IDE, w1sd0m, Skoll World Forum, Oxford Jam, TedXVolcano..

WOW! I don’t know how it happened, but somehow life has conspired to effect collaboration on a global scale. Ride-sharing, couch-surfing, new communities and networks forming … its mind-boggling and unimaginably inspiring. Last week, Oxford UK became the nexus of global social entrepreneurialism – launching a phenomenon (with a little help from a volcano in Iceland) that feels as if it has irrevocably altered the landscape for social entrepreneurs, their projects, and the people they exist to serve.

I came to Oxford During the Skoll World Forum for Social Entrepreneurship on behalf of IDE – (International Development Enterprises), a 28 year old organization founded by Paul Polak. I was to meet the international board and discuss how IDE could achieve greater scale and impact by helping more people at the Bottom of the Pyramid (BOP) sustainably increase their income . We stayed at Corpus Christi college and enjoyed gorgeous days and intensive discussions with great minds. I managed to make it to OxfordJam for a breakfast about online collaboration platforms for Impact Investing – I could only stay for an hour, yet even in that brief period met an incredible group of people open to innovation and collaboration on a scale I’ve never before experienced.

The volcano had already erupted, but nobody paid it any mind till the conferences were over and we realized that we were stuck. So back to London we all went..

… and so now, a new community is being born that is coming together in an even deeper way.

Saturday there was a great Kiva event where people shared Kiva trivia, their own business ideas, and trains and bus trips to the south of France and other places were arranged.

Here’s a little video clip of Matt Flannery, Kiva C0-Founder, and Premal Shah, President:

After this fun trivia contest, Matt & Premal asked if anyone had an emerging company and would like to talk about it. I stood up and introduced w1sd0m, an emerging network that I’m helping to build as core team, that helps social & sustainable enterprises like IDE (For which it’s already opened a lot of doors) find the intellectual, human, social & financial capital they need.

Sunday was the first ever “TedXVolcano” organized by Nathanial Whittemore, Evan Grant & June Cohen. In 36 hours these rockstars brought together TED, TEDxLondon, The Hub, Sandbox Network, Newspepper.com, & Robert Leslie along with Skoll World Forum Speakers and other great minds such as Matthew Bishop, Jim Hornthal, Gary Bolles, Peter Greenberg, Elizabeth Lindsey and musician Shesheela Raman.. Click here for the story of how they did it..

One of my favorite moments was when Jeff Skoll read his volcano poem:

Jeff Skoll’s volcano poem

Monday afternoon, Suzanne Biegel, social venture investor and “catalyst at large” (i love her title!) and Dr. Audrey Selian of Rianta Capital organized some action-takers from the Friday OxfordJam breakfast who have built collaboration and connection platforms for impact investors and social entrepreneurs. Socential, Artha, ClearlySo, Nexii, Sasix, Gexsi along with w1sd0m were there to talk about ways to collaborate in an efficient way and eliminate waste of resources for entrepreneurs, and the networks themselves.

Another networking event after this meeting led to even more fascinating conversations over dinner with Jill Finlayson & Jason Clark of SocialEdge, Lora O’Connor of Citizenglobal.com, Cathy Clark who runs the Center for the Advancement of Social Entrepreneurship (CASE) program at Duke, Suzanne Biegel, Sean Holt, David Green (Solar World for All), and others.

Waking up this morning I’m slammed with all of the ideas, people, and inspiration swirling in my head. I don’t even need coffee!

As much as being ’stranded’ in London would be viewed by many as disastrous, the remarkable thing about this exceptional group of people is that, when faced with no other options, they simply turned lemons into lemonade. For the past ten days, due in no small part to the intercession of the very earth so many are working to save, some of the most brilliant minds and open hearts in the world have come together to talk, to dance, to celebrate – and most importantly of all, to find new ways of working together (as the Buddhists would say) in service to all beings.

I’m grateful and honored and humbled to have been invited to engage with these people, at this time, in this way.

I was recently retained to help Touchpoint Trust Group find 75 Triple Bottom Line (TBL) deals to review by January 22. That means, these companies have put PEOPLE and PLANET on the same level of importance of PROFIT. I’m speaking to incredible human beings about their work EVERY DAY, and I can’t wipe the smile off my face.

The Innovative Lilith I4C Campaign is a partnership with Sarah McLaughlin and the Lilith Fair, and TouchPoint! Trust Group. The goal is to select 4-6 ’social enterprises’ or ‘people, planet, profit’ businesses to receive an investment and major promotion around the Lilith Fair, in June.  The selected companies will actually go ON TOUR with the Lilith Fair and the huge audience will learn about their business, and how they are changing lives.

Great story about this project here.

A little background on how I got here..

When I visited my friend Chandra Reddy Metzler during her Fullbright appointment in Nairobi, Kenya, in 2000, I was first introduced to micro-finance, micro-health and NGOs. I was incredibly inspired by the model, and it made an impression for the future when I would get introduced to the work of Acumen Fund.

I was head of fundraising at Acumen Fund in 2004 and 2005 and was more immersed than ever in the idea of ’social enterprise’ and ’social entrepreneurship’. I had dreamed about business models which generated social change before, but to see this group of MBAs, who could have been making a fortune in banking, putting their heads together to solve the world’s social problems.

I had a very successful time at Acumen Fund, and have been interested in the ‘Triple Bottom Line”  (TBL) space since then. To that end, in addition to this project, I recently joined the core team of w1sd0m, a network that connects entrepreneurs, investors and advisors in this industry.

You can do something too!

Please connect with the I4C Campaign on Twitter, and Facebook, and spread the word!!

I’ve heard all kinds of stories about the new moon, the blue moon, and the lunar eclipse, and how powerful the night of new years eve would be this year.

Apparently whether you believe these things or not, what you thought of on New Years Eve is a big part of what your life will become in the next 2 years. You will be able to manifest the plans you set forth on New Years Eve.

So, I was at a great New Year’s party at my very good friend’s home with about 60 other people celebrating the coming year together.  I stepped outside to look at the moon, alone, at one point in the night, very late. I took a deep breath and put out what I wanted to manifest in the next 2 years.

Now, on January 4, the first work day of the year, It’s already happening. I mean HAPPENING. I am on the biggest rollercoaster ride I’ve ever been on. (I LOVE rollercoasters and screaming my head off!)

First, I found out one of the businesses I’m doing is about to implode and fall apart. Then, I found a new one to plug my existing partners into which is a much better opportunity and more legitimate in every way. Baggage, negative thing gone. New, valid and big opportunity presents itself.

Then, I find out that an idea in the Social Entrepreneurship space that I presented to a friend and colleague 3 weeks ago has taken off and we are going to have major backing for our project, and kick it off TOMORROW.

And on top of that, I have meetings tomorrow with two major social enterprises / Triple Bottom Line organizations based in Colorado. IDE and I4C.  They are going to lead to big projects in this area, which is where I’m being pulled in a BIG WAY in the last couple weeks of the year, and now 2010 is kicking in HARD to show me the way..

So folks it looks like this blog is going to have quite a few updates and announcements coming… and coming… and coming!

Stay tuned!

The Angel Capital Summit was a pet project of mine over the summer and in the fall. I worked with Investor and Advisor Partners to help them get the word out about the event, which was intended to bring together a community of entrepreneurs, advisors, investors, and service providers.  It was a buzz of excitement and the energy was high.

190 Entrepreneurs submitted their deals and applications to present, and 40 companies were selected. mShopper, the company I co-founded with  my husband David Gould, was one of the companies and I found out later was one of the highest-rated deals. Exciting stuff!

mShopper, although it is a mobile app company, has an element of ‘giving back’ and social consciousness . When you purchase a product through mShopper, you can save from 10-40%, and then we suggest that you give some of that savings back to charity as you are checking out with your mobile shopping cart.

Of the 40 companies selected to present, HALF qualified as sustainable/green/social businesses. How Awesome is that!!?? Colorado is becoming a hub for social entrepreneurs.

I’ll be reviewing each of the other companies that I came across that day, and since the event. One that I want to focus on for the purpose of this post is “EVERYWUN“.

I was lucky enough to be invited to meet with the founder, Dan Jacobs, and his very talented partner/fiance Eve Cowen, last week.

In addition to Dan and Eve, I was in the company of some other brilliant social entrepreneurs, committed to be world-changing activators of social consciousness applied to business models. We had the most exhilarating, deep, intellectual conversation which was so incredibly refreshing. Passionate, brilliant people.

We spoke about Everywun and how it could work with a new project we’re working on called W1sd0m. More about W1sd0m later…

Everywun has made it possible for you to give to charity just by taking actions on the internet via social media. Just by placing a badge on your blog (as I have one here), or facebook, or signing up for the newsletter, and telling friends, you get ‘credits’, and then you can choose what to do with your ‘credits’.

Here’s a little blurb about everywun and SIGN UP! PASS IT ON! world changin’ is on its way…
I recently joined an incredible new website called, Everywun.com. By having businesses sponsor advertising, they enable people to take fun, easy, cost-free actions on behalf of charities.

One of the easiest actions I can take is to enable my network of friends and family to do the same! Every person who joins will automatically receive 100 “Everywun credits” that can go towards planting a tree, feeding children, or donating books! If you use my personal invitation link provided below, I’ll also receive 100 credits to plant a tree!

Please remember to click on the unique URL below or I won’t get credit!

http://www.everywun.com/signup?i=3258088