Jacqueline Novogratz, Founder and CEO of Acumen, was honored with this year’s Concordia Leadership Award in New York City for her pioneering contributions to developing innovative solutions to the world’s most complex challenges. Joining previous recipients—former Unilever CEO, Paul Polman, First Lady of the Republic of Namibia Monica Geingos and Econet Wireless Founder and Executive Chairman Strive Masiyiwa—Jacqueline was selected for her commitment to positive social and economic change and her ability to leverage partnerships across sectors to build a more prosperous and sustainable future for the nearly 263 million people impacted through Acumen’s work.
Acumen’s model to change the way the world tackles poverty is built on partnership: through supporting investees with patient capital, governance and technical support as they forge new paths in some of the most challenging markets and by developing emerging social changemakers around the world with the skills they need to lead. And Acumen depends on its own financial and thought partnerships in order to make the work happen.
“My work with Acumen has taught me the power of partnership in solving our toughest problems of poverty…and also reinforced that how we partner is as important as partnering itself,” Jacqueline said in her acceptance speech. “Working for a decade or more with each company has reinforced my belief that learning to partner well requires the audacity to imagine and articulate the challenge you are solving together….We must recognize that, in the end, all we have is each other. And we must see that no single one of us will solve our problems alone; to the contrary, solving our toughest problems will take all of us.”
Concordia, a nonprofit organization, brings together change agents to forge partnerships for positive social impact and presented the Award at their annual Summit in New York City.