In 1987, I completed my studies at HBS and headed west for San Francisco, inspired by every class I took on the topic of entrepreneurship and seeking to make my own mark creating and advancing companies, which has been my career’s work, both as a principal and advisor. [...]

Twenty years ago, I graduated from Harvard Business School (HBS) taken by an idea that financial capital markets and for-profit business models could create positive social and environmental impact. Ten years later, the term “impact investing” was coined to define a movement that would see investors weigh those impacts alongside financial returns. Just as my personal anniversary aligns with this shared milestone, my career has paralleled two decades of evolution in finance and investment management. [...]

“Anyone who will want to enter the field of finance or investment must be conversant in investing for impact. We believe this is the case, even if you are not yet convinced or don’t plan a career focused on this practice of investing.” This is the proposition faculty members Shawn Cole and Vikram S. Gandhi made to the approximately 50 students in the inaugural “Investing for Impact” course launched this past semester in the MBA elective curriculum. [...]

At DRK, our work is guided by a singular belief: that finding, funding and supporting exceptional social entrepreneurs and the organizations they start is the foundation for creating profound and lasting impact for those most vulnerable in our world and its most vulnerable populations. Since 2002, we have invested in more than 130 organizations, many of them legendaryincluding Kiva.org, Room to Read, One Acre Fund, Living Goods, Last Mile Health, Crisis Text Line, and EducationSuperHighway; and newly named 2018 Skoll Award winners, myAgro and Global Health Corps, to name just a few. [...]

This year, the Social Enterprise Conference (SECON) goes back to basics. The central tension in this field has always been the interaction between mission and profit (or sustainable financing). The term social enterprise is so broad and all encompassing, yet two things are consistent: social enterprises are driven by a strong mission and utilize commercial strategies or seek sustainable funding sources. We seek to understand how mission and profit complement, strengthen, or even undermine one another. Our speakers and tracks seek to break down this tension across the various stages that a social enterprise goes through. [...]