Talk at Coal + Ice
Harnessing the Power of Entrepreneurship and Art in the Climate Fight
Acumen hosts conversation about imagining a just transition to clean energy
Jacqueline Novogratz
Founder and CEO of Acumen, a global non-profit, social impact and moral leadership champion who transforms lives worldwide.
When Jacqueline Novogratz was 25, she quit her job on Wall Street and moved to Africa to focus on financing solutions for underserved communities. She worked as a consultant for the World Bank and UNICEF and co-founded Rwanda’s first microfinance institution, Duterimbere. The experience taught her that when you invest in local businesses, support local entrepreneurs, and help them scale, you create transformational opportunities for people living in poverty.
From Rwanda Jacqueline moved to the Rockefeller Foundation, where she founded The Philanthropy Workshop and co-founded the renowned Next Generation Leadership program. In 2001 she launched Acumen to introduce the concept of Patient Capital as an effective philanthropy-backed investment approach to tackle the most challenging issues of our time. Her vision and moral leadership through Acumen started a movement, and her success made impact investing a mainstream phenomenon.
Jacqueline is the author of two award-winning books: the best-selling The Blue Sweater (2010) and Manifesto for a Moral Revolution: Practices to Build a Better World (2020). She is a member of The B Team and serves on the boards of KawiSafi and Species Unite. She also serves on several advisory boards, including the Development Finance Corporation Development Advisory Council, Oxford Saïd Business School Global Leadership Council, Harvard Business School’s Social Enterprise Institute, Pakistan Business Council’s Centre of Excellence in Responsible Business, Acumen America and Acumen Pakistan, and formerly on Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s Foreign Affairs Policy Board.
She has been named one of the Top 100 Global Thinkers by Foreign Policy, one of Insider’s Climate Action 30 leaders, one of the 25 Smartest People of the Decade by the Daily Beast, and one of the world’s 100 Greatest Living Business Minds by Forbes, which also honored her with the Forbes 400 Lifetime Achievement Award for Social Entrepreneurship. She has received eight honorary doctorates and holds an MBA from Stanford University and a BA in Economics/International Relations from the University of Virginia.
Follow Jacqueline on LinkedIn, Instagram, X (Twitter), and Facebook.
Stories to shift systems
Jacqueline’s award-winning books on moral leadership, dignity, and solving problems of poverty.
Manifesto for a Moral Revolution
A moral compass for creating change in an interdependent world – one that requires us to renew our institutions, starting with how we define success.
The Blue Sweater
A memoir detailing Jacqueline’s journey through her career and the lessons she learned along the way – how to uplift people using dignity and the steps she’s taken to end global poverty.
Recent insights, ideas, news, and impact
Blog in Economist impact
Harnessing renewable energy for resilient food systems
Jacqueline Novogratz and Simon O’Connell explore how renewable energy can bolster food systems and aid smallholder farmers
Podcast with Infinite Loops
Jacqueline Novogratz: Manifesto for a moral revolution (EP. 205)
Jacqueline discusses how to create a high-trust society, the difference between moral righteousness and moral leadership, why the opposite of poverty is dignity, and much more.
Podcast with Rich Roll
Jacqueline Novogratz: How to change the world (EP. 657)
Jacqueline talks about cultivating moral imagination, practicing courage, and pursuing work with no end.
Quote in Bloomberg
Acumen, Climate Fund Have $250 Million Solar Plan for Africa’s Poorest Nations
The world’s biggest climate fund is backing Acumen in establishing a $250 million facility to bring electricity from off-grid solar projects to 72 million people in some of Africa’s poorest countries.
TED Talk
What it takes to make change
Learn how you can commit (or recommit) to creating big, positive change in your lifetime – and give back more to the world than you take from it. “It is in the darkest times that we have the chance to find our deepest beauty,” Jacqueline says.
Interview with Stanford Business
Jacqueline Novogratz, MBA ’91, on the role of storytelling in investing
Jacqueline shares how more honest, inspiring storytelling leads to better business.
Valedictory Address
Jacqueline Novogratz gives the 2023 valedictory address at the University of Virginia
Jacqueline provides inspiring insights and life lessons for the 2023 graduating class of her alma mater, the University of Virginia.
Op-Ed in Financial Times
Jacqueline pressing for changes in business school curricula to include social responsibility
Climate catastrophes, war, and political and economic upheaval: in a world of uncertainty, students and emerging leaders are seeking new frameworks and ways to reimagine our broken systems.