On November 16, the Yale School of Management Net Impact Club presented the third annual Philanthropy Conference. Conference co-chairs, Seanne Hanke and Sheryl Linsky, both of the class of 2009, did an admirable job of organizing this year’s conference, which attracted an audience of approximately 80 students and professionals.

Dean Podolny kicked off the day with remarks that firmly established the tie between the conference and SOM’s mission to educate leaders for business and society.

Opening speaker Courtney Bourns from Grantmakers for Effective Organizations (GEO) introduced discussion on the conference theme, “Achieving Effectiveness in Philanthropy.” While it is normally the role of funders to demand more accountability from grantees, GEO analyzes how funders themselves can change their practices and evaluate themselves to better support the effectiveness of their grantees and thus to enable more positive change. Ms. Bourns description of GEO’s findings was a fitting start to the day of thought-provoking discussion.

Seven panels covered topics such as innovative models for philanthropy, funder/grantee relationships, and measuring impact. SOM alumni played prominent roles. Tim Walter, SOM’90, and Renee Jacob, SOM’00, were featured panelists, while Nancy Raybin, SOM’79, Michela English, SOM’79, and Cheryl Casciani, SOM’88, ably moderated.

The theme of democratization of philanthropy, discussed in one of the morning panels, was picked up by the keynote speaker, Charles Best, founder and CEO of DonorsChoose.org and Yale College Class of 1998 alumnus. DonorsChoose.org is an online nonprofit that allows people to donate directly toward the purchase of classroom materials needed by public school teachers. Mr. Best described DonorsChoose.org successful attempts to harness the power of the Internet to raise awareness about inequities in education and to encourage philanthropy among people who do not consider themselves to be philanthropists. Their Blogger Challenge is an innovative way that DonorsChoose.org has been able to reach the “long tail” of values connected individuals. With a personal style and manner more befitting an online mogul than a nonprofit executive, Mr. Best confided that DonorsChoose.org — while the darling of Internet-entrepreneur philanthropists like Jeff Skoll and Bezos — has been less than successful at attracting the attention of more traditional foundations. A lively discussion ensued between Mr. Best and the audience.

Please visit the conference website to read more about the panel discussions and to get involved in next year’s event.

By Juliana Koo, SOM’06

Nonprofit healthcare managers often feel conflicted about charging a price for their goods or services, especially when clients’ immediate health and welfare are at stake. On one hand, it is often the case that their target client population is poor, and placing an additional financial burden on poor people feels wrong. On the other hand, there is evidence that clients do not use donated products appropriately, resulting in lower impact of nonprofit managers’ time and investments. Here is a case where the right decision may feel completely wrong.

In her PONPO seminar on September 18, Nava Ashraf (Assistant Professor of Business Administration, Harvard Business School) presented a report of a field study that she conducted in Zambia with two colleagues to sort through the factors that affect a client’s use of a product based on whether and how much she pays for it. If it is true that pricing boosts usage, Ashraf contends that there are two potential reasons. It may be that prices screen in people who want to use the product, resulting in a higher proportion of users among the purchasers. She calls this the screening effect. It may also be that paying actually has a psychological effect that induces use.

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By Ivy Washington, SOM’09

On October 29 through 31, more than ninety child welfare professionals from all over the country gathered in the GM Room to create plans to optimize systems in government agencies with the support of non-profits and for-profits to improve the efficiency of human services. Daniel Stein, SOM’87, co-founder of Stewards of Change, the organization that arranged this conference, attended his 20th SOM reunion in October and was delighted to be holding this third annual conference at SOM.

This year’s conference was called InterOptimability: Human Services 2.0: Preparing Child Welfare for the 21st Century. Mr. Stein’s opening remarks on Monday set the tone of thinking broadly about possibilities and about commonalities by noting the presence of representatives from disparate groups including practitioners, policy-makers, think tanks, and technology businesses.

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By Nikki Huvelle, SOM’07

On February 16, 2007, The Yale School of Management Education Club, The Yale Law School Project on Law and Education at Yale, and the Program for Social Enterprise co-sponsored the Yale Education Leadership Conference.

Over 130 participated in discussions of educational inequity and the role of leadership in addressing this problem. The day brought together people from nonprofits, foundations, policy institutes, school districts, charter schools, the private sector, universities, graduate programs, and Yale College to share their thoughts, knowledge and experience in this area. The highlight of the conference was the panel discussions featuring leaders in the field from around the country. Many alums from The Yale School of Management, The Yale Law School and Yale College participated on the panel discussions with other influential members of the education reform movement.

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On Friday, February 9^th, 2007, the Yale SOM Economic Development Club hosted its 8^th Annual Economic Development Conference. Attended by more than seventy-five students, alumni, and distinguished guests, this year’s conference, Trends in Economic Development, focused on community and international development.

Professor Sharon Oster gave an introductory address and was followed the keynote address by Namrita Kapur, SOM ’97, Vice President of Finance, Development & Planning at EcoLogic Finance. Kapur gave an inspiring talk on small and medium enterprise development in Latin America and Africa.

Preceeding Ms. Kapur’s address, the first panel discussion focused on the current state of community development and featured Brandon Birdwell, YLS’07; Nora Bloch, SOM’98, of Wainwright Bank & Trust Co.; and Malcolm Bush of the Woodstock Institute.

The second panel included remarks by David Browning, SOM’99, of Technoserve; Lara Puglielli, SOM’96, of Catholic Relief Services; and Donald Terry, YC’68, of the Inter-American Development Bank.

The Economic Development Club would like to thank all of the speakers and volunteers who made the event another great success. The conference was made possible by the generous donation of the Sidney Gross Memorial Community Economic Development Fund.

By Hannah Grannemann-Isaac, SOM’08

On March 30, the Arts and Culture Club sponsored a trip to Long Wharf Theatre, a professional non-profit theater in New Haven, that included a discussion, tour and performance.

Seven SOM students met with Joan Channick, Managing Director, and Josh Borenstein, Associate Managing Director, for a discussion of Long Wharf’s strategy and operations. Both Channick and Borenstein hold Masters Degrees in Theater Management from Yale School of Drama. Channick is on the faculty of the School of Drama, where she teaches a course on law and the arts. (She also holds a law degree from the University of Pennsylvania.)

Our discussion ranged from the payment structures of actors and playwrights to the impact of programming decisions on the organization. Along with non-profit theaters nationwide, Long Wharf Theatre must work hard to attract new audiences and adapt to changing ticket buying habits. Channick and Borenstein spoke at length about the financial and operational challenges the theater faces as it tries to support new work while maintaining or growing ticket revenue. Said Sheryl Linsky, SOM’08, of the presentation, “My greatest insight came from Joan’s frank discussion of the trade-offs necessary between customer and management interests. It was fascinating to hear the strategies theatres are implementing as earned income becomes scarcer.”

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By Fawzia Ahmed, SOM’07

The Program on Social Enterprise collaborated with Stewards of Change (co-founded by Daniel Stein, SOM ’87) to co-host a conference for child welfare professionals, “Technological Innovation: Creating the New Child Welfare Business Model.” The theme of this year’s conference, which took place at the Yale School of Management from November 13th to 15th, focused specifically on technological innovations that could be applied to improving child welfare services and outcomes.

Speakers spanned multiple sectors with the expectation that technologies used in other areas, such as in healthcare, education or the courts, could spur ideas for uses in child welfare. Panel participants included: Terrie Gray from Pearson Learning and PowerSchools, who discussed innovations in K-12 student information systems; Phil Longman from the New America Foundation, who discussed the development of medical records in the Veterans Administration hospitals; and David Schwartz from Q-linx, Inc., who discussed neural networks and their applicability in predictive analytics to assist in identifying children at risk.

Yale SOM professors also gave talks helping to spur ideas. Barry Nalebuff ran a session on creative problem solving, based on his book Why Not?, while Sharon Oster discussed technological innovations across sectors, and K. Sudhir talked about the uses of predictive analytics in marketing.

By the end of the conference, participants had drawn up long lists of ideas on poster boards surrounding the GM Room at the Yale School of Management. These ideas were the culmination of brainstorming sessions in which they debated how to import and adapt technological innovations for child welfare. Stewards of Change will use these ideas as a springboard for further research, and the professionals involved in the conference will take them back to their agencies.

More about Stewards of Change

The Program on Social Enterprise is sponsoring a number of events in winter-spring 2007.

Yale Education Leadership Conference. The SOM Education Club will present a conference on February 16, 2007 with the Project for Law and Education at the Yale Law School. Our featured speakers include Wendy Kopp, Founder of Teach for America; Dacia Toll, Founder of Achievement First; and Kristen Kane, COO, New York City Department of Education. Registration is open to all. Register now!

Global Social Venture Competition. SOM is hosting a regional final round of judging for this international business plan competition for MBA students starting new social ventures. The regional final will take place on March 30, 2007, and is an event open to all. Details.

PONPO Seminar Series. The PONPO seminars are a series of presentations and discussions on international and indigenous non-governmental organizations. Their main objective continues to be to map current research in the field. Winter-spring 2007 presenters include: Francesca Cornelli (London School of Business), Alex Mintz (Texas A&M University), Jonathan Morduch (New York University), and David Lewis (London School of Economics).

On Management Series. Chuck Slaughter, ‘85 BA, ‘90 MPPM. February 7, 11:45 a.m., GM Room.
Having founded TravelSmith Outfitters in 1991, Chuck built it into the #1 brand in travel wear with over 2 million customers and $100 million in gross sales. After selling TravelSmith, he created the Charles Slaughter and Molly West Fund, and currently divides his time between his work on poverty alleviation and healthcare in the developing world and his interests in advising and investing in consumer companies. Details.

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By Jessica Smith, SOM’07

The 2006 Future of Philanthropy Conference was a full-day series of speaker panels which exposed students to executives with unique perspectives on innovations in philanthropy.

The keynote speaker, Mary Ellen Iskenderian, SOM’86, President and CEO of Women’s World Banking, reflected on the conference theme, innovations shaping the landscape of tomorrow. Her expertise in microfinance allowed students to gain a firsthand account of its progress and challenges. Opening speaker Professor Claire Gaudiani of the Heyman Center for Philanthropy and Fundraising at New York University reminded the audience how powerful a force philanthropy has been throughout history and charted a course for its future development.

Five panel discussions addressed a wide range of topics:

• A common theme among presenters was the importance of collaboration between the for-profit and non-profit sectors. This cross-sector partnership was the focal point in the Corporate Social Responsibility panel, which featured Charles Adams from CARE and Rick Peyser from Green Mountain Coffee.
• The International Development panel, featuring Professor Gus Ranis and Nicky Newton-King, Yale World Fellow and Deputy CEO, Johannesburg Stock Exchange, stood as an example of SOM’s interaction with the larger Yale community.
• A full showing from the art community was represented on the Funding in the Arts panel, including Nicole Chevalier, Termaine Foundation; Robert Marx, Fan Fox and Leslie Samuels Foundation; Jane Christie, Neighborhood Music School; and Usha Pasi, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.
• Yee-Ann Cho, SOM’99, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation; Peter Lavigne, Rivers Foundation; and Nancy Yedlin, Donaghue Foundation on the Philanthropy 101 panel highlighted philanthropy basics. Audience members were able to learn of the diversity of the inner workings of each foundation.
• Shari Berenbach, Calvert Foundation; Paul Connolly, SOM’91, TCC Group; Maria Gavris, Bank of America; and Susanne Salerno, Fidelity Charitable Services discussed how philanthropic investment can have the most impact on the future of philanthropy.

Grown from a student-sparked concept into a student-lead success, this conference fully represented the SOM mission: educating leaders for business and society and embodies the accountability spirit of SOM.

On September 20, John Weiser SOM’84 presented his new book, Untapped: Creating Value in Underserved Markets. This book is a practical guide for managers on how to buy from, hire from, and sell to underserved markets in ways that create benefits for corporations and communities alike. While previous books have touted business opportunities in underserved markets, Untapped outlines the specific strategies necessary to turn this business concept into a detailed business model.

More on John Weiser | More about Untapped