“The beauty of this program is that we didn’t give temporary solutions to an individual, but rather permanent and sustainable solutions to communities. We came in as individual students with different backgrounds, not knowing what we had gotten ourselves into, but left as a part of a community.”Daniel Z., Duke University, Guatemala
Who We Are
Co-founder Greg Van Kirk interviewed on CNN Money about the MicroConsignment ModelTogether, with our participants (You!), we engage with individuals/entrepreneurs, local partners and communities to diagnose needs and create, implement and grow social innovations focused on intelligently helping impoverished, marginalized and vulnerable families build better lives for themselves and for their neighbors. Within all of our programs we work as a team and teams of teams so that our participants can play an important role in creating social innovation impact, and through this, gain the knowledge, skills and experience necessary to become the high impact leaders and social entrepreneurs of the future. Apply now to embark on the community impact and leadership learning experience of a lifetime!
“The program enhanced the quality and number of my dreams and has given me the encouragement to follow them. It taught me about the power and positive influence one person can have in this world and it taught me that development work and so much of life is about listening, humility and a mutual exchange of knowledge.”Margaret M., F&M, Ecuador
Our Values
The Social Entrepreneur Corps team is driven by a set of clear core values that we view as the foundational guiding principles for social entrepreneurship. These are not simply words posted on a web page or hanging in the back corner of an office. We aspire to live and work by these core values in every decision we make and action we take. We ask our participants and partners to hold us accountable to these core values in our programs. And we ask communities to hold us accountable to these core values in our social innovation work. Although we may fail at times, we aspire to be the following:
We constantly work to understand the situation, needs, wants, limitations,opportunities and aspirations of our team members, clients, and partners.
We work stridently to include all affected stakeholders in the problem identification, solution design and implementation process and are “open source” with what we learn and create.
We are focused on the change and impact our work has on the lives of our clients over the short, medium and long- term.
Our interactions and interventions treat our clients with the honor and respect that they deserve and have earned.
We are exceedingly thoughtful about how our work affects our clients and their communities taking into account potential unintended consequences
We strive to solve long-standing problems and overcome obstacles for our clients in creative, new ways that have never been tried before.
We strive to work with other professionals, organizations and clients in ways that leverage strengths and mitigate weaknesses so that everyone has an opportunity to both add and derive value.
We offer and/or create opportunities, services and products that are of the highest quality possible, create a sense of agency, are resilient and sustainable.
We are not ideological in our approach but rather focus on common sense and actionable work that contributes to us achieving our mission effectively and efficiently.
We enter all relationships with the assumption of goodwill, honesty and integrity in the way we would want others to do the same with us.
We hold ourselves, our colleagues and our clients responsible for ethical performance and feel a sense of ownership for the successes and/failures of all stakeholders in the value chain.
We are constantly seeking ways to create and implement processes and solutions that have positive and high velocity multiplier effects.
Our Leadership
Greg Van Kirk is the Co-Founder and President of Social Entrepreneur Corps. He as well is the Co-Founder and Executive Director of sister organization Community Enterprise Solutions. Greg an Ashoka Lemelson Fellow, Ashoka Globalizer and was recently recognized as Schwab Foundation “Social Entrepreneur of the Year for 2012 (Latin America)” at the World Economic Forum. Greg is the innovator who designed the MicroConsignment Model. He has served as a consultant for organizations such as USAID, Chemonics, VisionSpring, Soros Foundation, Church World Service, Inter-American Development Bank, IFC, Water For People and Fundacion Paraguaya in the US, Latin America and Africa. Greg also contributes time as “Social Entrepreneur in Residence” and has recently worked with Columbia University, NYU, Marquette University, Indiana University, University of San Diego and Arizona State University. He is a senior advisor for AshokaU. He has taught social entrepreneurship at Columbia University and NYU. Greg began working in rural small business development as a Guatemala Peace Corps volunteer in 2001. He worked in investment banking for five years before arriving in Guatemala. Two deals he led at UBS during this time won “Deal of the Year” honors from Structured Finance International magazine. Greg is a graduate of Miami University and currently lives with his family in New York City.
“I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.” - Thomas Alva Edison
