Social Enterprise Initiative

Summer Associates


2005 Social Enterprise Summer Fellowship Summaries

Click on organization name for summaries.

Advanced Energy Corporation

Lesley Said
How can a nonprofit help profit-minded builders to construct homes that are healthier for both their inhabitants and the environment? This summer I set out to answer that question, interning with Advanced Energy – a $5 million non-profit organization based in Raleigh, North Carolina, committed to creating environmental and economic benefits through innovative approaches to energy. I worked with Advanced Energy’s Building Performance group -- a team whose goal is to make buildings more healthful, environmentally friendly, durable, and comfortable in an economically sustainable manner. Over the course of the internship, I crafted a new business plan enabling the team to have greater impact in the marketplace. 

Academy of Business Leadership

Kian Gohar
This summer, I worked at The Academy of Business Leadership (ABL) – an innovative nonprofit based in Los Angeles that teaches inner city minority high school kids about finance and entrepreneurship. I spent seven weeks teaching fifty inner-city Latino and Asian kids about the business world, helped them create real business plans that were submitted for judging in front of professional venture capitalists, and also instructed them about investing in the stock market through fictitious $100,000 portfolios. In addition, I worked with the CEO of the nonprofit on various high-level strategy projects: the establishment of an endowment as a renewable source of funding; implementation of a national expansion strategy to New York; and development of PR initiatives targeted towards increasing national exposure.

Acumen Fund

JR Kent
Acumen Fund has been blazing a trail of innovation in the venture philanthropy sector for five years. Acumen’s vision is a sustainable investment model that channels much needed funding to companies that produce products the Bottom of the Pyramid – that is, the 4 billion people who live on less than 4 dollars a day. They offer a market-based solution to poverty reduction that complements donations from the multilateral agencies.

Measuring the impact and benchmarking it against alternatives (particularly donors) presents a formidable challenge. Not just because the economic impact is complex, but also because of the challenges of generating meaningful information on the activities of Acumen’s investments, given the highly informal sector they invest in.

As a Summer Associate with the Metrics department, I developed a management information system for collecting and disseminating information on investments during due diligence and after investment. The system, based on a well-known piece of customer relationship management software, will help the portfolio managers to know what’s going on in the investments from the day they first meet to the day they receive their final loan payment.

Radhika Piramal
Acumen Fund is a global non-profit venture fund that uses entrepreneurial approaches to solve the problems of global poverty. It invests in financially sustainable and scalable organizations that deliver affordable, critical goods and services that target the 4 billion people living on less than $4 a day. It adheres to a disciplined process in selecting and managing its philanthropic investments as well as in measuring the social and financial returns. Acumen is structured around 3 portfolios focused on specific global issues: Health, Water and Housing. This summer I worked as a summer associate in the water portfolio, assisting the water portfolio manager in evaluating potential investments for the portfolio. My work included conducting due diligence on several companies, including making detailed business plans and financial projections for two companies in particular. I was based in NYC the entire time.

Manisha Shetty
Acumen Fund is a nonprofit that espouses the philosophy that the best way to solve poverty is to use market-oriented approaches to bring critical goods and services to the poor. Acumen does this by operating like a venture capital fund: they give financial and management support to entrepreneurs that have products for the poor in South Asia and East Africa. My role at Acumen Fund was as an Associate in the Health Portfolio. I primarily worked on building the health pipeline in India to find innovative companies working on health technologies or services. In addition to traveling to India to find prospective new investments, I also worked closely with high-potential candidates to help them refine their business plans, build five-year financial models, and structure deals with Acumen Fund. The summer was an amazing way to see the challenges and promises of using business approaches to address poverty.

Ashoka Innovators for the Public/The Aspen Institute

Sarah Lucas
What are the factors that set certain successful social entrepreneurs apart form the rest of the pack? And what can business learn from organizations in the social sector that have achieved impressive growth rates, scale and impact? As a summer research associate with the Fast Growth, High Impact Nonprofits team, I spent my summer both asking and looking for answers to questions like these. This work included conducting interviews with founders, board members and senior executives from a number of leading nonprofit organizations. Based on the results of these interviews, I worked with the rest of the team to mine for insights into the key success factors of these nonprofits, and develop hypotheses about how the management teams, organizational structures, and business models of these nonprofits were formed and executed to lead to such remarkable impact.

Board of Investment of Sri Lanka

Hiran Embuldeniya

I spent the summer working for the Board of Investment of Sri Lanka (BOI) which is an organization within the Government of Sri Lanka. The BOI is the principal body in Sri Lanka responsible for attracting local and foreign investment into the country for the purposes of stimulating broad based economic growth. The BOI’s vision is “to make Sri Lanka the most sought after investment destination in South Asia”.

I worked directly with Saliya Wickramasuriya, the Chairman/Director General (DG) of the BOI (who is appointed by the President of Sri Lanka). He joined the BOI on July 5th 2004, with ambitious plans of revamping the organization to run more like a private corporation than a Government organization. Included in this plan were the objectives of being more efficient, transparent and service oriented. Now, a little over a year later he has completed a comprehensive seven stage review of the BOI and was awaiting final approval from the President of Sri Lanka to go ahead with implementing the new changes. My work at the BOI was primarily assisting the DG with this Change Management Program, which was the first voluntary restructuring effort initiated by a Government organization in Sri Lanka, with all levels of employees being represented in the process.

California State Teacher’s Retirement System

Natalie Eckford
I split my summer between the public and private sector of real estate equity. The first six weeks of my summer, and the portion sponsored by Social Enterprise Summer Fellowship, I spent at the California State Teachers Retirement System (CalSTRS) in the Real Estate Equity Investments Group. CalSTRS has been one of the longest-standing and successful investors in urban and underserved markets. Their fund managers have successfully targeted underserved markets such as women or ethnic minority owned or managed companies, companies located in or employing residents of low and moderate income areas, companies located in urban or rural areas, and a primary focus on California. The goal is to create high return investments while advancing the flow of private equity into underserved communities. I was assigned to work directly with the portfolio manager in multifamily housing. Given the huge success of the CalSTRS affordable housing developments, I was enthralled to learn about this interesting asset class. While the majority of my focus was on this asset class for the six weeks, I also explored other areas of urban infill development, including retail and hotel funds. The result of my six week at CalSTRS was a invaluable exposure to the various aspects of the urban infill development business and unexpected preparation for the social issues I would face most recently.

Cambridge College (New Sector Alliance)

David Jachym
Over the course of Summer 2005, I had the opportunity to help a mission-driven College shape its course for the future. In developing the College’s five year strategic plan, my team helped deliver a plan for the College to improve program quality, increase service levels to students, and ultimately effect greater social change.

The New Sector Alliance Summer Associate program provided the unique opportunity to work directly with the president of Cambridge College to develop a strategic plan for 2005 – 2010. The objective of the ten-week project was to develop a plan for the College to realize its vision for 2010 (developed two years ago, in collaboration with The Bridgespan Group). I led the project with the support of one full-time undergraduate intern and ad hoc support from New Sector Alliance and its network of in-kind service providers (including Accenture).

Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services

Minesh Mistry
Over the past three months, I served as an intern at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) in Washington, DC. The federal agency administers the Medicare program and works in partnership with the states to administer Medicaid and the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP). Almost 85 million beneficiaries receive health care through Medicare, Medicaid, and SCHIP.

During my internship, I worked with the Capital Markets Advisor to the CMS Administrator to evaluate and communicate the impact of agency decision making on the private sector. My primary responsibilities for the summer related to the implementation of the Medicare Modernization Act of 2003. More specifically, I assessed the impact of the approved legislation on private sector performance and profitability. In addition, I assisted in developing the private sector outreach program to help enroll seniors into the new prescription drug benefit. A major component of this assignment was to develop a strategic plan to leverage private sector distribution channels to educate and enroll seniors.

Overall, my experience at CMS was extremely rewarding. Through the Social Enterprise Fellowship, I was able develop insights into health policy, cultivate important industry relationships, and gain unique perspective into the decision making process by working at the highest levels of the agency.

Chigaco Public Schools

Carice Anderson
At Chicago Public Schools (CPS), I worked within the Office of Human Resources. My efforts were part of a large-scale effort maximizing the potential of CPS students by recruiting quality people and providing accurate, timely and courteous services to all our employees.” In their efforts to recruit, attract, and retain high quality employees in all areas, CPS has identified several human resources initiatives to help identify weaknesses and manage this effort. CPS hopes through its current PeopleSoft technology implementation to help managers and employees better access and manage information. CPS is also in the process of restructuring its compensation and performance management system. My objectives were to:
1. Assist in the development of criteria against which to judge vendors who submitted proposals for the million dollar PeopleSoft implementation.
2. Work with CPS Compensation team to develop Future state process mapping that would help CPS define its business requirements for the upcoming implementation.
3. Assist in benchmarking current CPS salaries against similar organizations in the Midwest and in the nonprofit sector.

As a result of these efforts CPS will be able to:
1. Become more strategically focused as opposed to transactionally focused with the new PeopleSoft implementation.
2. Allow its employees and managers to be empowered in managing and accessing their information.
3. Increase the speed and accuracy with which millions of transactions are processed annually.
4. Develop a compensation structure that is more focused on pay that is comparable to industry and regional standards.

Amanda Gulland
At Chicago Public Schools (CPS), I worked within the Office of Instruction and School Management (OISM.) My objectives were two-fold:
1) To develop a business case for a centralized library automation system. In the long-term, centralization would create cost and time savings, increase librarian-student contact time, reduce book loss and facilitate district-wide information sharing. However, centralization requires a significant upfront financial investment, and thus OISM needed to better understand the costs and benefits before moving forward with the project.
2) To develop performance metrics and goals aligned with OISM’s key activities, as well as corresponding tools to track progress. Tracking performance against these metrics will allow OISM to identify shortcomings and improvement opportunities on an on-going basis.

Monica Lee
During my summer with Chicago Public Schools (CPS), I worked closely with the Chief Information Officer to research a new method of connecting parents with real-time student information. The project consisted of two distinct phases—market research and business model development. In the market research phase, I conducted surveys and focus groups of CPS parents and employees to determine interest in several methods brainstormed by the technology team, including the use of cell phones to transmit student data. During the business model development phase, I researched a range of potential business models for CPS. Based on internal criteria, the range was narrowed to one business model, which I further explored. The summer culminated in a final presentation to the Chief Administrative Officer, who has decided to move forward with the project.

City and County of Denver, Office of Economic Development

Brooke Morrill
In the summer of 2005, I had the opportunity to work within the Mayor’s Office for the City and County of Denver. Working directly for the Mayor’s Policy Advisor for Economic Development, I was placed on several high priority projects related to public finance. The city is in the midst of reorganizing its loan fund to leverage it with private investments to target low-income neighborhoods. I was primarily researching the feasibility and financing needs of mixed-use real estate development projects that would generate both new jobs and mixed-income housing. I immediately put my first year curriculum from HBS to work by evaluating the investment potential and ROI for the pipeline of potential projects the city had previously identified. I also helped research existing financial products in the Denver market to determine the gaps the city funds could fill. All in all, it was a fulfilling experience to see the inner workings of city government and to reconfirm the notion that an MBA education can be easily applied to the social sector.

Conservation and Community Investment Forum

Julie Gavage
I have been working as a summer intern for CCIF on the Marine Aquarium Market Transformation Initiative (MAMTI) in Indonesia and the Philippines. The goal of the MAMTI project is to transform 21% of the Philippines and Indonesia marine aquarium trade to ecological and economic sustainability using conservation management and rehabilitation to ensure the health of coral reef ecosystems and their contribution to poverty alleviation and food security.

Given my business background, I have been focusing to the business/trade side of the program. The first part of my internship involved a lot of traveling as I got the opportunity to visit fishermen communities (most of them in beautiful tropical islands) in the Philippines and Indonesia. This enabled me to understand how the program worked on the field. The second part involved a more analytical and traditional office work. I interviewed industry experts, ornamental fish exporters and importers. This enabled me to do some modeling to estimate the profitability of the fishermen groups. I used my business background to identify the potential barriers to the success of the project and developed recommendations.

Digital Divide Data

Ngoc-Tram Lyse Nghiem
Digital Divide Data (DDD) is a social enterprise established in July 2001 to create sustainable jobs and educational opportunities in developing countries by providing outsourced data services to business and public sector customers. We are established in the U.S. as a 501(c)3 organization, as well as organized as a non-governmental organization in Cambodia. Our business employs disadvantaged individuals, including people with disabilities, landmine and polio victims, orphans, and abused women. My project within DDD was to develop the market for the NGO’s services in SE Asia among international development organizations, national embassies, national libraries and bi-lateral aid agencies. Building a local market for DDD’s services is critical to the NGO’s mission of advancing the IT sector in Cambodia and Laos. My managers and I believed these organizations to be the best potential market for DDD’s services in the region. We have identified several large, high potential sales opportunities in this market as a start, including the Cambodian National Library, which I am proud I made it a sales account during my 6-weeks internship, although my primary objective was to establish contacts with prospective clients and potential funders.

Adithya Raghunathan
I worked at Digital Divide Data(DDD), an ‘IT outsourcing firm with a social mission’ in Phnom Penh, Cambodia. DDD has an interesting model for social enterprise, running like a for-profit in providing digitizing services to clients locally and in Europe/US, and like a non-profit in hiring employees from disadvantaged backgrounds and subsidizing their education. I worked primarily in project management, operator compensation planning, and technology. With lots of picky customers, an uneven skills base among its employees, I helped to improve and communicate process workflow to minimize unnecessary communication and use technology to improve job throughput. One of the most difficult challenges in this cross-cultural setting was helping to design a fair, measurable, but widely trusted incentive-based compensation plan in a company culture that expected rewards for seniority. I also helped to test and clarify necessary features for the implementation of a new IT system designed to measure productivity, accuracy, profitability, job progress, and aid in scheduling, as well as advising on general IT management and education matters.

Doorway2Dreams Fund

Michael Hwu
Doorways to Dreams (D2D) Fund works to expand access to asset building opportunities for low-income families by creating, testing and deploying innovative financial products and services. This summer I researched new ways to deliver financial education through video games. Most financial education in existence today simply disseminate information and do not allow individuals experiment with different scenarios without actually incurring damaging long-term consequences in real life. Simulation games have emerged as a fun way to learn through experience, and I began the groundwork for development and distribution of a working product that would teach financial literacy in an engaging and entertaining way. We approached several organizations for funding and worked with game developers to design a prototype.

Education Pioneers

Debbie Kozar
This summer, I took a fellowship with Education Pioneers an organization with a mission to train, connect, and inspire a new generation of education leaders dedicated to transforming the educational system so that all students receive a quality education. Education Pioneer Fellows are matched with education focused non-profit organizations for a 10-week summer internship. During this time, the Fellows also meet every other week for training sessions during which they are able to explore, confront, and gain a better understanding of the current challenges facing education.

The partner organization I worked for this summer was the National Association of Charter School Authorizers (NACSA). Over the summer I collaborated with the President and Programs and Service Manager to create the Executive Leadership Summer Institute (ELSI), a week-long executive development program for charter school authorizers. I focused my research on benchmarking comparable executive trainings for education leaders as well as creating and executing a qualitative and quantitative market research study of charter school authorizers. The result of my work led to the creation of the strategy for ELSI and its alignment with NACSA’s five year strategic plan and the formation of one-year operational work plan.

Endeavor-RVOX

Eduard Soler Babot
Endeavor, the US-based organization that supports entrepreneurship in emerging countries, gave me the opportunity to meet and work with Jesus Gomez Espejel, from Guadalajara (Mexico), who founded RVOX, a network of small market research firms that cover most of Mexico using Sintecta, a patented technological platform that allows capturing surveys with palm pilots and then analyzing data in real time. During nine weeks, I helped him with three main goals:

  • Redesign the organization of RVOX, with special focus on how to improve the interaction with the members of the network
  • Redefine the revenue model with an intense diversification
  • Conduct preliminary research about the opportunity posed by the Hispanic market in the United States

It has been a great experience, both professionally and personally. Although is a small contribution, I am proud of having helped a company to succeed and therefore create wealth and jobs in an emerging economy.

Endeavor-MetrosCúbicos

Elizabeth Hopkins
I spent a summer in Mexico City working at MetrosCúbicos, an entrepreneurial company which is supported by the non-profit organization Endeavor. MetrosCúbicos is a real estate listings company with the largest database of properties in Mexico. It has both an online site and a newspaper and magazine in Mexico City.

Over the summer, my role was to analyze new markets and products and identify the most promising expansion opportunities. Given the strong growth in the real estate sector as well as in online advertising and listings in Mexico, MetrosCúbicos is in a very exciting position. Playing a role in their growth and in some small way contributing to the development of entrepreneurial business in Mexico was therefore a very exciting and rewarding way to spend my summer. It was also a great opportunity to learn about both business and non-profit organizations in Mexico and to gain an insight into the real estate and publishing businesses.

Endeavor-Tecsis

Ventura Pobre
Founded in 1995 in Brazil (Sao Paulo state) Tecsis makes blades for wind turbines (renewable energy). In only six years, the company has built an impressive list of key accomplishments, which includes recognition as the world’s second largest independent producer of wind blades and long-term 40%p.a. growth rates.

Starting the internship with a detailed work plan helped me gain credibility rapidly, specially as results of previous MBA interns had been mixed, but equally important was the flexibility required to adjust my work to explore the business’ most important needs. By the end I had mostly focused on the commercial review of a $100M business but in the process I had learnt from factory floor workers, participated in price negotiations with the biggest client and presented Tecsis to private equity investors. Overall, I had a fantastic summer where I had the chance to meet and work with excellent people in one of the most exciting markets today. The experience increased my interest in energy and entrepreneurship as a career path.

Expeditionary Learning Outward Bound

Margot Johnston
I spent my Summer Fellowship working with Expeditionary Learning Outward Bound (EL), the education division of Outward Bound USA. EL is a school improvement and professional development organization that works with the teachers and principals of its nearly 140 partner schools to employ a highly interactive, achievement-oriented learning approach both inside and outside the classroom. Its goals are to improve instruction and develop stronger school culture and community, and thereby enhance student learning and achievement.

Expeditionary Learning worked with The Bridgespan Group in 2004 to develop a strategic plan that plots the organization’s growth strategy and execution plans through 2012, which it is now implementing. While I was involved in several management-related projects over the summer, my primary project involved developing an organization-wide performance measurement and management system aligned with EL’s strategic plan. The goals of this system are to enable EL to 1) track its progress and performance against the priorities laid out in the strategic plan, 2) use actual performance data to better inform management decisions, and 3) communicate its priorities and performance both internally and externally.

FATE Foundation

Jennifer Chen
FATE Foundation was created in March 2000 by an HBS graduate and a LCA case protagonist Fola Adeola, with the belief that Nigerian youth can directly attack the high rates of unemployment and poverty in their country through entrepreneurship. FATE’s mission is to foster wealth creation by promoting business and entrepreneurial development. In addition to conducting classes and offering support services for aspiring entrepreneurs, FATE sponsors an internship program each summer bringing MBA students to Nigeria in order to consult for more experienced entrepreneurs, instruct classes for their aspiring entrepreneurs, and learn about this unique business environment.

During my 10 weeks as an intern, I was given the opportunity to run a telecom start-up and teach business fundamentals to aspiring entrepreneurs. Regarding the start-up, I was responsible for diagnosing the reasons for the company’s recent failures and leading the company toward sustainable profitability. This effort included re-organizing the company, developing a codified set of roles and procedures, setting a new marketing/sales strategy for the firm, and rebuilding morale among employees.

In addition to being stretched at work, learning to live in Lagos was in itself a challenge. Consistent power shortages, lack of consistent running water, and terrible traffic jams were only some of the daily challenges we faced. My summer was extremely rewarding…an experience of a lifetime which taught me lessons both professionally and personally.

Claire Levy
I was hired this summer by FATE Foundation, a Nigerian nonprofit organization whose purpose is to promote private sector development in Nigeria through entrepreneurship. My role was to intern for ten weeks with an entrepreneurial organization called Bio-Organics Nutrient Systems Limited (“Bio-Organics”) headquartered in Lagos, Nigeria. Bio-Organics supplies vitamin and mineral premixes to the Nigerian food and beverage, and animal health and livestock industries. The company currently employs 36 employees and generated approximately $3.8 million in revenue in 2004.

My project was to complete a study investigating the company’s ability to service the debt from a potential debt offering of N150 million (approximately $1 million) in combination with an equity offering of N50 million (approximately $350,000) to build modern and expanded production facilities. The study included:

  • A market analysis to evaluate the company’s growth opportunities
  • A supply analysis to determine the company’s ability to support its growth
  • A manufacturing process analysis to examine the current production process limitations and equipment needs
  • A financial analysis to review financial projections, benchmarks, credit ratios and debt paydown schedule

Given the positive outcome of the study, we approached investors and are awaiting their decision due in November.

Additionally, my project led me to review, and, with the support of the relevant employees, improve wherever possible, the different activities taking place within the company. I also coached the CEO and the managers to adopt new tools such as standardized client presentations and helped them draft action plans for the next year or so.

FINCA

Viviana Salinas L.
I was a Research Intern for FINCA International, one of the world’s leading non-profit microfinance networks and the pioneer for the Village Banking methodology. The purpose of my internship was the impact assessment of the FINCA program in Nicaragua and Guatemala. The methodology included over 1,000 interviews with Palm Pilots to new and current clients to determine improvements in their poverty level as well as in their micro-business profitability. In both countries, time was devoted to analyze the collected data and prepare and present final reports with main findings and suggestions to the executive directors as well as to headquarters.

Homeland Security Advisory Council

Benjamin Gray
My summer experience was spent working for the Homeland Security Advisory Council (HSAC), part of the Office of the Secretary at the Department of Homeland Security where I helped to lead an interagency task force to prevent the entry of weapons of mass effect on American soil. The position afforded me a unique opportunity to work with a broad range of national leaders from both inside and outside of government to address a pressing homeland security challenge. The role put all of my analytical and managerial faculties to the test in a very dynamic and fast-paced national policymaking environment which I had dreamed of as a potential career but had never actually experienced outside of a safe and controlled academic environment.

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Global Fairness Initiative

Ricci Wolman
The Global Fairness Initiative (GFI) was formed by former President Bill Clinton in 2003 to encourage free trade while preserving important environmental, labor and human-rights standards. During the summer my project was to create a social venture fund that would invest in organizations that strengthen, support and expand market opportunities for poor producers around the world.

Currently global markets do not offer a level playing field. Poor producers face barriers to entry that make it difficult for them to compete in global markets. These barriers include size; lack of information and market intelligence; policy barriers; and technical capacities. As such GFI wanted to create a fund that would capitalize institutions to provide services to the poor in the following areas: trade facilitation, public-private partnerships; capacity building; information clearinghouse and process facilitation.

During the summer I created the Synapse Social Market Fund, a non-profit social venture fund that invests in pro-poor grassroots trading network. My day-to day activities included formulating the find, creating a prospectus, completing all the legal requirements for registering the fund, marketing the fund and creating an action plan for the future management of the fund.

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Institute for the Future

Jason Hwang
I spent the summer at the Institute for the Future, an independent, nonprofit think tank in Palo Alto, CA. I worked on projects concerned with the future of obesity, personal health technologies, and noninvasive human pathogen detection. At IFTF, I enjoyed many of the qualities of a small organization situated in the Silicon Valley, such as telecommuting and flexible work hours. However, I also found working in a small, nonprofit firm to be challenging at times, especially since I was accustomed to working in the highly structured, hierarchical setting of health care. Self-motivation was essential in such an environment, and the flat organizational structure and indirect supervision could prove frustrating for some individuals. Nevertheless, I was extremely impressed with the dedication of IFTF’s employees, and extensive cross-training was necessary for such a small company. The knowledge base, skills, and credentials of IFTF’s researchers were top-notch. I thoroughly enjoyed interacting with them, and I am grateful to IFTF and the Social Enterprise Summer Fellowship Program for being given the opportunity to learn from the experience.

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IFC (International Finance Corporation)

Lilit Davoyan
This summer I worked for the Global Financial Department of the International Finance Corporation (IFC). As a member of the World Bank Group, IFC fights the poverty in developing countries by supporting sustainable private sector development. The work of IFC directly impacts millions of people all over the world.

My main project during the summer was a microfinance project in Russia. IFC was considering a loan to the largest microfinance NGO in Russia; which was seeking to transform into a bank to enhance the sustainability of its operations. As a secondary investment officer I participated in an appraisal mission to Russia, conducted due diligence of the project, wrote sections of the Investment Review Memorandum on the analysis of financial performance of the client as well as political situation and legal and regulatory environment in Russia and took part in the decision meeting during which the project was presented to the departmental management for approval. The experience was very rewarding.

Anna Shilova
Summer internship at IFC allowed me to learn a lot about the issues Russian entrepreneurs and Russian government face in developing different business sectors. Contribution of such international financial institutions like IFC to Russia are absolutely necessary for the company development, because low predictability of the country’s future progress hampers significant investments from private investors. My job embraced all aspects of business I learned during my first year at HBS, from accounting to macroeconomic context and business ethics. Such issues as possibility of grain import from Russia to China or reputation risks for IFC because of the past activity of the top executives at one of the leading Russian manufacturers were as important as the understanding of the companies’ financial reporting during the due diligence process.

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International Organization for Migration

Anusha Srinivasan
My summer internship was at the International Organization for Migration (IOM) in Banda Aceh, Indonesia doing post-tsunami redevelopment and rehabilitation work. Specifically, I worked with IOM’s Indonesia Disaster Recovery Program (IDRP). The IDRP uses a holistic approach, which entails consulting with the displaced populations and local authorities to:

  1. Move internally displaced persons (IDPs) into housing that has adequate water and sanitation facilities.
  2. Provide adequate health care facilities to serve the IDPs
  3. Provide displaced children with schools and the means to attend them, and
  4. Provide IDPs with access to training, livelihood materials, and capital to jumpstart micro-enterprises and businesses and thereby sustain their livelihoods.

My research also revealed that all of IOM’s funding was government-based. My activities entailed fundraising from the private sector (especially Wall Street), analyzing the micro-entrepreneurs needs, and recommending strategies to improve the overall efficiency of the IDRP’s business processes.

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Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, Inc.

Hope Carlson
This summer I was fortunate to be one of four summer fellows at Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, Inc. Lincoln Center is a world-renowned performing arts organization that acts as the umbrella organization for twelve different constituents, including The Metropolitan Opera, the New York City Opera, the New York City Ballet, the Juilliard School, and the New York Philharmonic. Lincoln Center serves three functions: 1) it facilitates relations between the constituents and acts as the landlord for the campus, 2) it serves as a national leader in the arts, education, and community relations, and 3) it provides its own artistic programming. While I was based in the Executive Office, my six projects enabled me to work closely with people in three different departments: redevelopment, development (fundraising), and the Lincoln Center Institute, which is the educational branch of Lincoln Center. It was an incredible experience to be able to see inside such an amazing performing arts organization, particularly since I hope to work in the arts long-term. The internship truly offered a golden-key glimpse of the inner workings, challenges, and successes of an extraordinary performing arts organization.

David Oppenheim
I spent this summer working at Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, the world’s largest performing arts center, located in New York City. I worked on a variety of projects, utilizing many skills I acquired during the first year of the MBA program. One large focus of my work was an analysis of the customer base through detailed ticket sales data, focusing on the types of customers we were attracting and what purchasing patterns emerged from the data. I also worked with development on identifying donors and sponsors both for programs to be presented here and tours planned for abroad. Finally, I identified and selected vendors for a new plastic gift card to replace the current paper gift certificates.

Clarissa Shen
As a Summer Fellow, I worked on several projects that were of immediate concern to the Executive department of Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, Inc. This meant that senior managers within the organization were actively engaged in the projects and that the work had real implications for the coming year. From analyzing transitional office space needs as Lincoln Center undergoes extensive redevelopment of its campus; to evaluating, designing and negotiating contracts and project plans for a new business in book publication; to designing a new rental price structure and marketing strategy for their concert halls and public spaces; the projects exposed me to multiple aspects of managing a large cultural institution. As an additional perk, outside of work, my fellow interns and I enjoyed some great productions that inspired us and reminded us of the purpose of all the hard work.

Marni Weil
I was one of four Summer Fellows at Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts. Lincoln Center is a world renown cultural organization located in New York City. Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts serves three primary roles: resident organization with its own series of artistic programming; a national leader in arts and education and community relations; and manager of the Lincoln Center campus. This summer I worked on projects with marketing, planning and development, and Lincoln Center Institute to do work that touches all three roles. The experience helped me to more clearly understand how a large successful non-profit became so successful, the roles of many executive management functions in an organization of this size and provided the opportunity to apply tools and frameworks that I learned during my first year at HBS.

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Massachusetts Renewable Energy Trust

Elizabeth Lewis
How can a state government encourage companies within its borders to invest in renewable energy? This question, which has implications for both the state’s economic and environmental well-being, was one I sought to answer this summer by working with the quasi-public Massachusetts Renewable Energy Trust. I helped evaluate technological innovations which had moved out of the laboratory but were not quite ready for commercial production—a vulnerable stage where private funding is often lacking. Over the course of the summer, we approved several investments, giving companies the resources to bring products to market and attract private-sector money on their own.

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Mayo Clinic

Madison Mauze
Through a project that I worked on before heading to HBS,I came to realize that I had a real passion for combining my managerial skills, entrepreneurial drive, and desire to help people live a healthier life. As I searched for an internship that would help me move in this direction what I heard about the Mayo Clinic sounded too good to be true. As I continued to research the Mayo clinic and particularly the Medical Ventures Group, I was fascinated and excited to find that the Mayo clinic’s mission and values fell right in line with what I was looking for. During my time at the Mayo Clinic I had exposure to some of the leading ideas in the healthcare industry, was able to apply my learning from HBS, and learned many valuable lessons that will serve me well as I follow this passion in the future.

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National Volunteer and Philanthropy Center, Singapore

Chiinga Musonda
I was part of a team of four HBS student whose purpose was to examine how Singapore responded to the Asian Tsunami, identify key constraints and issues and recommend strategies for creating an efficient and well-coordinated disaster relief response from Singapore NPOs (non profit organizations). We worked with a wide range of non-profit organizations, government agencies and private corporations to gain valuable information about the Singapore’s NPO sector, how they responded to the tsunami disaster, what work well and any issues and concerns that they encountered. In addition we had the opportunity to visit areas that were affected by the tsunami in Sri Lanka and Indonesia to gain a better understanding of the work that Singapore was doing on the ground and to understand the challenges that they were facing.

Nayana Mawilmada
My summer internship was at the National Volunteer and Philanthropy Center of Singapore. NVPC is an agency sponsored by the Singapore government to spearhead the development of the country’s non-profit sector.

The specific assignment came about as a result of the tremendous activity in the NGO sector of Singapore, following the recent Tsunami in Asia. NVPC was one of the umbrella agencies in Singapore, involved in trying to coordinate the overall Singapore response and support for the affected countries. They wanted to reflect on how the tsunami-response from Singapore came together, identify key bottlenecks in the system, identify strategic ways to continue assistance to affected countries, and then develop a strategy for future disaster preparedness.

My native country, Sri Lanka, was one of the worst affected countries in the tragedy. I took on this assignment with the intent of trying to support programs that were being developed for Sri Lanka and Indonesia.

John Serafini
My summer internship was both a rewarding and engaging experience, certainly a worthwhile three months. My summer internship consisted of living in Singapore and working as a consultant to a federal government agency which specializes in promoting volunteerism and philanthropy within the city-state. As a member of a four-person HBS team, our mission has been to objectively examine Singapore’s response to the Asian tsunami crisis and to: (1) identify key constraint and issues and recommend strategies for creating an efficient and well-coordinated disaster relief response from Singapore NPOs; (2) explore what mechanisms can be emplaced to foster the growth, professionalism, and maturation of Singapore’s NPO sector; and (3) recommend potential roles for our hosting government agency within a future Singapore disaster relief response. The final objective for our summer internship was to present the Singapore NPOs and related government agencies with a synchronized and sequenced plan for responding to future disasters as well as how Singapore NPOs can become more independent and decentralized from a particularly strong federal government

Alberto Suarez
I was a member of the four person Harvard Business School Tsunami Study in Singapore with the mission was to objectively examine Singapore’s response to the December 2004 tsunami disaster. Our ultimate goal was to devise a strategy and set of specific recommendations for the development of a humanitarian relief sector in Singapore’s NPO industry. To achieve this we analyzed the previous response to the tsunami and we explored what mechanism needed to be in place to foster the maturation and professionalization of Singapore’s NPO sector.

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National Park Service

Andrew Murphy
I spent the summer working with a team of two other graduate students to develop a business plan for Valley Forge National Historical Park. My co-consultants included a current MBA Student from Duke and recent graduate of Clemson’s Master’s in Public Policy Program. Our internship was part of the larger Business Plan Initiative (BPI) co-sponsored by the National Park Service and the Student Conservation Association, which included 30 consultants working at 10 different parks for the summer. Five of the consultants were from the larger Harvard Community (2 from Harvard Business School and 3 from the Kennedy School of Government). The plan we developed included an in depth financial analysis of the park’s revenue and expenditures in fiscal year 2004, an assessment of current operations, and the development of strategies, investment priorities, and partnerships that can help the park achieve it mission in the face of shrinking federal budgets. The experience was an excellent exposure to the pros and cons of management in the public sector and to the potential of private public partnerships. We will present our priorities, strategies, and partnership recommendations to the Director of the Park Service at a wrap-up meeting in Washington in October.

Reese Neumann
This summer provided me an opportunity to create a business plan for Channel Islands National Park. Located off the coast of southern California, the Channel Islands are often called the “Galapagos Islands of North America,” and are home to over 2,000 species of plants and animals, many of which are threatened or endangered. After a week of training in Yosemite National Park with consultants from eleven other parks, I was paired with two co-consultants and tasked with creating a forty-four page business plan, including an analysis of current operations, a definition of the park’s priorities and future investments, and strategies for increase non-appropriated revenues and reducing costs. This internship allowed me to put much of what I learned in the first year of HBS into practice and to accomplish work that will have a significant impact on the organization.

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Navajeevana Development Alternatives

Matthew Adams
My Social Enterprise experience this summer was EXCEPTIONAL, and without a doubt one of the most unique and gratifying experiences of my life.

I was working with Navajeevana in Sri Lanka, and found that the opportunity for both learning and impact was very high. Navajeevana is a small dynamic NGO run by Kumi Wickramasuriya, the founder and executive director. The organization is focused on two major goals at the moment:
a)Serving the needs of the disabled in the rural coastal areas surrounding Tangalle. Although this area is one of great natural beauty, it has very little in the way of health services, especially for the disabled. Thus Navajeevana fills the gap by providing health and rehabilitation services to the disabled in the surrounding community. The organization also runs a dedicated pre school for disabled children, as well as community outreach programs in which health workers go into remote villages to care for disabled people who otherwise would have no help at all.
b)Helping in the effort to rebuild and reconstruct after the tsunami disaster. Navajeevana has taken the lead in assisting the fishing village of Kudawella, and is also involved in helping the people of Tangalle to recover. Major projects here include financial assistance for livelihood activities, psycho-social services, and the replacement of vital goods such as boats, etc.

Jessica Freireich
Navajeevana Development Alternatives, an initiative of a local NGO in Sri Lanka, is spearheading the relief, rehabilitation, and reconstruction efforts in a tsunami-affected fishing village on the Southern Coast.

Over the summer, I focused on two main projects: 1) collaborating with local micro-entrepreneurs to help them rebuild their businesses through strategic support and funding linkages, and 2) exploring potential revenue generation and employment opportunities for the parent NGO which serves disabled people. In addition, based on my perspective on the ground, and participation in local meetings with NGOs and governmental agencies working in the district, I helped provide some recommendations about how to improve coordination efforts to the national taskforce responsible for rehabilitation country-wide.

The internship provided an amazing opportunity to live in a remote area in a developing country and work with an inspiring social entrepreneur. It also helped me begin to experience firsthand the many daunting challenges NGOs face -- both individually and as a group -- as they seek to address difficult situations and improve living conditions for people around the world.

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NeighborWorks America

Marc Diaz
Working for NeighborWorks America, the Federal Government’s community development arm, I served two of their neighborhood-based nonprofits in Atlanta, GA. At the Historic District Development Corporation, I led the predevelopment fundraising work on the historic restoration of Herndon Plaza. This complex of buildings served as the headquarters of the Atlanta Life Insurance Company, one of the country’s largest black-owned insurance firms founded by Alonzo Herndon, a freed slave and Atlanta’s first black millionaire. After experiencing a generation of decline on “Sweet Auburn Avenue” the building’s planned restoration and the neighboring Martin Luther King, Jr. Historic District’s rejuvenation are bringing commercial activity back to this historic in-town neighborhood.

I also served the Reynoldstown Revitalization Corporation, rezoning a parcel of land to build senior citizen affordable housing. In this rapidly gentrifying in-town neighborhood, the construction of affordable rental apartments will allow many local seniors to retain a place in the community in which they have long lived. Both projects provided extensive applications for my finance skills, while also demanding strong project management over myriad details and coordination with development partners, such as banks, private developers, local government, and neighborhood associations

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Northern California Community Loan Fund

Amy Yamner
I spent this summer working as a business development intern for the Northern California Community Loan Fund. A Community Development Financial Institution, NCCLF provides loans and technical assistance to non-profit organizations that serve low and very low income communities. As a result of a thorough due diligence process, NCCLF has not had a loan loss in 18 years. As a testament to their expertise in the field, they were approached in 1999 to create a formalized technical assistance program to help non-profit organizations gain a greater understanding of responsible fiscal management. This program has slowly grown over the past six years, resulting in the creation of the Consulting and Grants Program department for which I interned. My primary task this summer was to help with the expansion of this program. I completed a historical review of services provided and a market analysis of what NCCLF should offer moving forward. I helped to improve some of their existing services by writing Visual Basic Programs (in Excel, something I had not heard of previously!). I pitched in and performed trend analysis of several non-profit organizations to help assess their readiness to take on a facility project. My internship included many more mini-projects than I thought it would, but I gained valuable experience through each component and found that there was often more to learn from the unexpected tasks I was given than there was from the tasks I knew I would have to complete. It was a very interesting summer and an organization I would recommend that future HBS interns consider in their summer job search.

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Office of the Governor of Illinois

Josh Gray
I had a terrific experience working in the Office of the Governor of Illinois. The three primary responsibilities of the Governor’s office are to 1) initiate, implement and oversee statewide programs to improve the welfare of Illinois’ citizens; 2) work with legislators and state agencies to formulate and execute policies and programs; and 3) set priorities and direction for the state. I mainly focused on four initiatives:

  • Planned and managed an event for thousands of veterans to file disability claims, receive free health screenings, and search for employment.
  • Conducted research on the Illinois homeland security industry and recommended creation of a homeland security entrepreneurship center focused on transportation at Northwestern University.
  • Developed a plan for implementing a book-of-the-month program to promote early childhood literacy and expanded the program to include parenting resources.
  • Point person in Governor’s office for Team Illinois, a program intended to bring resources to four of the poorest communities in Illinois.

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Polynesian Cultural Center

Diana Hassell
The Polynesian Cultural Center (PCC) was established on the North Shore of Oahu in 1963 to help defray educational expenses and provide practical work experience for students attending Brigham Young University Hawaii. Representing the island people and nations of Hawaii, Samoa, Maori New Zealand (Aotearoa), Fiji, Tonga, Easter Island, Tahiti, and the Marquesas (French Polynesia), the PCC focuses on preserving the culture traditions, and customs of these areas. The PCC currently has very few ways of monitoring guest satisfaction on a proactive, real-time basis. My project for the summer consisted of establishing a Quality Assurance (QA) program that would provide this type of information so that the guest experience can constantly be improved. This is vital to the PCC as more than 70% of guests visit the PCC as a result of referrals from friends and family. I established the foundation for the QA program that focused on three areas—guest satisfaction survey, mystery shopper guide, and quality metrics that can be monitored internally. The QA program is currently in the process of being implemented and the senior management team hopes to use the results to make ongoing improvements that will be most beneficial to improving the guest experience.

Pacific Aquaculture and Coastal Resources Center

Dan Svoboda
The PACRC is an initiative under the University of Hawaii at Hilo that is trying to improve lives of coastal communities in economically disadvantaged geographies, mainly through farming of marine and other natural products. My work with them was in two areas: first, I did marketing and sales of several natural products – black pearls, natural seas sponges, and cinnamon bark therapeutic tea. Second, I did marketing and sales training and consulting with natural producers throughout the Pacific. The work took place in five Pacific islands: Majuro, the Marshall Islands; Pohnpei, the Federated States of Micronesia; and three Hawaiian islands – the Big Island, Maui, and Molokai. Neither the natural producers nor the non-profit I worked with ever got any serious business and especially marketing help, so the impact, appreciation and personal satisfaction one can have from work like this is huge and I highly recommend it!

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Rocky Mountain Institute

Lionel Bony
Think economic growth necessarily implies environmental destruction? Well, think again, as more and more NGOs, companies and entrepreneurs are working on ways to make our business model, not destructive, but restorative of nature. At the forefront of this trend is the Rocky Mountain Institute, “an entrepreneurial nonprofit organization that fosters the efficient and restorative use of resources to make the world secure, just, prosperous, and life-sustaining” (Source: www.rmi.org). I spent my summer working as a consultant for RMI, and was lucky enough to be staffed on a great variety of projects, from setting up a smart growth plan for a county to crafting a global warming investment strategy for an international bank.

Roxbury Preparatory Charter School

Ben Kleban
After finishing my coursework at HBS, I worked as the Director of Development at Roxbury Preparatory Charter School in Boston. Roxbury Prep’s Director of Development had recently moved to New York and I was asked to fill the position until the school could find a permanent replacement. This internship was somewhat unique in the sense that I was able to fill an existing structured full-time position as the school made this transition. The experience of taking over an existing role and becoming a part of the fabric of the school was extremely valuable.

Task Force for Rebuilding the Nation

Annie Bertrand
The Task Force for Rebuilding the Nation (TAFREN) was established by the President of Sri Lanka shortly after the Tsunami that hit 2/3 of the coast on December 26th 2004. The role of the organization is to coordinate and assist government agencies and institutions in their efforts to rehabilitate and rebuild affected areas, with a focus on long-term economic growth. My role is to ensure that the 800,000 affected people get a livelihood, either through (1) social protection for those who cannot work anymore, or (2) short term employment such as cash-for-work, or (3) economic activities such as access to capital and skills development for full-time jobs. To support coordination of interventions at the local level, we hire and train 100 Livelihood Officers across 60 affected Divisions, establish mechanisms to help affected people communicate their needs, identify project requirements, support local economic recovery plans, write project proposals, and identify donors (TAFREN has no money for implementation). Since additional support is needed to ensure continuity and ongoing management of performance, I decided to stay for one year and postpone the completion of my MBA. This opportunity is the most challenging and the most directly aligned with my personal objectives I ever had.

Technoserve

Francesco Russo
I was hired by Technoserve to help the El Salvador cheese producers find common, effective business strategy. In fact, they are facing an always stronger competition, for their relatively big market, from cheaper neighbors countries, and their actual export are negligible.

The experience was comprehensive, exciting and extremely satisfying. I could work with well motivated Technoserve’s people, and more important I could work with local people at every single level of the chain, from the milk producer of a remote rural area, trough small and medium size entrepreneurs and to the vice Ministries of Agricolture and Economy. The result was a set of recommendations, adequately published in order to reach every influential player of the sector, a fulfilling sense of having done something useful for disadvantaged people, their sincere gratitude demonstrated in thousand ways, and the discovery of the type of job I really want to do.

United Nations Development Program

Keat Goh
I served as an intern at the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) Country Office in Antananarivo, Madagascar. I worked for the Growing Sustainable Business (GSB) Initiative, a program designed to identify and facilitate enterprise solutions to poverty. My task was to identify pro-poor private sector investment opportunities in the tourism (esp. ecotourism), mining (sapphire, gold) and agriculture/food processing (e.g. rice, shrimp farming, fertilizers, fruit/vegetables) sectors by interviewing donors, government officials, entrepreneurs, private investors, economic sections of embassies, chambers of commerce and non-governmental organizations.

US Agency for International Development: Global Development Alliance

Emily Rose Bolon
How is it possible to combine the technical expertise and dynamism of the private sector, the field experience and manpower of non-profit associations, and the tremendous resources and staff of the U.S. government when addressing international development challenges? After spending three months working in the Global Development Alliance of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), I feel that I have experienced first-hand what it means to be on the vanguard of development. I have learned the mechanisms by which private-public alliances are established and the basis for identifying the overlap between partners’ strategic objectives and constraints. My specific responsibilities ranged from conducting due diligence on corporate partners to establishing USAID’s first agency-wide staff exchange program. Overall, this summer familiarized me with both the structure and processes of a large government agency and gave me a great understanding of the various players in the world of development.

US Department of the Interior, Office of Insular Affairs

Chris Staudt
My internship was at the United States Department of the Interior, with a specific mission of helping develop the private economy of the Federated States of Micronesia (FSM), an independent nation in Free Association with the United States. Through the course of this internship, I spent part of the summer in the FSM interviewing senior government and business leaders, and the balance in Washington D.C. This internship allowed me to see international development from a new angle. It also gave me exposure to development banks and private firms trying to mix development with for-profit enterprise. While the summer was less structured than I might have hoped, it was nonetheless extremely useful for me in aligning my near term goals and deciding how I will work in the field of social enterprise.

Monica Harryono
After working for 4 years in the private sector before coming to HBS, I find my summer experience in the public sector to be very refreshing. I worked for the US Department of the Interior, Office of Insular Affairs (OIA) this summer as a Business Fellow for the 2005 DOI Summer Business Fellowship Program. OIA is an office within DOI that has jurisdiction over several commonwealth and territories as well as 3 Freely Associated States (FAS). One of OIA main goals is to promote private sector development in these places.

My main role a Business Fellows is to help develop business opportunities and potential public and private partners in the islands, in support of the OIA’s ongoing initiative aimed at supporting private sector-led economic development in the US affiliated insular areas. With the guidance and approval of OIA, I provided documentation, support and scouting for these opportunities, and prepared the ground for future Business Opportunities Conferences and Missions, to help maintain the momentum and viability of the initiative to bring investments to the islands.

Year Up (New Sector Alliance)

Jenna Lemieux
This summer I conducted a series of consulting projects at Year Up, a local non-profit organization in Boston that provides intensive job-training in information technology to urban young adults. The organization, founded five years ago by Gerald Chertavian (HBS Class of 1992), is currently in a period of high growth, a result of their impressive track record thus far. My projects addressed issues related to the rapid growth of the organization, and assessed two key issues in relationship to plans for future organizational expansion. Specifically, the two main projects were: (1) an evaluation of the organization’s current model of social service delivery for their students, and the formulation of recommendations for how to address student social service needs as the organization grows; and (2) a financial analysis of a new business idea being considered by the organization.

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