Morgan Simon: Transformative Principles & Practices Yielding REAL IMPACT Returns

Next Economy Now highlights the leaders who are taking a regenerative, bio-regional, equitable, transparent, and whole-systems approach to using business as a force for good. 

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Building bridges between finance and social justice, Morgan Simon is a widely-recognized leader in impact investment, influencing over $150 billion in investment capital over the past seventeen years.  Morgan co-leads Candide Group, which supports two clients, including members of the Pritzker family on behalf of the Libra Foundation. She is also co-founder and chair of the non-profit Transform Finance.  Morgan previously served as the founding CEO of Toniic, a global network of impact investors, and as the founding executive director of the Responsible Endowments Coalition. She has worked with the United Nations in Honduras, in corporate reform with ForestEthics, and in domestic microfinance with the Women's Initiative for Self-Employment. She currently serves on the boards of the Restaurant Opportunity Center, The Working World, and CARE Enterprises. A graduate of Swarthmore College, Morgan serves as an adjunct professor at Middlebury College's graduate school program. She lives in the Bay Area and is the author of “REAL IMPACT: The New Economics of Social Change.”

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Some highlights from Ryan’s interview with Morgan include:

  • Morgan’s path to shift economic systems to be more just, moving from activism in immigrant communities in downtown LA to shareholder activism through university endowments to work in impact investing through a constellation of leading finance & social justice organizations

  • A review of the 3 Transformative Finance Principles intended to democratically guide and inform non-extractive impact investments and how they are applied in practice as a tool to center impact in every asset class for systemic transformation

  • How picking out eggs at the grocery store relates to investment decisions

  • Balancing the mindset & practices of financial return with the mindset & practices of impact return

  • The genesis of Morgan’s book, the coupling of ethical principles with impact investment, and asking the right questions as the field rapidly scales

 

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LIFT Economy is an impact consulting firm whose mission is to create, model, and share a locally self-reliant economy that works for the benefit of all life.

Ryan Honeyman is a Partner at LIFT Economy and author of The B Corp Handbook: How to Use Business as a Force for Good (Berrett-Koehler Publishers). You can follow Ryan on Twitter @honeymanconsult or email him ryan@lifteconomy.com.