By Carolyn Gray Anderson
Impact@Anderson and the award-winning UCLA Anderson Net Impact chapter presented Anderson’s 2018 Impact Week in April. Under the theme Purpose + Profit, invited thought leaders and company founders shared stories about mission-driven careers, businesses and projects that fulfill unmet needs in sectors from entertainment to real estate.
Impact Week attracted members of the greater UCLA and Los Angeles communities to engage with Anderson students, alumni, faculty and staff in interactive panels and workshops tackling topics that included impact investing, affordable housing, blockchain technology and finding purpose in traditional workplaces.
The week kicked off with a keynote address by Cara Chacon, VP of social and environmental responsibility at outdoor clothing retailer Patagonia. The privately held company is on its way to a 100 percent climate-neutral goal by nurturing a squeaky-clean supply chain that accounts for everything from healthy soil for regenerative organic agriculture to fair wages for a healthy community (and therapeutic surfing breaks for Ventura-based staff). “A responsible business model works,” said Chacon. The proof? Patagonia recently reached $1 billion in revenue.
Every company represented contributed to an encouraging conversation about doing good while doing well. Among the highlights:
1. Impact investing took center stage throughout the week. The myth of investment portfolios with an ESG (environmental, social and governance) profile is that they don’t perform. But arguments to the contrary were well represented. Investment strategist Andrew Olig said, “If we can move capital toward companies that are part of the solution, and if we can deliver fund performance, a lot more investors will be motivated.”
Morgan Stanley financial advisor Darya Allen-Attar said, “Purpose-driven companies are solving for a real problem in the marketplace with a business-oriented solution. I foresee those having the greatest successes.” Joan Trant of TriLinc’s executive management team said, “The world is a huge adventurous place where we all want the same things, but we don’t all have the same opportunities. TriLinc harnesses the power of capital markets to create the kind of world we want to live in.
Elektra Grant, a sustainability lecturer at Otis College of Art and Design and Cal Poly Pomona, said, “I came to Impact Week curious to learn how businesses strike a balance among ‘people, planet and profit.’ My work tends to emphasize social equity and environmental responsibility, versus helping the workplace achieve and maintain financial sustainability. The impact investing panels helped me appreciate the tremendous social and environmental value that a financially healthy business or organization can create.”
2. The session on affordable housing was attended by a standing-room-only crowd. Enterprise Community Investment, which partners with development capital via equity and debt products, expanded its green building criteria — design integration, energy efficiency, water conservation — to include health. “For some people a house is enough,” said Robin Hyerstay, vice president of capital markets. “But long-term viability includes consideration about jobs, education and health outcomes.”
Jessica Lin, a 2018 Impact Week co-organizer and Net Impact officer, said, “I heard a student mention that she learned a lot from the panel and it made her think more about her future career options.”
3. Technology is fueling the future — literally. Closing keynote speaker Brian Kariger, co-founder and CEO of Recargo sustainable energy data and infrastructure company founded, is laser-focused on the electric vehicle. He said, “Every time an EV is sold it expands our market. Every time an EV is driven we all benefit environmentally.”
Blockchain continues to confound a lot of people. But forward-thinkers are seeing great potential for its equalizing effects. “Society has very little access to justice,” said Amy Wan, founder and CEO of SageWise. “Cryptoeconomics creates entirely new legal paradigms for a decentralized world.” Gaby Katsnelson, COO and co-founder of SMBX, a marketplace that connects small businesses to investors, said, “What hooked me was the concept of incentivized integrity.”
4. Participation through social media constitutes another kind of investment, a sense of ownership that motivates people. “We look at our shares, not video views,” said Buzzfeed’s VP of operations, Michelle Kempner. “Because we’re looking at meaningful metrics around engagement.” And Jennifer Vaden Barth, program manager for Google’s K-12 CS education initiatives, is working to involve young people who can change the face of computer science if they are better represented. “YouTube is the megaphone to Gen Z,” she said. “If you can’t see it, you can’t be it.”
5. Honoring your purpose, no matter what your business, is a great place to start as well as wind up. Alex Belisle, purpose strategy director at technology startup Imperative, maker of a living assessment and learning platform that helps teams uncover and activate purpose, said, “Purposeful business requires purposeful people. People who feel purpose in their work are likelier to be top performers and take on leadership roles. Yet only about a third of the workforce feels meaningful purpose in their work.” It’s a myth, he said, that people need to be motivated by a traditional cause.
Net Impact’s VP of Impact Week Karthik Patange said, “The week highlighted how, in all the different sectors, professionals can make an impact, no matter their careers. Imperative’s workshop on building purpose in the workplace got a lot of people talking about how they perceive their past work experiences and what they want for their own futures.”
Enjoy photos from UCLA Anderson’s 2018 Impact Week, which included an interactive workshop with OpenIDEO.
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