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Guest Post: An Entrepreneur's Thoughts on Market Incentives & Foreign Aid

Mills Scofield

Among this group has been a founder of a wildlife foundation, a married Wall Street duo, a management consultant, his digital artist wife, and an urban planner. One of his main tasks was to structure a hedging derivative that negated foreign exchange risks so that Microfinance institutions could take safer loans from the developed world.

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Why CEOs have Liberal Arts Degrees

Mills Scofield

A career advisor once told me that those who pursue liberal arts majors and enter finance, consulting or technology are not the exceptions. She's spending the summer in Dhaka doing microfinance. Even though they don’t directly align with my career aspirations, they will not take me out of the game. They are the norm.

CEO 70
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Why CEOs have Liberal Arts Degrees

Mills Scofield

A career advisor once told me that those who pursue liberal arts majors and enter finance, consulting or technology are not the exceptions. She's spending the summer in Dhaka doing microfinance. Even though they don’t directly align with my career aspirations, they will not take me out of the game. They are the norm.

CEO 70
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The Innovation Mindset in Action: Shantha Ragunathan

Harvard Business Review

Sasikala, a Block Development Officer (BDO), talked to the Kodapattinam villagers about microfinance , only Shantha, of all the villagers, saw the opportunity and took action. Undeterred, Shantha persisted until she persuaded the required number of people to sign up for the microfinance project.

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Global Entrepreneurs Need New Funding Models

Harvard Business Review

In low-income countries, according to World Bank data in a recent paper by the consultancy Dalberg, 43% of businesses with between 20 and 99 employees say that access to finance is a major constraint. Some microfinance organizations are also moving out of the purely micro and toward larger lending. But times have changed.

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An Approach to Ending Poverty That Works

Harvard Business Review

Microfinance and other market-based interventions don’t generally reach them. Unfortunately, these trends still have little to no impact on the lives of a critical and chronically marginalized subset of the extreme poor around the world, those living on less than 60 to 70 cents per day. And we may have found a way to do this.

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How Social Entrepreneurs Can Have the Most Impact

Harvard Business Review

My organization, The Bridgespan Group, received 1,800 applications for 18 entry-level positions consulting to nonprofits and philanthropy. Meanwhile, 19,000 high-scoring college graduates across the U.S. applied for Teach for America—including 10% of the graduating classes of Dartmouth and Yale.