The Civic Impact Awards is an awards ceremony hosted by the Center for Civic Innovation to celebrate leaders and organizations who love Atlanta and are fighting for better policies, stronger civic engagement, and an Atlanta that is built for everyone.

We started this awards ceremony in 2015 to shed light on the work of dedicated and effective leaders who are doin’ the work and to remind people that amazing things are happening in our city every day.

We need your help! We are accepting nominations for the 2019 Civic Impact Awards in the following categories:

Investing in Impact: this award is for a foundation, corporation, or philanthropic organization that invested dollars into a project or program that moved the needle forward on advancing a new or more effective approach to solving a systems-level challenge in Atlanta.

Government Innovation Award: This award is for a government or quasi-government agency that executed a new or more effective program and/or policy to increase public participation or advance a new approach to solving a systems-level challenge in Atlanta.

Community Engagement Award:
 This award is for an organization, formal or informal, that executed a program or service to increase how people are informed and/or engaged in local decision-making.

NOMINATE AN ORGANIZATION TODAY – http://bit.ly/2019-CivicImpactAwards

This post originally appeared on LinkedIn.

Relationships Matter for Diverse-Led Startups & Social Impact Startups: What We Learned By Spinning Up The Intentionally Good Project in 90 Days

October 14, 2019

On May 31st, we received notification that we won a VilCap Community license grant from Village Capital for their accelerator curriculum and data collection tools. On June 13th, Joey Womack presented on creating an “intentional” culture to support diverse changemakers at SOCAP’s Spectrum conference. And on June 24th at 4:32pm, we received an email from Kapor Center saying that we were selected to be one of ten grantees from across the United States, and the only one in the Southeast, to receive a $100K Tech Done Right grant. This is the story of how we launched The Intentionally Good Project, a ground-breaking initiative, against impossible odds over the next 90 days.

The Problem

Research shows that startups that raise venture capital use 40% of the funds for acquiring users and/or customers. In Atlanta, we estimate that our diverse-led startups, defined here as either Black-led, Latinx-led, or women-led, and social impact startups with founders from all backgrounds, typically receive funding two (2) venture investment levels (VIRAL) lower than the level indicated by their progress. For example, while many of their counterparts are raising seed rounds, these startups are still being forced to use personal savings or credit cards. This makes it extremely difficult to get the product ready for broad commercial distribution, talk with large partners, and determine if revenues/costs support positive unit economics, much less see inbound interest from potential acquirers. In short, these startups never get close to reaching their potential.

In 2018, the Kapor Center published The Leaky Tech Pipeline report, a comprehensive framework for understanding and addressing the lack of diversity across the tech ecosystem. Among other things, the report identifies how cumulative economic barriers and biases in entrepreneurship pathways affect the opportunities for diverse entrepreneurs to launch products and companies and invest in revenue-generating and social impact ventures. Chief among the barriers for the aforementioned Atlanta startups is low social capital caused by lack of access to high-powered social networks. Specifically, there is a huge disconnect between diverse-led startups/social impact startups and corporate employees, alumni of prestigious colleges and universities, and the entertainment industry.

Our Solution

We believe that Atlanta has everything needed to solve this problem. However, the startup, corporate, nonprofit, and entertainment ecosystems are highly inefficient relative to helping diverse-led startups and social impact startups. The Intentionally Good Project solves this inefficiency by using a collective impact model that connects these startups to corporations/large companies for short pilots or strategic partnerships, macro and micro-influencers for endorsements or key advisors, and investors where it makes sense.

The Intentionally Good Project is part culture and part program. Womack wrote about building an “intentional” culture in a July LinkedIn post. The design of the program is like a pipeline and divided into five (5) stages that begin every quarter: identifying the top startups in the area and selecting the top 10-12; assessing their readiness for corporations, influencers, and investors; pairing them with accountability mentors to improve their weakest areas over 90 days; introducing them to well-connected people; and starting meetings for pilots, endorsements, and investors.

What Happened In Q3 2019

Well. Everything.

In addition to actually building the parachute after we jumped out of the plane, we identified 150+ startups that fit our criteria and announced at a Georgia Social Impact Collaborative coffee meeting and the State of the Atlanta Black Tech Startup Ecosystem on August 7th that applications were open for the Fall 2019 cohort. Aided by articles from Hypepotamus and Urban Geekz along with sharing by 30+ people on social media and email, 125 startups applied.

Five (5) startups were advanced to Stage 3: Capway, EnrichHER, Goodr, InterAct Lifeline, and Qoins. Twelve startups were selected for Stage 2: Aquagenuity, Citiri, Civic Dinners, Countalytics, Empowered, Hawque, Make Music Count, Partnr, Speakalytics, TenScores, Unboxt, and Uplift.

We also partnered with Venture Atlanta for a dinner that led to eight (8) startups being selected as Showcase companies, and with Moxie for a FutureX lab where several startups secured meetings with Moxie executives as well as their clients. Nine of the applicants were selected for the Revolt Summit Code in Color Pitch Competition with musicbuk winning the competition. 26 of the applicants were selected for a recent Google For Startups Pop-Up where they received intensive mentorship from Google leaders. Startups in the cohort also secured meetings with Combs Enterprises, Porsche, Delta, Mercedes-Benz, and Lightspeed Venture Partners.

Assessments

Before we make warm introductions in earnest, we host a series of Investor, Corporate, and Influencer Readiness sessions where each startup is paired with an evaluator for a curated 90 minute 1-on-1 conversation using the VIRAL rubric as the framework.

Google served as our host for the Investor Readiness Evaluation session where investors from Loeb.ATL, Shadow Ventures, Atlanta Tech Angels, and more grilled the startups on everything from their team to their plans to scale as well as exit potential.

On Saturday, September 21st, corporate innovators from companies like The Home Depot, NCR, Deloitte, Nine Labs, Twilio, Proctor & Gamble Alumni, and Southern Co. came out to ATDC in Tech Square to determine other large companies’ likely confidence in wanting to run a short-term pilot or create a strategic partnership with the startups.

The Assessment Phase concluded with a trip to the Porsche Experience where local influencers (both corporate and consumer) with experience from the Atlanta Greek Picnic, SalesLoft, Sony Music, Beyond The Game Network, The Garner Circle PR, MailChimp, Target, and Emory University rated the startups on the likelihood that they will be able to attract other influencers to become key advisors or endorsers.

Our work bringing together the ecosystem is already paying dividends. Partnr, a startup that makes it easy for software development teams to track, sync, and get insight into their code quality and project productivity data in one place, has begun discussions for pilots with Delta and Porsche due to connections made in August and September. And this story is not uncommon Take Make Music Count which is working eliminate students math phobia by teaching them how to play popular songs on a piano-based app with direct math lessons. Evaluations revealed a need to improve the founder’s understanding of the market and financials. The founder took the feedback and used it to win the $5,000 Black Founders Exchange Pitch Competition a week later.

Sponsors + Partners

Special thanks to our sponsors The Gathering Spot, Google For Startups, ATDC, Porsche Experience, Venture Atlanta as well as ecosystem partners like Metro Atlanta Chamber of Commerce, Georgia Social Impact Collaborative, Moxie, UrbanGeekz, Hypepotamus, Engage, HBCU.vc, Atlanta Influences Everything, Propellant Media, Butter.ATL, KTC, SOCAP, Startup Atlanta, and Atlanta Black Tech.

What We Learned

Total Applications: 125

  • Self-Identified as Diverse-Led Startups (No Social Impact): 46
  • Self-Identified as Social Impact Startups: 81
  • Self-Identified as Diverse-Led and Social Impact: 68

African/African-American Founder:

  • Applicants: 100
  • We Got Now inaugural Fall 2019 Cohort: 10

Latinx Founder:

  • Applicants: 7
  • We Got Now inaugural Fall 2019 Cohort: 0

Woman on Founding Team

  • Applicants: 54%
  • We Got Now Fall 2019 Cohort: 33%*
  • Global: 47%

*Note: Four (4) women-led startups that would have been in the Fall 2019 cohort were advanced to the next stage. Also, one other woman-led startup deferred to Winter 2020 due to startup-related travel commitments.

Strong-Potential* Applications: 56

  • Self-Identified as Diverse-Led: 25
  • Self-Identified as Social Impact: 8
  • Self-Identified as Diverse-Led and Social Impact: 23

Average Startup VIRAL Self-Assessment Score:* 2.28

Average Startup VIRAL External Assessment Score*: 2.24

VIRAL 3 Progress x Strong-Potential Applications: 29

  • Self-Identified as Diverse-Led Startups: 18
  • Self-Identified as Social Impact Startups: 4
  • Self-Identified as Diverse-Led and Social Impact: 7

Strongest VIRAL Business Areas:

  • Self-Assessment: Problem, Value Proposition, Product
  • External Evaluation: Team, Problem and Product

Weakest VIRAL Business Areas:

  • Self-Assessment: Investor Exit, Scale, Market
  • External Evaluation: Market, Scale, and Investor Exit

Business Areas With Largest Difference Between Startups Self-Assessment & Investor Evaluations

  • Team (-1.83)
  • Market (-1.67)
  • Value Proposition (-1.33)

Percentage of Applicants That Have Raised $ From 

  • Angel Investors: 11%
  • Family & Friends: 11%
  • Accelerators/Fellowship Programs: 10%
  • Business Plan Competitions/Crowd-Funding Campaigns/Other Individuals: 7%
  • Philanthropic Support: 31.3%

Fall 2019 Cohort Customer Relationship Breakdown

  • B2B: 7
  • B2BC: 4
  • B2C: 1

Prior Experience Founding Company

  • Applicants: 67%
  • We Got Now Fall 2019 Cohort: 82%
  • Global: 50%

Been Through an Entrepreneur Support Program

  • Applicants: 50%
  • We Got Now Fall 2019 Cohort: 75%
  • Global: 30%

Have Patents

  • Applicants: 17%
  • We Got Now Fall 2019 Cohort: 17%
  • Global: 12%

Started In Previous 36 Months

  • Applicants: 70%
  • We Got Now Fall 2019 Cohort: 67%
  • Global: 36%

Amount of Money Founders Have Invested in the Startup (Median)

  • Applicants: $8,000
  • We Got Now Fall 2019 Cohort: $45,000
  • Global: $2,000

Desired Financing Over Next 12 Months (Median)

  • Applicants: $500K
  • Cohort: $750K

Desired Financing Over Next 3 Years (Median)

  • Applicants: $2.5M
  • Cohort: $3.5M

Trends and What We Are Observing 

  • Ecosystem building/connecting for diversity and social impact in the startup space is hot as evidenced by the work of the Georgia Social Impact Collaborative, Kapor Center, Village Capital’s VilCap Communities, TechStars Impact, The Gathering Spot, and the Russell Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship.
  • Tech and the creative industries are on a collision course.
  • More diverse and social impact founders are accepting that they’ll be forced to bootstrap as opposed to raising investment capital, and the goal is to become cashflow positive as soon as possible.
  • Building $1 billion companies is no longer the standard. Now, the focus is on getting to $1M in revenue, and then deciding to try to get anywhere from $10M – $30M in revenue.
  • Startups will travel to where the resources (entrepreneur support programs and capital) are located.
  • More startups than expected participated in Y Combinator Startup School.
  • Applicants ranked awareness and credibility as the top benefit for being in an accelerator
  • The cohort ranked gaining access to a group of like-minded entrepreneurs as the top reason for the importance of accelerator benefits

Analysis

  • The time is now for this initiative.
  • Relationships matter. This all boils down to social networks.
  • The Atlanta Tech Startup Pipeline has leaks AND is backed up. May take a 1-2 years to flow smoothly.
  • Social capital is more expensive than financial capital until about $50,000 (estimate).
  • This framework also works for tech-enabled startups, e-commerce companies, and “main street” businesses.
  • More Atlanta startups have made progress along the VIRAL rubric than we originally thought.
  • The majority of social impact companies can’t get past VIRAL 2 in Investor Exit because there’s little-to-no evidence of their value proposition to acquirers.
  • Many black-led startups can’t get past VIRAL 3 in Investor Exit because serious companies haven’t made serious investments in their industries.
  • Pitch competitions funded by foundations are the primary source of capital
  • Some founders were not able to provide answers during the Evaluation Sessions and the evaluators challenged them to think about aspects of their business that they had not thought of before. The founders are being pushed and stretched to know every aspect of their business – not just the product.
  • Founders have been able to receive many points of feedback instead of just one-off conversations with mentors or advisors. These conversations also lead to relationship building, which is an added benefit of this program. It opens up the chance for the founder to make connections with other founders and advisors to aid in the growth of their company.
  • Fortune 1000 employees, many of whom are on the pathway to qualifying as accredited investors due to income, are engaged in this process. They see the evaluation sessions as a way to learn how to vet startups like seasoned angel investors and venture capitalists.
  • There is a disconnect between non-tech startup professional scene and tech startup scene – especially for African Americans.
  • There is a large opportunity to connect Atlanta startups, especially social impact startups, to non-Atlanta corporations, influencers, investors, and social networks.

What’s Next in Q4

Now that each startup’s three business areas to improve have been identified, the founders will begin working hard to make those areas strengths. We’ll also host four workshops over October and November where the startups will assess and score each other, develop their origin stories, and learn about advanced topics like B2B Sales, designing a pilot with corporations, working with influencers, and more.

In December, we’ll bring back all evaluators, sponsors, partners, mentors, and speakers for a dinner where the startups will present their progress since September. Also, we’ll open applications for the Winter 2020 cohort.

What We Need

We’re proud of how the ecosystem has responded and rallied, but there’s a ton of work to do moving forward:

  • The startups will have specific needs, and will need to access the social networks of corporate employee resource groups, university alumni associations, and professional organizations.
  • Angel investors, venture capitalists, corporate innovators, and influencers to serve as evaluators in January and February for the Winter 2020 cohort.
  • Donors and sponsors y’all.

Conclusion

We’re on to something big here. You can feel it in the air. This is tech done right.

Contributors: Raven Hinson, Brandy Nagel, and Joey Womack

Foundations and community lenders scaling outcomes through capital

October 9, 2019

Last week, the Georgia Social Impact Collaborative (GSIC) hosted leaders from nearly 40 GA-based foundations and 15 community development financial institutions (CDFIs) to gain insights on how to advance their common goals around social outcomes. After an immersive session to understand how CDFIs drive impact in Georgia, the event – Leveraging CDFIs for Mission – was highlighted by a series of breakout groups, each focused on ways to enhance sustainable solutions through collaborative investment. The small group settings provided a unique opportunity to workshop specific initiatives that need greater levels of capital to truly scale.

“Foundations and CDFIs often work on very similar issues in the same communities, yet investment capital for both capacity and projects has always move slow in Georgia. This is changing quickly as these discussions proved,” said Sam Moss, chair of GSIC and senior director of finance at the Cousins Foundation. “Foundations are realizing the incredible leverage they can gain by using their balance sheet, as well as their grant dollars, to drive impact through community development lenders.”

CDFIs, usually nonprofits, are financial intermediaries that are certified by the U.S. Department of Treasury, which they can then apply to for grants and low-cost capital for purposes of providing cost-effective, flexible financing in underinvested communities, which are often ignored by commercial banks and other mainstream financial institutions. CDFIs are adept at underwriting loans, and providing technical support to ensure repayment, for both low-income and low-wealth individuals and businesses.

While CDFIs receive some federal support, their primary source of capital is from larger commercial banks, which rely on CDFIs to satisfy regulatory commitments to provide loans to low income populations. A rapidly growing and very positive trend since the great recession is for foundations and other place-based funders to support CDFIs through both grants and low-cost loans (often with program-related investments, PRIs). In this way, local funders can work closely with CDFIs on the unique issues and challenges of communities of common concern. PRIs, grants and other forms of local assistance allow CDFIs to provide even more advantageous terms on loans and valuable technical assistance to individuals and businesses with the greatest needs.

Leveraging CDFIs for Mission featured three executives with considerable experience working with CDFIs:

  • Sameera Fazili, director of engagement at the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta, opened the program with a landscape analysis of community development investment in the South.
  • Sandra Mikush, former deputy director of the Mary Reynolds Babcock Foundation, which has already aligned its assets 100% with impact, shared the opportunities and challenges they found in realigning their investment strategy.
  • Courtney Smith, senior vice present at PNC and experienced board member and investor in several CDFIs, gave an overview of the CDFIs working in Georgia and their specific competencies.

The program concluded with foundation and CDFI leaders meeting in small groups to workshop specific place-based issues, including affordable homeownership, financial inclusion, rural economic development, minority-owned businesses and social entrepreneurship and transit-oriented development of affordable housing. Post-event, GSIC is committed to continuing to provide connections and learning opportunities to impact investors and social enterprises of all types throughout Georgia.

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Media contact: Jonny Newburgh, [email protected]

Notes from the event’s breakout session: Leveraging CDFIs for Mission – Breakout Notes

By: Lisa Calhoun

September 30, 2019

If you’ve ever thought about spending your money with one brand instead of another because one of them had a better reputation, you’re an impact investor. Investors who want to scale their impact know every dollar under their influence can be part of their strategy to transform the world in a positive way. I care passionately that my “imprint” on this world is a positive one, from my lifestyle (vegan), to my conversation style (direct), to my car (electric), and to my work (venture capitalist).

The area I’m most passionate about is making sure investments I make have every opportunity to optimize ROI. One tool I use to do that is understanding the inclusion premium, a word we invented and invite you to use.

The inclusion premium is what happens when you manage the risks of group-think proactively instead of reactively. Everyone has experienced an episode of group-think. Maybe it’s a board you’re on, a sports team, a charitable organization, or a company you know well—but group-think is when everyone is so sure they’re right they do not seek to entertain contrary opinions.

Groups with different perspectives have inherently contrary opinions. They have to work through disagreements to wind up at a consensus. This tough process contributes to dramatically better financial outcomes.

Here are some of the financial statistics associated with using the inclusion premium to manage downside risk and optimize upside potential:

  • Racially and ethnically diverse startups outperform industry norms by 35%. (McKinsey, Why Diversity Matters)
  • In testing the performance of 2,360 public companies globally over the last 6 years, companies with one or more women on the board have delivered higher average returns on equity, lower gearing, better average growth and higher price/book value multiples. Racially and ethnically diverse startups outperform industry norms by 35%. (Credit Suisse, Gender Impact)
  • Among top quartile managers, there’s actually an overrepresentation of diverse managers, with 39% of diverse managers falling in the top quartile of performance, vs. 25% for non-diverse managers. And so it’s particularly interesting to note that you actually have a better chance of outperforming the benchmark by investing with diverse managers. (SuperReturn 2019, “Expansive viewpoints for better results: why you should consider diversity when choosing managers”)
  • Along all dimensions measured, the more similar the investment partners, the lower their investments’ performance. For example, the success rate of acquisitions and IPOs was 11.5% lower, on average, for investments by partners with shared school backgrounds than for those by partners from different schools. The effect of shared ethnicity was even stronger, reducing an investment’s comparative success rate by 26.4% to 32.2%. (Harvard Business Review, 2018, The Other Diversity Dividend)
  • This research utilized the Morningstar database to gather information on 5,000 US mutual funds to compare net alpha and value added between male funds and female funds. The present research found that female managers have statistically significantly higher net alpha and higher value added, compared to male managers, likely indicating that females are not allocated enough capital but have higher skill, as they are able to extract high value added even without proper capital allocation. (Natalie Borowski, Ph.D., “The Impact of Mutual Fund Manager Gender on Investor Capital Allocations”)

Research like this makes the reality of an “inclusion premium” for investors quite clear. At Valor, we’re actively using inclusion premium analysis as an additional layer of investment risk management and returns optimization.

Here are three ways we do it:

  • Sourcing Inclusion: We use industry benchmarks to make sure our funds source investments from across the full spectrum of founders seeking venture capital today. The end result is that Valor’s portfolio is led by 60% under-represented founders in a venture capital environment when the average is that less than 5% of venture capital is invested in under-represented founders. One of the ways we succeed at creating such clear alpha is through the nonprofit Foundation we started, Startup Runway. It is the largest pitch event for under-represented founders in the country. It has sourced many of our most interesting and innovative investment opportunities precisely because it sources from a group (startups led by women and people of color) that is historically under-invested in. See it for yourself—join us at the next Startup Runway Showcase and see the inclusion premium in action.
  • Recruiting Inclusion: When Valor makes an investment, the journey is just beginning. That team we invested in will be scaling quickly, and as they do that, we want them to be able to “see around corners.” That means making sure the next hires not only are exceptionally skilled, but also have exceptional perceptions and understandings not inherent in the core team’s DNA. We know more perspectives earlier in a company’s journey create an inclusive culture that is not only more effective in terms of financial performance, but also more attractive to acquirers.
  • Governing Inclusion: I was recently speaking with a successful Atlanta software company founder who walked away from a $100 million valuation and large investment at the 11th hour. He shared that when the final board composition was revealed, it “looked like a picture I didn’t want to be a part of”—all one race, all one gender. Smart founders—and investors—know that the board composition also has to also be informed by multiple perspectives, which is why when Valor takes a board seat, we pay attention not only to talents, skills and chemistry, but also to inclusion.

Inclusion is one of the risks controllable by investors and it is also one of the few risks that, if well managed, has a strong positive outcome for the investment. If topics like these get you going, and you want to join forces with us on the journey of inclusive innovation, please check out one of Valor’s upcoming events for investors at www.valor.vc.

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Lisa Calhoun is founding general partner at Valor.VC, the first female-led venture capital firm in Georgia. Valor.VC is based in Atlanta, Georgia. The investment firm’s second fund invests in financial inclusion platforms outside of Silicon Valley at the first institutional round. Find out more at www.valor.vc

The Georgia Social Impact Collaborative (GSIC) provides resources to connect, educate and inspire stakeholders for the purpose of accelerating the development of Georgia’s impact investing ecosystem. Recently, GSIC announced the launch of the Georgia Social Impact Map (the “Map”), an interactive platform designed to connect and educate stakeholders interested in accelerating impact investing for social outcomes. Intended as a resource for communities around the state, the Map connects new forms of capital to sustaining and scaling solutions to social challenges. GSIC also provides workshops and programming for training specific groups of stakeholders on ways to leverage impact investing to achieve their impact goals.

Originally posted on Invest Atlanta

September 24, 2019

Four Atlanta social ventures have been awarded a total of $200,000 by the Spanx by Sara Blakely Foundation and Atlanta Emerging Markets, Inc. (AEMI) through the Civic Impact Loan Fund. This loan fund is an effort created in partnership with the Center for Civic Innovation (CCI) to support early-stage civic entrepreneurs in scaling their businesses and expanding their community impact in Atlanta.

The Civic Impact Loan Fund, created in December 2016 by Atlanta Emerging Markets, Inc. in partnership with the Center for Civic Innovation, is an innovative investment tool that provides flexible, zero-interest loans to entrepreneurs who have early-stage businesses that are making a difference in their local communities.

“We are proud to continue supporting civic-minded businesses and those working on the front lines to make a positive impact on other people’s lives,” said Stephen McRae, President of AEMI. “These outstanding entrepreneurs are not only bringing new business ideas to life, but they are also showing their commitment to creating equity in our underserved communities. I wish each of these entrepreneurs continued success and admire their dedication to making Atlanta a greater city for all.”

The Spanx by Sara Blakely Foundation was founded in 2006 with a mission to support and empower women through education, entrepreneurship, and the arts. The contribution from the Sara Blakely Foundation ensured that at least $100,000 of the fund went to women-led ventures.

“For me, this is about investing in the person, not just the business,” said Sara Blakely, Founder and CEO of Spanx and the Spanx by Sara Blakely Foundation. “Not only do I believe we need to close the gap in women’s access to capital, I believe we need to give these women the holistic support that will enable them to soar. After providing them with a year of mentorship and training in partnership with CCI, we are celebrating their success and excited to invest in their businesses so they can grow and scale their impact.”

AEMI and the Spanx by Sara Blakely Foundation each contributed $100,000 to fund early-stage civic entrepreneurs. The applicants selected to receive the $200,000 in total funding are Civic Dinners, The Showcase Group, Brown Toy Box, and SwemKids (The William Pleshette Company). All four of the entrepreneurs leading these organizations are recent graduates of CCI’s Civic Innovation Residency program, a one-year intensive leadership, business development, and coaching program for civic entrepreneurs in the greater Atlanta-area that was sponsored by the Spanx by Sara Blakely Foundation. CCI also provided deal sourcing, underwriting, mentorship, and programmatic support, with loan servicing and back office support provided by Invest Atlanta.

“These civic problem solvers represent the greatest assets of our economy,” said Rohit Malhotra, Founder and Executive Director of the Center for Civic Innovation. “Each of their businesses exists to solve a specific systemic challenge, and their success will create ripple effects for generations. Civic Entrepreneurship is in Atlanta’s DNA. We’re just shining a light on the people who are on the ground, doing the work.”

The 2019 recipients are:

  • Jenn Graham | Civic Dinners aims to help create a more inclusive world where everyone feels invited and engaged in co-creating a better future by bringing people together over food for conversations that matter.
  • John Kennebrew | The Showcase Group works to strengthen justice-involved youth and families through psychological and personal development services inside and out of juvenile detention centers. Showcase Group provides support to incarcerated youth and their families by implementing psychosocial services such as advocacy and family and individual therapy by trained professionals.
  • Terri Nichelle-Bradley | Brown Toy Box produces children’s products and exposure experiences designed to encourage and prepare black children to pursue interests and careers in STEAM.
  • Trish Miller | SwemKids (The William Pleshette Company) is a 501(c)(3) school-based program that teaches children introductory swimming lessons and water safety skills as a part of their school’s curriculum. The William Pleshette Company, Swem Kids’ for-profit entity, is designing and testing a fully waterproof swimming cap to keep thick and curly hair dry in the water and address a cultural obstacle to swimming.

“This contribution is really going to take The Showcase Group to the next level,” said John Kennebrew, Executive Director and Founder of The Showcase Group. “We’ve grown from working with two youth out of the detention center to working with one hundred youth this year. Now, we’re able to put a Program Director in place to manage the logistics of working with the clinical social workers, advocates, and other community members who help to strengthen the youth we work with. It’s a great relief to now have someone who can manage the day to day relationships, while I can focus on taking the organization to the next level.”

Now in its third year of operation, the Civic Impact Loan Fund has provided $455,000 to a diverse group of early-stage businesses in many different impact areas, including community development, the arts, wellness, and education.

Originally posted on Forbes.com

September 17, 2019

The U.S. is struggling with mounting social issues, such as the growing wealth gap and an increase in the number of people experiencing homelessness. To combat these problems, foundation leaders and trustees throughout the country are looking for new investment opportunities that yield both social and financial return. The potential of this impact is enormous, as over 86,000 U.S. foundations currently possess $890 billion in assets.

Private foundations are ideally suited to drive social change through “mission-aligned” or “impact” investments. Such investments, such as Ford’s $1 billion committment in 2017, are on the rise. Foundations such as The Patricia Kind Family Foundation in Pennsylvania have even mission-aligned 100% of their endowment portfolios.

Foundations have powerful potential, not only for their experience with initiating social impact, but also because they possess more risk-tolerant capital than most other investors. By making initial investments of patient capital, foundations can de-risk opportunities for private and government investors with even greater resources. By assuming this initial risk, foundations can onboard other more risk-averse investors to make meaningful, measurable impact on issues they care about.

Forbes Nonprofit Council member Amelia Nickerson is Vice President of Development and Community Relations at First Step Staffing, an alternative staffing organization employing men and women experiencing homelessness. Founded in Atlanta in 2007, First Step is one of the first workforce development organizations to use impact and mission-related investment dollars to support its growth. Nickerson attributes First Step’s success to those early lenders who were willing to assume some risk to support social good. “With that success, we have been invited to bring the model to two additional cities, allowing us to continue expanding our impact and directly hire more men and women with barriers to employment,” she says.

First Step epitomizes the financial return that can accompany social change. In 2015, the organization purchased an existing for-profit staffing agency and converted it into a social enterprise with a mission-driven employment strategy. The same acquisition strategy allowed First Step to open a Philadelphia location, with a third acquisition underway. “Both opportunities were nearly 100% debt financed with impact investment dollars,” Nickerson says. “This model has allowed First Step to grow from 100 employees working each week and $2 million in revenue, to nearly 1,800 employees working weekly and a projected $42 million in revenue in 2019.”

According to Nickerson, First Step is now nearly 95% self-sustaining, relying on limited philanthropic dollars to support services like additional job coaching and transportation for clients, which helps increase job placement and retention rates. “In addition to providing jobs to those otherwise disenfranchised from the workforce, First Step is able to save the community millions of dollars each year,” she says. As the leader of the organization’s traditional fundraising efforts, Nickerson hopes to see an even greater increase in social impact investing, which she believes will be the driving force for expansion into more U.S. cities within the next five years.

Nickerson says impact investments from the foundation community will continue to fund new and diverse projects – from large affordable housing developments to research on environmental sustainability – throughout the country. She says the ensuing benefits to communities could be life-changing for many Americans. For example, First Step has been able to translate over $10 million in loans from community development financial institutions (CDFIs) and private foundations into more than $34 million in annual wages for the individuals it employs. “To fund this level of dramatic growth with traditional grant dollars would have taken years; however, by partnering with lenders and foundations in this way, we are able to move much faster,” she says.

Nickerson advises nonprofit leaders interested in attracting impact investments to begin talking with local foundations that are already doing mission-aligned investing about their current and future goals. For those whose communities are not yet active in the impact investment sector, she recommends initiating a conversation with foundation leaders and community experts about the potential risks and societal rewards of funding community initiatives with impact investments. “Review your current programs to understand the potential for scale and what collateral would be necessary to secure these types of loans,” she says.

Ultimately, Nickerson emphasizes the enormous potential of billions of untapped U.S. foundation dollars: “To drive long-lasting positive change in our society, philanthropic leaders need to begin looking at their entire portfolio of potential impact dollars. Nonprofit leaders and foundations need to work in partnership to better understand the risks and rewards of such investments, removing any concerns or perceived barriers that may exist based off more traditional investment strategies. The promise of the good work that can be accomplished and the transformational opportunities at hand are well worth the work.”

August 29, 2019

By: Pavan Iyer, founder of eightvillage and Backyard ATL

Backyard ATL is an affordable housing initiative that provides Atlanta homeowners with backyard space a platform to earn additional income with their property. We are a turnkey solution that takes care of the design, financing and construction of a rental unit in a homeowner’s backyard. A homeowner signs a lease agreement for Backyard ATL to construct an Accessory Dwelling Unit (ADU). After building and renting out the unit, the homeowner receives a percentage of the revenue as part of the land lease agreement while we continue to manage the rental.

 

 

 

 

 

 

*interior image from AIR Serenbe artist homes

The concept seeks to create a mechanism for homeowner preservation. The homeowner receives a new income stream that would otherwise be inaccessible to them. Homeowners can use this passive income to offset various rising costs from gentrification to preserve their existing homeownership. Backyard ATL’s scalability tangibly impacts density, providing housing choice via incremental, scattered development. This found density and housing choice helps keep market rates in neighborhoods down while integrating new residents into the community.

We are currently in a pilot phase. Generator, Ryan Gravel’s non-profit dedicated to the catalyzation of innovative ideas for cities, helped spark the beginnings of our pilot by connecting us to communities where the issues and opportunities related to Backyard ATL were most relevant. From that we were able to secure a partnership with Focused Community Strategies (FCS), a non-profit community developer in South Atlanta, to build out our program in their community. FCS helped us secure contracts to develop three sites in the South Atlanta neighborhood, which is in an early phase of gentrification and is presently home to a predominantly African-American working-class community. We have also obtained preliminary commitments from investors willing to fund the construction of the pilot projects. Our customers are proud to participate because it helps with their own housing and financial security and adds an affordable unit that integrates new residents into the community while preserving the existing character of the neighborhood.

Backyard ATL is a capital intensive business, and the model inherently has to be a for-profit, social venture. The reasons being that:

1) The market for our business only exists if we do our best to benefit the homeowner’s interests (i.e. homeowner preservation/cutting homeowner costs of living through passive income), and because our market is mostly lower-middle income homeowners, we have to be intentional to create a business model that benefits homeowners.

2) For this to be impactful on any sort of meaningful level socially, we need scale. Philanthropy is not an option as it does not offer a mechanism to scale the operations of this business. A for-profit model allows for the potential scale of Backyard ATL through access to a larger pool of capital. Ideally, the scale results in attracting political capital, resulting in philanthropic capital to layer our investment pool.

3) The idea for the business was conceived out of a social need. Affordable housing is a large issue across all cities, and not many solutions are attempting to create a model that hits on “gentrification without displacement” like we are.

The challenge to all this is that this type of capital has been very difficult to find, especially in the fiscally conservative South. For Backyard ATL to be successful, there needs to be some sort of financial value put into the social value that we are generating. In other words, investors can take a reduced return with the knowledge that for each basis point they give up, they can create that much more affordable housing and reduce the socioeconomic and racial gap that much more.

Most investors’ expectations are that it is achievable to create the same meaningful social impact while maintaining traditional returns, which is practically and unfortunately untenable.

If Backyard ATL scales, we can help to keep thousands of low-middle income homeowners in place while accommodating Atlanta’s skyrocketing population growth. However, it can’t scale unless the social value of what we are bringing is not only accepted but also embraced by its investors. If we hope to provide market solutions that are actually solving social issues, we will need to find capital that is more conscience of the realities of the problems we are trying to solve.

 

Profile Summary:

  • Entrepreneur Name: Jack Griffin
  • Venture Name: FoodFinder
  • Impact Focus Area(s): Food Insecurity
  • Business Stage (Ideation, Startup, Early, Later, Mature): Early
  • Year Venture Established: 2014
  • Business Type: Nonprofit

The Issue

Social entrepreneurship is about solving problems. Tell us about the challenge you are focused on addressing and why it is critical that we make progress.

“FoodFinder addresses the massive issue of childhood hunger in America and the information gap that exists between families looking for free food assistance and the providers of that assistance. Inaccurate information found online and the stigma surrounding poverty are the two greatest obstacles to learning about and receiving help from a food pantry or similar program. Despite how pervasive food insecurity is in the United States, very little has been done to modernize or streamline efforts to feed the 40 million people who are food insecure. This is especially true for the local pantries and shelters that are on the front lines of feeding those in need – not all of them have an online presence. While websites that compile information on these free food providers exist, they often include incomplete or outdated information that offers little value to a person looking for a place where they can receive food. We’re already at full employment in America, so if we want to move the needle on hunger, we’re going to need bigger and more innovative solutions so that families can always put food on the table.”

Your Journey

Entrepreneurship is a journey that requires connections and support from a wide array of stakeholders across the ecosystem to help successfully identify, start, and grow a social enterprise.

“Coalitions, partnerships, and collaborative efforts have propelled my work to where it is today. The education system is arguably our biggest ally since public schools house food insecure students, play a tremendous role in supporting those students through breakfast and free/reduced lunch, and are home to the first responders to hunger that FoodFinder also wants to reach. Community-building for FoodFinder can enable possibilities that are impossible for us to achieve by ourselves. Partnerships can result in things like our efforts with the Georgia Department of Education who has contacted every teacher and administrator of every public school in the state with information and a call to action regarding FoodFinder – 8 times now. Especially in the nonprofit world, competition and cynicism can creep into those trying to help others. But we’re all trying to help the same people, so that’s why I’m excited for FoodFinder’s ability to help everyone from individuals to state/federal entities.”  

Why Georgia’s Social Impact Ecosystem Matters

Being an entrepreneur is hard and it’s even more challenging when you are a social entrepreneur as your business model and / or structure doesn’t follow the same path as traditional start-ups.

“FoodFinder is extremely grateful to be part of a new generation of social enterprises, one that innovates and develops new ways to help others without ever forgetting why we do it. For us, we don’t see being a highly efficient and effective startup as being mutually exclusive with being a kind, caring, and compassionate nonprofit. We strive to be both. As a result, our revenue mix should reflect that philosophy by having varied sources of income, ranging from large institutional partners like corporate foundations to unique opportunities for earned revenue where we can monetize our services while still fulfilling our mission. We’ll always have to fundraise. We’ll always have to raise more awareness of our work. But we’ll never get tired of doing so because we know better than anyone how much of a transformative impact our work can have.”

Interested in learning more about FoodFinder, please visit:

  • Instagram: @foodfinderus
  • Twitter: @FoodFinderUS
  • Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/FoodFinderUS/ 
  • Website: https://foodfinder.us/ 
  • LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/10326829/admin/

Profile Summary:

  • Entrepreneur Name: Nedra Deadwyler
  • Venture Name: Civil Bikes
  • Impact Focus Area(s): Historic Preservation, Community Identity, Culture Work
  • Business Stage (Ideation, Startup, Early, Later, Mature): Early
  • Year Venture Established: 2013 / 2014
  • Business Type: Social Impact / LLC

The Issue

Social entrepreneurship is about solving problems. Tell us about the challenge you are focused on addressing and why it is critical that we make progress.

“Civil Bikes brings attention to unseen and under-recognized stories of Atlanta. We emphasize the importance of having someone who resembles or is from that particular community. We want to be as authentic as possible. This allows for those outside (and inside) to gain a deeper understanding of the lived experiences and have a nuanced view of the history. The Guide serves as a literal guide through the highs and lows of the historical narrative. The 1.5 to 2 hours is not enough time to tell the full story, so we pair the history up to sites that are critical to the telling of the narrative that we may have lost to demolition, at risk of losing because of neglect, or it has been adapted to some other use and we have no idea what purpose it once served. In a changing city, remembering is a challenge because sometimes people prefer to forget and move on.” 

Your Journey

Entrepreneurship is a journey that requires connections and support from a wide array of stakeholders across the ecosystem to help successfully identify, start, and grow a social enterprise.

“My entrance into culture work came in an unassuming way and has multiple threads. It is an extension of my love of riding a bicycle and having the thought while touring Alabama- a largely rural state- that exploring history on a bicycle would be more interesting than riding in the back of a car! Another thread is while growing up, I constantly asked questions to understand why issues like racism, genderism, and nationalism existed, not using those words of course, but sought to understand these things that did not align with my beliefs or what my parents and family taught me. I became a social worker, lived in other cities and the practice of listening, examining society and embracing cultures were choices I sought in my professional, religious, and social life. The final thread was coming to terms with the fact that relationship and lifestyle choices were not enough to create equity for myself and others, that goodwill didn’t go far and wide. I was compelled to take action and find more intentional ways to address issues that are of concern and work to impact society. Today, I believe that the only way to have a future is to seek a just society.”

Why Georgia’s Social Impact Ecosystem Matters

Being an entrepreneur is hard and it’s even more challenging when you are a social entrepreneur as your business model and / or structure doesn’t follow the same path as traditional start-ups.

“There are entrepreneurs on both sides of my family and both are traditional in structure. I come from a non-profit/service mindset, and learning how to create a sustainable business model is one of my biggest challenges. Civil Bikes’ current business model takes money from admissions tickets and reinvests those profits into locally-owned businesses, cultural and historical spaces and artists, which changes our profit margins. 

Additionally, this direct exchange into the tour community supports spaces at-risk of being gentrified, harkens use to the identity and character of the neighborhoods, and are either Black, women, immigrant, or LGBTQAI/ Queer-owned. Other sources of revenue are a list of services: tours for our audiences, developing tours as an economic development tool for groups (municipalities, cultural groups, businesses, etc.), sponsorships and grants, and merchandise. 

Finally, I am thankful to my last employer for not seeing any conflict with me running Civil Bikes and appreciate Clay, my family, a few close friends and now my CCI [Center for Civic Innovation] family for that felt and necessary emotional, hands-on, and technical support. I’ve experienced burnout before and thankfully, it is not on the horizon!”

Interested in learning more about Civil Bikes, please visit:

  • Instagram: @civil_bikes
  • Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/civilbikestours/ 
  • Website: https://civilbikes.com/
  • LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nedra-deadwyler-7a793122/ 

June 27, 2019

By: Scott Sadler, Founder and President, Boardwalk Capital Management

 

Today’s companies echo the refrain that “sustainable business is good business” (or something like that.)  But eight or nine years ago, that wasn’t necessarily the case.  

Most businesses at that time had yet to openly embrace sustainability, and the investing public surely didn’t uniformly believe that such activities were a good use of corporate funds.  Even today, investors still don’t all buy into the story.  But, as they say, “that’s what makes a market.”  (You’ll never get everyone to agree on anything.)   

As an indicator of how far sustainability was from the mainstream in 2010, only 20% of the S&P500 reported on sustainability factors.  It was still a confusing topic for many, and the term was still rather ill-defined in the public eye. 

As the owner of a new company focused on sustainable investing, I knew we had a challenge.  We wanted to tell the story that sustainability is about running a better company, and that including these factors in an investment process was logical and (importantly) didn’t undermine financial returns.  But as a startup, our credibility was a little on the light side.  

So, we teamed up with the Green Chamber of the South, where I was a board member, to create a new kind of sustainability conference.  We enlisted the help of Atlanta’s (and the region’s) companies and created a conference where the investing and business public could hear this truth about corporate sustainability directly from the decision makers.  Where my company lacked credibility, the region’s corporate giants had it in spades.   

Of course, we weren’t sure what we’d hear from those companies.  Would they even want to participate? And would they tell the same story that we were telling?  It turns out that we need not have worried.

We called that conference “Sustainability Interactive” (SI) and joked that it was like speed dating with a room full of CSOs (Chief Sustainability Officers.)  Indeed, attendees moved from table to table to hear sustainability officers tell their stories.  Incorporating a cocktail reception in the mix helped drive free flowing conversations and networking.

 In retrospect, the conference was well timed.  To quote one attendee from the solar industry, it signaled “a sea change” in business attitudes in the Southeast.  Companies told a story about Return-on-Investment (ROI). Yes, their sustainability programs were an investment – with a payback period and an expected return.  This wasn’t about hugging trees. It was about reducing costs, building more resiliency and reducing risks. (And thank goodness that’s what we heard…) 

On November 4, Sustainability Interactive will be back again, in its seventh edition.  And the conversation around the event is completely different. Sustainability is a “given” among companies large and small.  And while few companies published a sustainability report in 2010, 86% of the S&P500 does so today. Customers, shareholders and employees alike are engaged and are choosing to vote with their time and their dollars for companies whose principles and actions sync with their own.

From my perspective, companies have evolved greatly over this period, but perhaps not as much as their messaging has.  With a more receptive audience among customers and investors, what was once rather hidden moved to the front. Yes, they are doing more.  But they’re also saying more. 

So, SI-7 will be about companies doing more, and yes, telling us about it.  The conference will focus on business playing a role in addressing what ails our world.  We’ll be using the UN Sustainable Development Goals as a template and learning how companies in the Southeast are addressing these needs.  We’re looking forward to another lively evening. Visit www.greencs.org for more info.

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Atlanta-based Boardwalk Capital Management is an independent Registered Investment Advisor specializing in Sustainable and Responsible Investing. Their principals have decades of combined financial experience, providing counsel to individuals and institutions all over the country. They offer both proprietary investment solutions, and premier third-party managed strategies, in order to meet the unique needs of each client. Certain principles transcend investment styles.  Boardwalk Capital Management firmly believes in the value of asset diversification, tax efficient management and full transparency. Learn more at https://www.boardwalkcm.com/. 

The Green Chamber of the South aims to bring together businesses and organizations across the Southeast to promote the growth, innovation and success of sustainability. Discover more at https://greencs.org/. 

The Georgia Social Impact Collaborative (GSIC) provides resources to connect, educate and inspire stakeholders for the purpose of accelerating the development of Georgia’s impact investing ecosystem. Recently, GSIC announced the launch of the Georgia Social Impact Map (the “Map”), an interactive platform designed to connect and educate stakeholders interested in accelerating impact investing for social outcomes. Intended as a resource for communities around the state, the Map connects new forms of capital to sustaining and scaling solutions to social challenges. GSIC also provides workshops and programming for training specific groups of stakeholders on ways to leverage impact investing to achieve their impact goals.