Business Social Responsibility

Bruce Arbit is the founder of Melarbit and Community Investing Network of NJ and will be moderating the webinar. Bruce has been directly involved in the creation of local community investment funds where he has worked to engage a diverse range of investors with varying interests and motivations. His work supports the development of affordable real estate for housing and community facilities; start-up and small business development; and creative place making in urban areas.

Roslie Sheehy Cates is a highly regarded community investing professional who recently authored a report Options and Innovations in Community Investing: A Report from the Field for The Forum for Sustainable and Responsible Investment (US SIF). Following the overview, we will facilitate a conversation with Rosalie and other community investing practitioners about current practices in community investing with a special focus on New Jersey.

Elizabeth Glenshaw is the Managing Director for Clean Yield Asset Management, an asset management a firm that promotes societal sustainability into their investment strategy. Prior to joining Clean Yield, Glenshaw spent the preceding decade with Calvert Foundation building out the Calvert Community Investment Note program both on the lending and investment side of the shop.

Greg Stankiewicz is COO of New Jersey Community Capital (NJCC). NJCC is an example of the type of organization that can leverage community investments to help neighborhoods across the state. Stankiewicz will provide updates on two new programs: one providing aid to small businesses impacted by Sandy and the other to homeowners facing foreclosure.

International speaker Shel Horowitz's eighth book, Guerrilla Marketing Goes Green: Winning Strategies to Improve Your Profits and Your Planet (co-authored with Jay Conrad Levinson, published in 2010 by Wiley) was on Amazon's environmental bestseller list for 18 months. The book documents how businesses can be green, ethical AND profitable. Using examples from Fortune 100 companies to solo-preneurs, the book lays out how ethics and green principles are not just about doing the right thing but also about profitability. Surprising principles are demonstrated that show why most businesses shouldn't even worry about market share. The book shows business owners how to form powerful partnerships, even with competitors; how to get your green message out without green-washing; and how to become a much deeper shade of green. Shel also writes the internationally syndicated monthly column, Green And Profitable.

Antony Bugg-Levine is the CEO of the Nonprofit Finance Fund. Prior to taking up this position in October, 2011, he was a Managing Director at the Rockefeller Foundation, where he designed and led the Rockefeller Foundation's Impact Investing initiative. He convened the 2007 meeting that coined the phrase "impact investing" and is the Board chair of the Global Impact Investing Network. A former consultant with McKinsey & Co., he also teaches at Columbia Business School. A native of South Africa, he served in the late 1990s as the acting communications director at the South African Human Rights Commission.

Jed Emerson is executive vice-president for Strategic Development with ImpactAssets, a nonprofit financial services firm that provides information about impact investing to interested asset owners and creates impact investing products to the asset owner/impact fund market.

He is a Senior Fellow with the Center for Social Investing at Heidelberg University (Germany) and Senior Advisor to The Sterling Group (a multi-family office based in Hong Kong, which pursues a sustainable/impact investing strategy for its clients). He was a founding board member of Pacific Community Ventures, founding director of REDF and has been affiliated with various leading investment firms, such as Generation Investment Management (London).

Jed is also an adjunct professor with NYU-Abu Dhabi, in addition to having held faculty appointments at the Harvard, Stanford, and Oxford business schools. He is internationally recognized as a thought leader, having originated the concept of Blended Value and produced numerous articles on investing capital and managing firms for multiple returns. Jed has presented his work at the World Economic Forum, CGI and other events around the world. His various papers/research may be found at www.blendedvalue.org.