is doing just that. Dorsey founded a daily newsletter called ThePLUG to report on founders, investors and innovators of color. This month, she talked to Vice about the need for more data on Black entrepreneurs. This is one of the many great points she made: 

“A lot of times, especially in the black community, when you look at entrepreneurship, there’s been very little data collection—like, the kind of businesses we’re creating, the kind of problems that we’re solving. (…) A lot of times investors are looking for patterns in data, so when that information is not shared in public, you get a knowledge gap.” 

To extrapolate out from what Sherrell is saying, if investors don’t have the data they are used to having when making investment decisions, they are less likely to fund initiatives. Therefore, having a more robust dataset on Black entrepreneurship could help spark solutions across the board. That’s something we’re working towards as we champion inspiration capital as a core part of our Inclusive Entrepreneurship work. By uplifting the stories of underrepresented entrepreneurs—stories that share both their challenges and their unique insights—we’re hoping to change widespread assumptions about who is and can be a talented entrepreneur. 

Entrepreneurship can flourish across in all communities across the U.S.

Another widespread assumption about entrepreneurship we’re working to challenge is the notion that Silicon Valley is the only great place to launch a company. Fortunately, that idea is being challenged by entrepreneurs, investors and ecosystem builders across the country. We loved hearing about how Kela Ivonye, founder of connected delivery storage service, MailHaven found Louisville Kentucky, not Silicon Valley to be the best place to build the company.  

On the ecosystem side, we’ve been inspired by news about places like Raleigh, where a program is helping formerly incarcerated individuals pursue entrepreneurship. In the Midwest, a variety of organizations are working to support the region’s female entrepreneurs. And in New York, three of the city’s major banks announced plans to give a combined $40 million to programs supporting women and entrepreneurs of color there.  

This month, Engine also interviewed an ecosystem builder in Colorado as part of an ongoing series we love, #StartupsEverywhere, where the outlet talks to the people building entrepreneurial ecosystems across the country. And this week’s Kauffman Foundation newsletter poses important questions on how we can build inclusive ecosystems, including a powerful video by Melissa Bradley on her experiences as an entrepreneur, investor and ecosystem builder. 

From celebrating past and present Black entrepreneurs and leaders, to building solutions for female founders, to tackling the data gap, to highlighting innovation everywhere—leaders in the world of Inclusive Entrepreneurship are getting to work. The stories we’ve seen this month inspire us and we can’t wait to read and share even more of these informative and inspirational stories. To learn more, sign up for our newsletter, Breaking Good. 

Is there anything we missed this month? Tell us about your favorite social good story you saw in February! 

18 Leaders in the Open Source Community to Follow on Twitter

Posted on by Case Foundation

Open source is an essential tool for the tech community, providing open and accessible platforms for accomplishing everything from building websites to artificial intelligence. Yet the drivers behind open source are often individuals, and their commitments of time, energy and inspiration are truly an act of personal philanthropy; many players in the movement do it on their own time. 

 We talked about how open source can accelerate social good last month in SSIR, and increasingly, open source is critical for nonprofits and individuals who may not have the funds to build out software from scratch or license expensive and cumbersome enterprise software. 

 At the Case Foundation, we’re committed to contributing to the open source community and recognizing others who are doing so too. These 18 people have made a personal commitment to sharing their digital work with the online community. Learn more about them and how you can follow their work on Twitter below. 

  Name                   Twitter Handle                     Bio
Alolita Sharma
@alolita
Software Engineering, Open Source, Open Standards, Language Technologies i18n/NLP/ML/AI, Women In Tech At:@AWSCloud Boards:@Unicode,@SFLCin
Andrew Means
@meansandrew
Head of the #philanthropy beyond @Uptake; Founder – @theimpactlab & Data Analysts for Social Good @da4sg ; Invested in @City_Fields
Angela Byron
@webchick
Herder of cats. @Drupal core committer. Director of Community Development for @Acquia. @OReillyMedia author. Mom. Lesbionic Ace. Nerd. Gamer. INTJ.
Ben Balter
@benbalter
Attorney, open source developer, Product Manager working on Community and Safety at @GitHub. Previously @WhiteHouse Presidential @InnovFellows.
Christopher Fabian
@hichrisfabian
UNICEF ventures lead. co-founded our innovation unit. advise on open-source overlaps of tech, design, development, start-ups, and academia. our team is awesome
Daniel Berg
@dancberg
IBM Distinguished Engineer delivering cloud native solutions focusing on microservices, containers, and DevOps practices. Opinions are my own.
David Stoline
@davidstoline
Avid reader. Occasional cyclist. Well rounded geek. Former @POTUS44 tech lead. @drupalsecurity team member
Erica Kochi
@ericakochi
co-leads (and co-founded) UNICEF Innovation, TIME100 most influential, mobiles in emerging markets, epicurean, extreme sports enthusiast
Erie Meyer
@Erie
America’s foremost technologist named after a Great Lake. Now @CodeforAmerica! Co-founder @techladymafia + @usds. Former @harvard @whitehouse @cfpb.
James Kurczodyna
@jamesmk
Director of Technology at @wearefine and creator of Fae. #webdev #ruby #js #rctid
Jeff Walpole
@JeffWalpole
CEO @phase2. Board @DrupalAssoc. Leader in #opensource. Following #omnichannel #cms, #ux, #drupal, #collaboration #leadership #opengov #ai,
Jessica Bell
@SirJesstheBrave
Developer with @WapoEngineering. Chair of @DCACM. Leadership with @DCtechmeetup, @DCFemTech. JavaScript, SASS, cat gifs, and comics. My opinions are my own
Jessica Lord
@jllord
Node.js @MongoDB, previously @GitHub, @CodeforAmerica and @BostonPlans // I saw all the Vermeers!
Joshua S Campbell
@disruptivegeo
Geographer, PhD. Founder @sandhillgeo & @MapGive, Council @AmericanGeo. Fmr @StateHIU & @GFDRR. Geospatial, Open Source, Design, Product. Views mine.
Michael D. Johnson
@CodeNonprofit
Chief Operating Officer @freeCodeCamp
Rikki Endsley
@rikkiends
A little bit country, a little bit punk rock & roll. http://Opensource.com  community manager, tech journalist, runner
Sage Sharp
@_sagesharp_
Diversity & inclusion consultant at @ottertechllc. @outreachy organizer. Explorer of the kyriarchy. Hufflepuff.
Shannon Turner
@svthmc
Founder @hearmecode: free beginner-friendly coding classes for 3000 women in DC | Full-stack developer | Portfolio at http://shannonvturner.com  | Views mine

Are the SDGs the North Star for Corporations?

Posted on by Case Foundation

Each September, delegations of public and private sector representatives from almost every country meet at the UN General Assembly (UNGA) to discuss how best to work together to solve the world’s most endemic political, economic and security challenges. On the development front, a framework called the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) serves as a collective action agenda, with progress measured against 17 primary goals and 169 targets covering a broad range of issues inclusive of poverty, health, education, hunger, women and girls, city sustainability, climate change and others. Experts estimate that it will take approximately $2 trillion a year—through the expiration date of 2030—to finance the goals. That’s a total need of about $26 trillion. If we can find a way to fund the Goals, we have the potential to end global poverty and hunger, protect the planet from degradation, ensure human beings can enjoy fulfilling lives, and foster peaceful and inclusive societies.

This means we have a lot of work to do. For years, SDG organizers and activists have pushed the private sector to play a more robust role in developing and delivering on the framework. And many corporations have stepped up to the plate in the process, even aligning their own activity with the Goals.

Recent rhetoric around “urgency” and “need” and “responsibility” on the part of private actors has been deafening. For many of these organizations, focusing on the Goals is synonymous with understanding what their company’s future might look like. In a world of increasingly scarce resources, rapid automation, global climate shifts and growing power of a socially conscious customer-base, sitting on the sidelines may mean getting left behind. The imperative to pursue these global mandates can either be to mitigate risk or to truly appreciate the value of profit and purpose. Regardless, the zeal with which corporate leaders and institutions are reaching for the baton feels unprecedented.

Conversations during UNGA week were abuzz with one key question—how can the private sector approach the SDGs in a way that actually achieves our shared global objectives? In response to this, the Global Impact Investing Network, in partnership with The Abraaj Group and Bank of America Merrill Lynch, convened business leaders to discuss what they’ve been doing to meet this goal and what more will be needed.

Inspired by the enthusiasm of the participants—and the ambitious thinking of changemakers in the room, here were some things we heard:

First, we have to start talking about the SDGs as a framework, not a silver bullet.

It was inspiring to hear representatives from Safaricom, Royal Phillips, and LADOL broadly agree that the SDGs create a construct for real conversation. Specifically, the Goals offer an organized way of aligning business activities with delivering impact. The segmentation of goals—and even more importantly, their targets—help businesses understand which of their peers are tackling the same problems and encourage collaboration towards these ends. In our own Impact Investing work, specifically through the Impact Investing Network Map, we’ve seen firsthand that there’s real value in understanding who’s playing in your space. By identifying likely allies, organizations are motivated to work together to achieve better results.

Second, the private sector must be the nexus for change, not an afterthought.

Capital and investment have often powered the wheel of innovation, for better or worse. As our panelists pointed out, businesses are not just a key stakeholder in systems-wide change, but a key organizer. Particularly in emerging markets, they are required to work with local communities, align different sources of capital, and inspire local government to serve the immediate needs of their own supply chain. That’s a unique position to be in. Take healthcare, for example. To revolutionize the healthcare system in emerging markets, as was explained from the mainstage, the solution is not as simple as building one hospital. Businesses need to create relationships with pharmaceutical companies, train doctors and nurses and even improve local transport and infrastructure to facilitate effective treatment. As representatives of Abraaj’s Growth Markets Health Fund, Royal Phillips, PBUCC and the IFC made clear (through their partnership in the Growth Markets Health Fund), even the most catalytic investments or innovative solutions need everyone around the table.

Third, without refreshed norms on how the private sector operates, progress will be stunted.

Even with the best collaboration and innovation, how we measure success needs an update if the goal is to maximize impact alongside profit. And that requires a move from short term wins to long term sustainability. As Amy Jadesimi pointed out from the stage, we’ve allowed the industry to drift dangerously away from what “long term” used to mean in the 70s and 80s. Corporate trailblazers—like Paul Polman of Unilever—continue to urge businesses to rethink how they measure success and with what frequency. But many agree that to do this, we need to first educate those calling the shots, and that extends beyond the C-Suite. Shareholders need to be informed of the value of sustainable thinking and long-term planning. They need to be encouraged to use their voice and to exercise their votes in alignment with what they believe to be fundamental to the success of a company long-term. Financial managers need to be at the helm of product innovation, exploring new mechanisms that leverage both social and financial returns. Stakeholders—every entity or individual affected by a businesses’ core activity—must be engaged holistically. Even across private assets, there’s a role for Limited Partners to play with General Partners and fund managers to actively demand that they work with their portfolio companies to think beyond just the bottom line—for financial and social benefits.

Achieving the SDGs are more of a reality today than ever before. They are integral to the well-being of hundreds of millions of people around the world. Some corporations are ready to move to fulfill this mandate, while others are waiting to be inspired. If we can use the framework of the SDGs to usher in this new way of thinking, acting and partnering—with the private sector as an integral and active participant—we may truly have an opportunity to massively reduce global poverty.

Looking for Fearless

Posted on by Case Foundation

This fall, I will be tackling a new endeavor: writing a book about the Be Fearless principles that will feature remarkable stories of fearless people and organizations that embody them. The book will be grounded in five principles that together represent keys to creating the “secret sauce” that can bring about transformational change. Being fearless means setting audacious goals, acting urgently and boldly. It means experimenting, taking risks, being willing to strike unlikely alliances and accepting the possibility of failure while still pressing forward.

Since launching our Be Fearless work at the Case Foundation, we’ve highlighted and written about many wonderful stories of fearlessness—those inspiring people and organizations that started with a big bet, took risks, built unlikely partnerships, remained undaunted in the face of failure and used urgency to help conquer fear. These stories run the gamut from those more familiar—from President Kennedy’s moonshot, to two-time Nobel Prize winner Marie Curie’s pioneering work on radioactivity, to modern day Elon Musk—to lesser known contemporary tales of remarkable people and organizations who are doing remarkable things. Many of these are highlighted on the Be Fearless website and featured on social media through events like #FearlessFriday.

We live in a time when the world demands we build innovative, new approaches. And we know there are stories of fearlessness playing out across America and around the world every day. We know that there are many individuals who have lived the principles of Be Fearless through time, but whose stories may not be known. Their stories run the gamut: from business owners to nonprofits leaders, from those trying to make a difference in their communities to those launching a startup. These are the people and organizations who have brought us unique inventions, great discoveries and impacted the lives of others, and they have done so fearlessly.

And that’s where you come in.

We want to learn about these stories so we can highlight their successes, the challenges they overcame and their Be Fearless thinking to both raise the profile of their stories and to provide compelling role models for those who will follow in their footsteps. No matter the focus, no matter the scale, no matter when or where they lived, if you have a compelling story about an individual or an organization that you think embodies the five Be Fearless principles, we want to hear it.

To make it easy to submit the story you want us to know about, we’ve created a simple template that you can find at FindingFearless.org. There, you can post short descriptions of what inspires you—whether it’s from your own journey or that of another individual, nonprofit, corporation or startup—and how they put Be Fearless to work. We have a team of researchers prepared to dig deeper, should we select the story to be highlighted in my book or to lift up through the Case Foundation.

I have no doubt that our Be Fearless work at the Case Foundation and the stories I will highlight in my book will be made better through the contributions of others. I invite you to join us on this exciting Finding Fearless journey.

Biggest Trend in Social Good? Women in the Driver’s Seat!

Posted on by Case Foundation

I was recently asked to open up a dinner conversation with a room full of social innovators—a mix of foundations, entrepreneurs, impact investors and companies—by laying out what I saw as the top three trends in social good. These trends are important in that they inform our arenas for action and the clarion call we, at the Case Foundation, are making to all citizens to “Get in the Arena.” That night, I picked three distinct trends because I felt it opened up more conversation. In hindsight, I wish I’d gone with my original three: women, women and women. 

Trend 1: Women as Investors

You may recall an earlier blog I wrote about Trailblazing Women in Impact Investing where I talked about women emerging as a driving force behind the growth of the Impact Investing industry. From founding firms focused on impact investors, to creating tools and products to catalyze capital, to leading nonprofits and foundations focused on educating and activating a host of actors, women are spearheading and populating this sector more so than any other financial services sector.

A recent Calvert Investments report asserts that women, along with younger investors, will indeed drive the growth of the broader responsible investment industry. In a study of affluent women, 95 percent ranked “helping others” and 90 percent ranked “environmental responsibility” as important. And beyond driving the growth of Impact Investing, woman may be our greatest hope to unlocking the kinds of game-changing innovations required to solve the most persistent problems. Turns out that women wealth holders exhibit more risk tolerance toward new and innovative solutions, once they have met the financial security needs of themselves and their families. As Sallie Krawcheck wrote in her thought-provoking piece, women investors exhibit a slightly different values-based perspective. More women want their investments to not just generate excellent returns, but also have a positive impact on the world they live in. And they’re willing to make some big bets to deliver on that perspective.

This data reinforces the importance of ensuring that women continue to be aware of the momentum in the Impact Investing space. Remember, their purchasing power and, therefore, their potential social impact power is enormous—women control 39 percent of investible assets in the U.S. today. That number will continue to rise; women currently control 51 percent, or $14 trillion, of personal wealth in the U.S. and are expected to control $22 trillion by 2020.

Trend 2: Women as Consumers

Women represent the largest market opportunity in the world. Globally, they control $20 trillion in annual consumer spending. In the next five years, it is expected that this number will rise to nearly $30 trillion. For context, that is more than the two largest growth markets typically identified—China and India—combined! In the U.S., women control somewhere between $5-15 trillion, with estimates that they will control two-thirds of the consumer wealth in the U.S. over the next 10 years.

Women handle the bulk of purchasing decisions for everyday items like groceries and clothing and are also heading up and/or highly influential in large ticket purchases like cars, homes and appliances. Here’s another kicker—they even purchase 50 percent of the products marketed to men!

Why is this a trend worth watching in social good? Because women often make purchasing decisions based on their personal and social values. The HBR piece on the “Female Economy” is a must-read on the role women will play as consumers, members of the workforce, productivity drivers and caregivers. On the women as consumers front, my favorite quote:

“Once companies wake up to the potential of the female economy, they will find a whole new range of commercial opportunities in women’s social concerns. Women seek to buy products and services from companies that do good for the world, especially for other women. Brands that—directly or indirectly—promote physical and emotional well-being, protect and preserve the environment, provide education and care for the needy, and encourage love and connection will benefit. And women are the customer. There’s no reason they should settle for products that ignore or fail to fully meet their needs, or that do so cynically or superficially. Women will increasingly resist being stereotyped, segmented only by age or income, lumped together into an “all women” characterization, or, worse, undifferentiated from men.”

Given the forthcoming wealth transfer predicted, many of these upwardly mobile consumers and asset owners are Millennial women. Millennial customers, employees and importantly—entrepreneurs—lead their lives and make choices with a more holistic worldview. They contribute to and support the things they believe in and they use their dollars to exercise those views and beliefs.

Trend 3: Women as Entrepreneurs

And perhaps the greatest trend of all to watch in terms of opportunity to drive social good is the rise of women in entrepreneurship.

American Express OPEN’s 2016 State of Women-Owned Business report is a must-read. The number of women owned firms and their economic contributions continue to rise at rates higher than the national average. As of 2016, this data shows 11.3 million women-owned businesses in the U.S., employing nearly 9 million people and generating over $1.6 trillion in revenues.

The report show that between 2007 and 2016:

  • The number of women-owned firms increased by 45 percent, compared to just a 9 percent increase among all businesses. That’s five times faster than the national average.
  • Their employment growth increased by 18 percent, compared to a 1 percent decline among all businesses.
  • Their business revenues increased by 35 percent, compared to 27 percent among all U.S. firms. That’s 30 percent higher than the national average.

And check out the growth of firms owned by women of color! Their numbers have more than doubled since 2007, increasing by 126 percent.

Now, let’s turn our attention to venture-backed companies in particular, given their potential for high growth. Less than 10 percent of venture-backed companies have female founders, despite the evidence that gender-diverse companies drive greater market returns and innovation; that VC portfolios show women-founded companies outperform those founded by men; and that funds declaring gender diversity an “investing factor” give higher returns with women at the leadership level.

I think we are going to see these dreadful statistics change over the next couple of years. Increased attention being paid to these numbers, including by our own #FacesofFounders campaign and others (UBS, Blackstone Foundation, Google for Entrepreneurs, Kapor Center, 500 Startups, JumpStart, to name just a few) will help. Why is this a social trend worth accelerating? To put this into perspective, according the Economist, if women entrepreneurs in the U.S. started with the same capital as men, they would add 6 million jobs to the economy in five years—2 million of those in the first year alone.

…

As we ring in 2017, with all of its uncertainties, I for one commit to getting in the arena of investing in women with intention. For one thing appears pretty certain—our economy, as well as our social fabric, depends on them.

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