Fuel for the Field

Introduction by Carla I. Javits

Outstanding leadership is a central factor that distinguishes any successful enterprise; this is certainly true in the social sector.  REDF started its signature Farber Program a decade ago to provide hands-on experience in job-creation social enterprises for MBA students and graduates who want to contribute and learn through summer internships and one year fellowships in the social sector.

More than one hundred people have now participated in REDF’s selective Farber Program.  It combines the excitement of project-planning and product development for social enterprise with a professional development curriculum that includes meeting with REDF’s Board of Directors and exposure to the sector’s seminal ideas and tools.  The Farber Program honors the memory of Mike Farber, an early social entrepreneur who was a leader at Rubicon Programs, a signature member of REDF’s early portfolio.  Stephen McCann was one of a class of six MBA interns this year who joined a proud group of Farber alumni now working in some our country’s leading philanthropies, nonprofits, and private sector companies.
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MBA Student, Interrupted
Stephen McCann
Farber Intern, 2009

Coming to the Haas School of Business at UC Berkeley, I was no stranger to working in the social sector. Ever since undergrad, my goal has been to combine my business knowledge and experience to contribute to the betterment of society; after all, if we don’t use the best of our abilities to leave the world better off for having us in it, what else are we here for? Prior to business school, I helped start up Deloitte Canada’s first pro-bono consulting practice dedicated to serving local nonprofits, and while at Haas, I spent the majority of my free time advising the Alameda County Foster Youth Alliance. These were only part-time roles, though, and for my summer internship, I really wanted to dedicate all of my time to working “on the front lines” and fully immersing myself in the sector. Working as a Farber Intern allowed me to do that, and so much more.

Stephen enjoys a walking tour of San Francisco-based social enterprises

I was matched up with one of REDF’s portfolio organizations, The Society of St. Vincent de Paul of Alameda County (SVdP, for short), a fantastic organization that provides assistance to needy men, women and children. Rich with history, the organization has a Special Works community campus in downtown Oakland that provides for peoples’ basic needs (e.g., a free dining room, a food bank) as well as supports their first steps towards achieving self-sustainability (e.g., educational classes, job training). This campus is supported by social enterprises that not only help to subsidize the organization’s services, but also offer job training for the poor and works to keep the community green. Last but not least, SVdP coordinates over 600 volunteers who perform community outreach, offering access to food, clothing, temporary shelter and financial assistance to those who need it the most. Needless to say, there was no better organization for exposing me to a diverse array of models for assisting those in need.

I was tasked with developing an “organizational dashboard” for SVdP’s Board and Management. If you’re unfamiliar with dashboards, they are easy-to-read, highly visual one-page summaries of how an organization is performing against its key financial and social goals. Just as with the dashboard on your car, at a glance, you can quickly get the information you need to help you on your way to meeting your objectives. REDF and SVdP hoped that this project would help SVdP’s leadership become even better informed, increase the amount of quantitative data utilized in decision-making, and aid all departments in becoming more accountable for their results.

I was excited about this project, as SVdP had all of the ingredients needed for success. SVdP’s staff was completely behind the project and fully participated in offering input and guidance, and there were already systems in place to collect the data that the dashboard would report on. One concern we had, however, was whether SVdP would have the capacity to continue producing the dashboard each month after my internship ended. For a dashboard to be sustainable, the staff time required to develop it each month could not outweigh its benefits, or it would likely be dropped in favour of more pressing needs.

I am happy to report that the project was a success; I developed an organizational dashboard that SVdP uses and continues to update to monitor its ongoing performance against critical goals. I trained all key stakeholders on what they would need to do each month, put appropriate controls in place to ensure timely completion, and documented the process such that as SVdP’s key metrics of success change, they can update and adapt their dashboard accordingly.

Dashboards can be immensely helpful tools for nonprofits, but unfortunately many organizations do not have the time or resources needed to build one on their own. This is one of the reasons that REDF established the Farber Program, which matches MBA students like myself who are interested in social enterprise with REDF Portfolio organizations in need of business assistance. In this way, REDF is able to bring its experience and resources to help find talent for strategic projects that might otherwise not get done.

I have been asked many times about my choice to work in the social sector for the summer, and about the “opportunity cost” or tradeoff of doing so – after all, it is no secret that MBA’s can make more money working in the for profit sector during their internships. I don’t see it this way, though, as this only measures the immediate financial consequences of my choice. For me, the greater cost would be to work in an organization whose mission I did not believe in or was not passionate about, and whose work I did not find meaningful. A professor once told me, “If you always focus on your passions, you will be able to look back on your life and be content. Your resume may not end up being neat and linear, but you will at least be proud of what you have achieved.” Working with REDF and SVdP for the summer was not only incredibly meaningful, but it changed my outlook on my career permanently, and for the better.