Jed Emerson, senior fellow at ImpactAssets, a nonprofit financial services firm, has played founder roles with some of the nation’s leading impact investing, venture philanthropy, community venture capital and social enterprises. Since 2010, he has served as senior strategic advisor to five family offices located around the world with over $1.4 billion in total assets, each executing 100 percent impact/ sustainable investment strategies with their total net worth.
Author of numerous articles and papers, Emerson is coauthor of the first book on impact investing (and winner of the 2012 Nautilus Gold Book Award), Impact Investing: Transforming How We Make Money While Making a Difference as well as coauthor of The Impact Investor: Lessons in Leadership and Strategy for Collaborative Capitalism.
He has also coauthored/edited three books on social entrepreneur- ship. Originator of the concept of Blended Value, Emerson has presented at The World Economic Forum (Davos, Switzerland), The Clinton Global Initiative (New York City), The Skoll World Forum (Oxford, England) and professional meetings around the world. He serves as Chief Impact Strategist for ImpactAssets, a nonprofit financial services firm. He served as Associate Fellow with the Said Business School at Oxford University (2015– 16), a non-resident Senior Fellow with the Center for Social Investment, Heidelberg University (Germany) and has held faculty appointments with Harvard, Stanford and Oxford business schools.
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Tim Freundlich, President of ImpactAssets, is an innovator of financial instruments for impact investing. Over nearly the last 20 years, he served 12 at Calvert Foundation, helping to build the $250 million Calvert Community Investment Note ($1 billion cumulatively invested into hundreds of nonprofits and for profits globally). While there he conceived of and launched the prototype of the Giving Fund – now a $300+ million impact investment-based donor advised fund that was spun out as ImpactAssets in 2011, which he co-founded and serves as President. Additionally, he co-founded and serves on the management board of Good Capital, which is the General Partner of the Social Enterprise Expansion Fund LP and has co-founded two social enterprises, the SOCAP Conferences and ImpactHUB SF, Berkeley, NYC and DC; co-working, collaboration and community spaces for more than 2,000 social entrepreneurs, and part of a global network of 85 ImpactHUBs across five continents with 20,000 members. He received a BA from Wesleyan University with a major in Film, an Executive MBA from the University of San Francisco, and lives in San Francisco with his better half Julie, and sons, Milo and Gus.
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Brad Harrison, of Tiedemann Wealth Management, worked previously with Threshold Group, helping foundations, endowments, and non profit organizations to align their investments with their mission. He developed the firm’s scientific approach to low-carbon portfolio management and leads the environmental impact strategy focusing on clean-technology, forestry, agriculture, and fisheries. In addition, he built and leads a place-based investment platform which seeks to drive investments within the themes of sustainable environments, equitable communities, and responsible economies to advance community-centric outcomes. Prior to Threshold Group, Harrison worked at Ecotrust Forest Management, a regionally-focused forest investment management firm, and Green Building Services, a sustainable development consulting firm. He earned a bachelor’s degree in Applied Economics and Management from Cornell University and master’s degree in Environmental Management from Yale University.
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Amy Hartzler, Founder of Do Good Better, provides marketing and communications for organizations and leaders trying to do good, better. After an early chapter in academic publishing (Duke University Press) she moved to Washington, D.C., establishing deep roots in the local creative communications scene. For the past five years her focus has been on translating and marketing the many ways that capital can be used to tangibly create the world we want. That has included campaigns focused on positive impact investing, including work with the Calvert Foundation, naming, launching and supporting Ours To Own and Age Strong. Both Initiatives welcome investors starting at $20 through the online platform Vested.org, and have deployed a combined $55 million of community-directed capital in 2.5 yrs. More recently, she partnered with the Business Alliance of Local Living Economies (BALLE) to help them better reflect, connect and activate its community of highly effective local and regional economic leaders — from Fellows, investors and entrepreneurs to leaders within anchor institutions and philanthropy. Her framing drives their Local Economy Framework, eight strategies to build healthy, equitable local economies. For seven years she led the Washington, D.C. office for Oakland-based Free Range, developing brand and campaign strategy services, leading major campaigns and contributing to the book, Winning the Story Wars: Why Those Who Tell – and Live – the Best Stories will Rule the Future (Harvard Business Review Press) by Jonah Sachs. Amy grew up in a midwestern, bipartisan, multi-faith home. She is based in Washington, D.C., where she serves as Brand Director for the D.C. Department of Funk Funk Parade, and Board Chair for the sponsoring nonprofit All One City. She loves to host, walk, listen, question assumptions, and meet new people.
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Jennifer Kenning, Co-Founder of Align, serves as an independent impact advisor to asset owners. In collaboration with advisors, Align aims to increase the effectiveness and alignment of philanthropic grants, impact investments and mission-related investments. Kenning was named “40 under 40” for InvestmentNews in 2014, a finalist for “Rising Star for Family Wealth” report and selected for Private Asset Management’s “50 Most Influential Women in Private Wealth” 2016. Kenning sits on the industry advisory board for the Center for High Impact Philanthropy, Wharton Social Impact Initiative and Tara Health Foundation joint project aligning investors interests in improving the lives of women. She has a BBA degree in finance and BA in economics from the Southern Methodist University and graduated cum laude. She finished her accounting certificate at UCLA and holds a Series 65 license.
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Sara Olsen is the founder of SVT Group, “your outsourced Chief Impact Officer,” an impact management firm that provides investors, companies and social enterprises support to measure, manage and communicate their social and environmental impact (e.g., theory of change, impact metrics, impact IT systems onboarding and support, retrospective impact analyses and more). A pioneer in the social capital markets, Olsen and SVT’s team of subject- matter experts have measured the social and environmental value of approximately $9.08 billion in private equity, debt and grants in dozens of countries and issue areas. Recent clients include Yo Yo Ma, Restore the Earth Foundation, Fair Trade USA, Global Fund for Women, Beneficial State Bank, and CalPERS’ Environmental Investment Advisor.
Olsen has been recognized twice as one of America’s Most Promising Social Entrepreneurs by Bloomberg Businessweek for her work defining the impact management discipline. She is a founding board member of Social Value United States, and an adjunct faculty member at Middlebury Institute of International Studies and Hult International Business School. There and in collaboration with SVT clients, she has educated over 5,000 people in- person on impact management.
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Sandra Osborne, Investments Director of ImpactAssets, manages investment management for the Giving Fund and ImpactAssets’ Impact Notes. She also Supports ImpactAssets’ product development and field building. Prior to joining ImpactAssets, Sandra served as a Risk Officer at Developing World Markets, an impact investment asset manager focused on linking the capital markets and financial institutions serving the bottom of the pyramid in emerging and frontier economies. She also worked at Keefe Bruyette & Woods, a boutique investment bank where she worked in sell-side equity research covering the U.S. banking industry. Sandra holds an MA in Economics from New York University and a BS in Economics from Louisiana State University. She is a Chartered Financial Analyst and speaks Spanish.
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Kris Putnam-Walkerly, Founder of Putnam Consulting Group is a trusted advisor to high-wealth donors and foundation leaders across the globe, helping them transform their giving and catapult their impact. She’s advised over 60 foundations and philanthropists to strategically allocate and assess over $350 million in grants and gifts, including leading funders such as the Charles and Helen Schwab Foundation, David and Lucile Packard Foundation, Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, and Annie E. Casey Foundation.
Kris is the author of Confident Giving: Sage Advice for Funders, which was named one of the 10 Best Corporate Social Responsibility Books. She was named one of America’s Top 25 Philanthropy Speakers, and regularly gives keynotes and workshops at private donor meetings and leading philanthropy associations. As a thought leader in transformative giving℠ and delusional altruism℠, Kris was one of six global consultants inducted into the 2017 Million Dollar Consulting™ Hall of Fame.
Kris is a frequent contributor in the publications of organizations such as the National Center for Family Philanthropy, Exponent Philanthropy, AsianNGO, Learn Philanthropy, Foundation Center, and Southeastern Council on Foundations. She provides expert commentary about philanthropy in the Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Seattle Times, Washington Examiner, Entepreneur.com, BusinessWeek.com, and others. Learn more at putnam-consulting.com.
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Stephanie Cohn-Rupp, of Tiedemann Wealth Management, was previously Managing Director of Threshold Group, bringing more than 17 years of experience in global impact investing, impact fund design and implementation, and microfinance, as well as crowd funding. Stephanie works closely with Chief Investment Officer, Ron Albahary, CFA, in developing creative goals-based solutions for clients who desire portfolios aligned with what matters most to them. Stephanie’s extensive experience spanning the global ecosystem of impact brings with it a multifaceted toolkit of skills in sourcing, evaluating and measuring opportunities from both investment and impact perspectives.
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Lindsay Smalling is Producer and Curator of the Social Capital Markets Conference (SOCAP), convening impact investors and social entrepreneurs at the intersection of money and meaning. The annual flagship event in San Francisco is the largest conference for impact investors and social entrepreneurs and has drawn more than 12,000 people since 2008. Smalling was previously Strategic Initiatives Officer at ImpactAssets where she was focused on building knowledge resources that advance the field of impact investing, authoring multiple issue briefs and producing the annual ImpactAssets 50.
Prior to receiving an MBA at Columbia Business School, Smalling worked at Entrepreneurs Foundation, consulting with venture-backed, pre-IPO companies on corporate social responsibility programs. She spent the first four years of her career in financial services at Wellington Management and Lord Abbett. Smalling graduated from Pomona College, where she was a Division III National Champion in water polo.
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Matthew Weatherley-White, Co-Founder and Managing Director of The CAPROCK Group, shapes The CAPROCK Group’s initiative in Impact Investing. Matthew is a sought-after speaker and thought leader. In addition to keynoting the 2013 European Commission’s Annual Award for Social Innovation, Matthew has guest-lectured on sustainable business management and non-financial value creation at such business schools as Stanford, Oxford, Dartmouth, Northwestern, University of Chicago and the American University in Paris, has presented at global conferences, serves as a strategic advisor to several Impact Investing funds, and has been quoted widely in the media, including Barron’s, NPR, International Business Daily, Bloomberg Business Week, Kipinger’s, Forbes and The New York Times. More recently, he successfully shepherded two pieces of legislation through the Idaho Statehouse: the first authorizing Pay For Success Contracting and the second awarding legal status to businesses structured as Benefit Corporations.
Matthew graduated from Dartmouth College, has competed internationally in five different sports and continues to serve as a Director for the Lee Pesky Learning Center, an organization he helped launch nearly 20 years ago. When not working, Matthew can usually be found outside, running, skiing, mountaineering, cycling… and generally encouraging his daughter to enjoy wilderness with the same irrational exuberance as her father.
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