Mentor: Ms. Christina Pop & Ms. Melanie Yonks

Profession: Directors of Education, Community Outreach, and Production @ EarthX

Location: Virtual Zoom Call

Date: January 21st, 2020

Time: 5:00 PM – 5:30 PM

Assessment:

As I was able to explore conducting an informational interview with Mayor Jeff Cheney, this week, I was able to set up a meeting with EarthX. EarthX is an international nonprofit environmental organization dedicated to educating and inspiring people and organizations to act towards a more sustainable future worldwide. By establishing this meeting and discussing with Ms. Pop and Ms. Yonks, I was able to better understand the components of sustainability and how they tie into private investment, as the EarthX prioritizes implementing private investments to spur sustainable development. Through this interaction, not only was I able to establish important connections that have expanded my network but was able to grow my understanding to effectively complete my final product.

With this interview meeting, I was primarily able to learn the fundamental aspects that drive sustainability and finance in the private sector. Both EarthX representatives describe the “multiple initiatives that [their] organization prioritizes within [their] program such as the Ocean, Renewables, Emissions, Sustainable Policy, and Investment”. Moreover, they debuted their new initiative, EarthX TV, through which they could educate and bring awareness about sustainability to a larger population. This provided me with both technical knowledge on the subject matter of impact investing as well as important awareness on how to grow my startup’s educational aspect to ensure my target market is comprehending the problem being solved. On the technical knowledge aspect, I was able to better understand methods for promoting private investments through the ESG lens and how many individuals are being able to innovate within their companies to promote ESG activities and investments. Furthermore, given my strides within this field, I was given the opportunity to premiere as a speaker on their episode discussing Sustainability.

Upon shifting gears to how this applies with my final product idea, I was able to implement not only the knowledge they provided but components of the EarthX organization to materialize the business plan for my new financial technology company that prioritizes impact investments in the private sector. As the two representatives described how financial return and risk and the most important components for any investor, I have made sure to tweak the business model to include risk ratings for each social company for the investor and conduct a thorough selection process for each company that applies to be on the platform, thereby ensuring that the investor will get a return on his or her investment. Moreover, I have added another unique value proposition to the business model to make it investor-friendly and thereby have eliminated any potential weakness, thanks to the EarthX representatives’ discussion. I have decided to include an investor interface in which the investor can track their past investments, the impact they have made through their investments, any major company updates, and recommended steps based on their activity on the platform. This eliminates what the EarthX organization outlined as a huge deterrent for private impact investments, “investor confidence”, By providing investors with this user-friendly dashboard, I have ultimately applied the knowledge Ms. Pop and Ms. Yonks provided me to better my ISM Final Product.

In conclusion, the biggest takeaways from this meeting were that I was able to better understand the examples of a successful sustainability organization as well as realize the importance of social entrepreneurship and impact investing in and for the future. For the upcoming weeks, I look forward to staying in touch with the EarthX organization and continue seeking their advice as I expand my impact investing and entrepreneurial skillset.