Greetings, Agents of Impact!
Welcome to ImpactAlpha’s weekly roundup of impact investing career moves, job openings, events and opportunities. Help the growing ImpactAlpha community follow your talent: Send job moves, mandates, event announcements and other news to [email protected].
An ImpactAlpha exclusive: “Ross Baird’s blueprint for local entrepreneurial revival”
– Dennis Price, editorial director
Agent of Impact
Ceniarth’s Diane Isenberg. “For me, the most responsible choice I can make is to abandon the need to make more money, while trying to preserve and recycle it to do future good,” Diane Isenberg wrote in ImpactAlpha last year. The founder and director of Ceniarth, her $400 million family office, staked out a provocative strategy that is proving appealing to other ultra-high net worth impact investors: Impact-First Capital Preservation. “If you are rich today and invest in a manner that generates deep impact, and returns your capital with a yield in line with inflation and reasonable expenses, you will still be rich tomorrow.” Last year, Ceniarth moved $40 million into 21 investments, including $32 million into the impact-first strategy, primarily to improve rural livelihoods through the production of additional income. Isenberg leads Ceniarth from rural Wales, where she, and her husband, ran a sheep farm and she worked as a teacher and with community organizations. Earlier, she worked in Bangladesh on family planning and maternal health. Her father, Eugene Isenberg, was the longtime CEO of Nabors Industries, one of the largest land and offshore oil and gas drillers. “I have the privilege of doing what I do because my father was very good at making money,” she says. “The choice is now mine, though, to use my capital to its highest impact.” Follow ImpactAlpha on Instagram.
- ICYMI: “How Ceniarth is seeking higher impact on rural livelihoods – while preserving its own capital”
How Ceniarth is seeking higher impact on rural livelihoods – while preserving its own capital
Seize the Opportunity
Impact Community Capital is hiring a controller in the San Francisco Bay Area… The Los Angeles Cleantech Incubator seeks a senior vice president of unlocking innovation… Unreasonable Group is looking for a global programs coordinator in Boulder, London, or anywhere… The Farm Animal Investment Risk and Return initiative, or FAIRR, is recruiting an ESG analyst and other roles in London… Kauffman Foundation’s Inclusion Open is seeking programs that remove barriers to starting and growing a business…
Veris Wealth Partners is hiring a chief operating officer in San Francisco and a senior wealth manager in New York… Blueprint Local is recruiting a director of investments in Washington DC, Baltimore, or Texas’ Austin-San Antonio corridor… Village Capital is looking for an impact metrics analyst in Washington DC… Total Impact seeks a senior associate in New York… Blended finance platform Convergence is hiring a managing director for the Americas.
Follow the Talent
Allie Burns is the new CEO of Village Capital, moving up from managing director. Victoria Fram continues to lead VilCap Investments, Village Capital’s venture fund. Ross Baird will remain on Village Capital’s board as he launches Blueprint Local (see above)… Jennifer Anderson and Nikita Singhal have joined Lazard Asset Management as co-heads of sustainable investment and ESG… Lara Metcalf, previously a fellow at MIT’s Engine fund, joins The Social Entrepreneurs’ Fund as managing director…
Ana Marie Argilagos of Hispanics in Philanthropy and Google AI’s Anand Babu join the board of Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors… Michaela Edwards, ex- of Norges Bank Investment Management, joins Capricorn Investment Group as a partner in New York… Stephen Priestley is the new managing director of funds and capital partnerships at the CDC (see, “Deeper, focused customer impact assessments can also deliver business value”)… HCAP Partners promotes Bhairvee Shavdia to senior associate.
Where to Be
The Reproductive Health Investors Alliance is hosting a venture fair featuring 10 reproductive health entrepreneurs in San Francisco Feb. 20.
Apply, Respond, Submit
Smart city accelerator Urban-X is accepting applications for its 6th cohort (see, “Urban-X graduates target city life and infrastructure”).
Get Smarter
Intelligent Impact, and the Blockchain Academy are hosting ‘AI and blockchain impact’ trainings Feb. 26 and 27 in Johannesburg and March 5 in Cape Town… Suzanne Biegel and Wharton Social Impact released the Project Sage 2.0 scan of gender lens private equity, venture and debt funds (see our fall preview: “More than two dozen new private gender-lens funds launched in 2018”). “Since we completed the research last summer, so many more great funds are on our radar,” Biegel says.
That’s a wrap! Help the growing ImpactAlpha community follow your talent: Send your own job moves, new opportunities and event announcements to [email protected].
