Joining us this week on Planet Good Radio is Michael Pirron, CEO of Impact Makers, one of Business Week’s Most Promising Entrepreneurs.
As founder of Impact Makers, Michael developed a business model that takes social entrepreneurship to a new level. Impact Makers is a non-stock, competitive social venture dedicated to delivering quality professional services in IT and Management consulting, as well as Web design. However, there is a critical difference between Impact Makers and their competitors: their profits go directly to charitable community partners rather than to shareholders.
Their community impact is guided by four important principals. They allow the community to support Impact Makers’ efforts with the least potential for conflict and with full disclosure of their process. Here are those principals:
* We will partner with local, non-profit, community organizations – ensuring our profits will always be used to improve the quality of life in our own backyards.
* Our partners will be secular, apolitical organizations in existence to help people help themselves to improve their lives.
* Our Board of Directors is empowered to make all the decisions regarding the organizations we select to be our partners.
* The Board will hold our executive leadership accountable to maximize our profits while growing our firm and will allow the public to view our records.
Impact Makers also provides every employee the opportunity to spend part of the week, each week, working with their partner organizations, or any community organization they prefer, while being paid (by Impact Makers). In this way, their support and partnership with local non-profits deepens well beyond the fiscal support the firm supplies and provides the opportunity for their people to make a personal impact on their community.
Michael spent the early years of his career as a Senior Consultant with Andersen Consulting (now Accenture) based in Sophia Antipolis, France. His tenure allowed him to consult, with increasingly complex engagements, throughout the EMEAI (Europe, Middle East, Africa, and India) region. As a result, Michael has lived or worked in seven countries and spent significant time in over 25 nations. He became conversant in French, and when he moved on to be a Product Manager with ViryaNet Systems in Jerusalem, Israel, he added Hebrew to his language skills. Later, while an independent consultant, Michael completed an MBA from Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois.
Join us for this week’s conversation and learn about a new business model that’s making real impact all around the world.
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