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REDF in the News 1996 - 1999
ABCNews.com
Tech Workers Turn to Charity Published in 1999 “Rubicon Bakery is a living example of the kind of project favored by the new philanthropists... The Roberts Enterprise Development Fund...has supported the bakery for years. ‘What they’ve done is taken a long-term equity partnership with us,’ says Rick Aubry, executive director of Rubicon Programs. ‘They’re not just going to give us a grant for a year or two and expect it all to work out.” Newsweek: Careers 2000
When You’re the Boss Published December 1999 Harvard Business Review
Philanthropy’s New Agenda: Creating Value Published November/December 1999 “Working closely with its grantee Rubicon Programs, REDF developed 25 criteria that not only measure the success of job-training programs but also help Rubicon to manage the programs more effectively. In addition to the most obvious criteria — changes in employment stability, wages, and job skills — REDF and Rubicon found that related factors such as substance abuse and even qualitative factors such as the trainees’ own assessments of their success in reaching personal goals were all meaningful measures of outcomes the program was trying to achieve” The New York Times
PERSONAL BUSINESS: Lending His Name, and Tools, to Charity Published October 3, 1999 Wired
Nonprofit Motive Published September 1999 “We’re kind of the lunatic fringe of venture philanthropy, taking financial metrics and applying them in the social sector,’ says Jed Emerson. The Roberts fund recently hired a full-time financial analyst from J.P. Morgan to help build models for determining what Emerson calls ‘social return on investment.’ ‘We basically view all of our philanthropy as a form of investment,’ Emerson says. ‘We want to kow what impact it has.” Leader to Leader
Leadership of the Whole: The Emerging Power of Social Entrepreneurship Published Summer 1999 By REDF’s Jed Emerson “Historically, leaders of a movement were recognized as leaders largely by their individual vision and ability to work across regions and borders... However, it appears that this kind of national leadership of movement is fading... In a globalized society...regional voices will set the national agenda... The new leader’s value will be found in the spirit of their words, their ability to inspire others to join the parade, and their ability to bring cool water — in the form of new resources — to those who march. It is a new role for those used to competing for a single spotlight.” The Grantsmanship Center Magazine
Generating Income from Customers and Clients Published Summer 1999 Sidebar: Nonprofit Business Ventures: Getting Started “If you’re seriously interested in educating yourself about the whys, wherefores (and why-nots) of nonprofit business creation, the best place to start is The Social Entrepreneur’s Resource Page on the World Wide Web: www.redf.org. It’s a project of The Roberts Enterprise Development Fund, which supports selected nonprofit business ventures and disseminates evaluative studies of their successes and failures.” Harvard Business School: Social Enterprise People & Practices
Social Enterprise Club on a Mission Published Spring/Summer 1999 “George Roberts...spoke on ‘Investing in Social Enterprise’ to a standing-room only gathering of students, alumni, and faculty. Roberts was joined by Jed Emerson.” The Chronicle of Philanthropy
Cheers and Challenges Published May 6, 1999 “Jed Emerson...provided one of the more entertaining moments of the conference when he used the metaphor of marriage to describe the relationship between grant maker and grantee necessitated by so-called venture philanthropy. ‘Classical funding is to dating as venture philanthropy is to marriage,’ Mr. Emerson said.“ His implication was that venture philanthropy, like marriage, has tremendous rewards — but that a lot of grant makers might want to think long and hard before deciding to take the plunge.” Harvard Business School (HARBUS)
George Roberts Inspires During Visit Published April 5, 1999 “George Roberts is a man who believes in innovation. After making a fortune breaking new ground on Wall Street...his ideas are now quietly transforming social enterprise in San Francisco. ‘By the early ’80s, I was financially secure enough to want to give back some of what I’d enjoyed to the community. But I wanted to do something that would make a difference to people, something that wouldn’t get done if I didn’t do it,’ he explained. ‘Three to four percent of people in the U.S. aren’t taken care of by the private enterprise system. They’re the people who didn’t go to school, who can’t get up on time or who have problems with substance abuse. There’s a much higher cost to creating jobs in the part of the economy — and businesses employing such people aren’t going to be able to compete and be 100% self-sufficient.’ ‘I wanted to bring some of the lessons of the private sector, like accountability and holding people responsible to the world of philanthropy,’ explains Roberts, ‘so we basically analyze, we invest, and we monitor.’ Roberts is optimistic about the future — for the sector and his fund. ‘What you’ll see over the next ten to fifteen years is people who have been successful in their 40s and 50s wanting to give something back.’ But he stresses there is no simple model to copy. ‘What’s important is the mix — of private expertise and money, and social problems — that’s what provides the power. Our early results are good. But you really need history to make an assessment of how effective you’ve been. You need to be able to track what happens to people once they’ve left your employment. What we want to do next is grow, add staff, and help make sure that others who try this sort of thing don’t have to make the same mistakes that we did.” Worth Magazine
Venture Philanthropy Published February 1999 REDF featured “Roberts is often asked why, if the goal is to train and employ the virtually unemployable, he doesn’t just support job-training programs in conventional existing businesses? His answer is that nonprofit service organizations are better suited to assist the working homeless because their managers are far more familiar with the myriad personal and psychological problems their employees face.” The Chronicle of Philanthropy
Press Clippings: Worth: Investor Finances Charity Businesses Published January 28, 1999 “The financier George Roberts had one requirement when he decided to step up his philanthropy in the late 1980’s: ‘What I was looking for was something that wouldn’t be done if we didn’t do it.’ he told Worth magazine (February). Mr. Roberts says he is now undertaking a review of how well his approach has worked, but he told the magazine he believes one key to success has been the nonprofit groups, which he says understand how to help people deal with personal and psychological problems better than business-run training programs.” Bridge News
CMaking Sure Your Charitable Dollars Go To Work: Five Tips for Making Donations that Make a Difference Published December 29, 1998 Commentary by REDF’s Jed Emerson “...when it comes to charitable gifts, many Americans invest without a strategy or in-depth understanding of where their dollars are going... The following five tips can help. 1. Act on your commitment to become an informed investor. 2. View each gift as part of a linked strategy of support within a single area of interest. 3. Ask for accountability. Donors should look for measures of impact, not process. 4. Invest for the long term. 5. If you are a parent, mentor your own future ‘fund managers.” The Washington Post
A LOOK AT...The New Philanthropy: Targeting the Cash Published December 13, 1998 “Jed Emerson: ‘With the high degree of wealth creation that has taken place recently, there are individuals who, having become successful in the for-profit community through the use of their business skills, are now looking to have the same degree of impact through the application of those skills to their philanthropic activities. These folks represent a new type of player in the ‘nonprofit capital market’ and they are demanding a level of accountability and involvement not seen before in the sector. This means donors are asking recipients to track and document social return on investment, and viewing their gifts not simply as isolated donations, but as part of a philanthropic portfolio being managed in order to achieve certain stated objectives.” The Christian Science Monitor
A Businesslike Approach to Helping the Homeless Published October 7, 1998 REDF featured “...The Roberts Foundation has zeroed in on a formula that seems to be working. The enterprises it funds, to the tune of several million dollars a year, are modeled after private-sector start-ups, though dedicated to alleviating social problems. ‘We’re trying to harness a free-enterprise approach to addressing social issues,’ says Jed Emerson... In the past year, the businesses have put more than 300 homeless people to work. ’...few nonprofits have attempted to build businesses around the homeless. As such, The Roberts Foundation ‘is definitely a bright light,’ says [Chris] Denniston [of Community Wealth Ventures].” The San Francisco Chronicle
Wanted: New Hires/Firms Find Talent Among Disabled, Welfare Recipients Published October 6, 1998 “For a lot of folks on the margins of the labor market, the main issue is not whether they can get a job, but whether they can keep it,’ added Jed Emerson... ‘A lot of support is needed because excitement about the initial placement wears off after a few weeks,’ Emerson added. ‘Child care, transportation and other problems can make everything unravel.” The NonProfit Times
The NPT Power and Influence Top 50 Published August 1998 Jed Emerson named as one of the Top 50 people “leading and causing shifts in the third sector” “[Jed] Emerson leads one of the most forward, foundation-based, venture capital organizations. The organization seeks to marry venture capital with the concept of “virtuous capital.” The Roberts Enterprise Development Fund recognizes the difference between financial risk exposure and organizational risk.” The Chronicle of Philanthropy
Nonprofit Pay Scales: Getting What We Deserve Published July 30, 1998 Opinion piece by REDF’s Jed Emerson “A commitment to community and economic justice should not mean a willingness to be paid substantially less than those who do similar work at for-profit companies. The time has come to surrender the notion of the glamour of poverty that we have held so long. However, before nonprofit staff...crusade for higher salaries, they should be aware that with the advocacy of increased compensation comes something else from the for-profit world: increased accountability.” National Public Radio (NPR)
Social Entrepreneurs Published in May 26, 1998 partial transcript “ARNOLD: There’s another type of social entrepreneurship out there where the nonprofit is actually running a money-making business...social entrepreneurship in its various forms is spreading around the country, and Jed Emerson with The Roberts Foundation thinks it’s largely a good thing that the walls between business and nonprofits are being breached. EMERSON: Before, when business was evil and bad and Satan incarnate, social workers wouldn’t want to have anything to do with corporates downtown or even the small business people in their own community. And I think what’s represented by the evolution of new social entrepreneurs is in fact individuals who can play both sides for the common good. ” The Grantsmanship Center Magazine
Business Ventures for Nonprofits — Finding the Right Legal Structure Published Winter 1997 This article originally appeared in New Social Entrepreneurs: The Success, Challenge and Lessons of Nonprofit Enterprise Creation, published by REDF and available in the Publications Section. Inc.
The State of Small Business 1997: Crossover Published Winter 1997 “The Roberts Foundation...recently published a book of case studies called New Social Entrepreneurs. ‘Finally, people are realizing that we have to rethink not how to raise money but how to make use of the resources in our communities,’ says Jed Emerson, author of The Roberts Foundation’s case study book. ‘People are talking not about charitable contributions but about how to bring added economic value to the interaction between nonprofits and the communities in which they work.’ ‘I’m a big fan of failure,’ says...Emerson, who approaches funding nonprofits more like a venture capitalist than a typical foundation officer. ‘People involved in funding start-ups will tell you that out of every 10 launches, they’ll get two really successful efforts, two that are complete failures, and the rest in the middle — the walking wounded. When a for-profit fails, it’s viewed as a learning experience, an investment in intellectual capital. But when a nonprofit manager fails? It scars the person for life. We try to help the nonprofits adopt the private sector’s attitude.” Buffalo News
Seminar Focuses on Jobs for Needy Published November 14, 1997 REDF featured “[Jed] Emerson set forth a new set of rules for nonprofits, which he came up with after dealing with the successes and failures of nonprofit entrepreneurial ventures. [His rules include getting] a patient funding source for the venture, since it can take three to five years before the business makes a profit; [and hiring] a qualified business manager.” Business First — Columbus
Lecture Details How Nonprofits Can Benefit from Business Savvy Published October 10, 1997 “Today, [Jed] Emerson heads a foundation that [George] Roberts funds, committed to creating businesses to employ the homeless and the poor. Emerson said Roberts‘ interest reflects what social entrepreneurism is all about. ‘It’s business people expert in the free enterprise system partnering with nonprofits,’ said Emerson. ‘...We’re looking at different ways (nonprofits) can make themselves more effective in work and not rely on grants.” Entrepreneurial Nonprofit Leader
Famous Last Words of Failed Social Entrepreneurs Published May 1997 This article originally appeared in New Social Entrepreneurs: The Success, Challenge and Lessons of Nonprofit Enterprise Creation, published by REDF and available in the Publications Section. The Chronicle of Philanthropy
Putting Charities in Business Published October 3, 1996 featuring HEDF, predecessor of REDF “For people to get out of difficult situations in life, they have to have hope,’ says Mr. Roberts. ‘And the best way to give a person hope is to give them a job.’ Over the last seven years, The Roberts Foundation has spent more than $4.5 million to help nonprofit organizations in the San Francisco Bay Area establish profitable businesses that have put hundreds of needy people to work.” Shelterforce
Moving Toward the Market Published September/October 1996 by REDF’s Jed Emerson “Clearly, the future holds great risks for all nonprofit managers, enterprise and non-enterprise alike. However, the rewards of pursuing an entrepreneurial approach to social issues are great and, in many ways less risky than simply ‘staying the course,’ as some would have us do. To grow a venture that supports itself, creates jobs for people long considered ‘unemployable,’ and kicks off money to help cover program costs can be an incredible, empowering experience for all involved.” The Grantsmanship Center Magazine
Business Ventures on the Web Published Summer 1996 “While most nonprofits initiate business ventures for the purpose of generating new revenue, some have other goals as well. One of the most important of these is to provide work opportunities for the people they serve... Examples of these enterprises have been assembled under the rubric of Homeless Economic Development Fund (HEDF).” |
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