Jacqueline Novogratz

Founder and CEO, Acumen Fund

Tossing the Rubric

Forget about the rubric. It doesn't work. Just ask Jacqueline Novogratz, who has been working against it for 20 years, trying to bring health, water, and housing to the world's poorest people.

She dislikes categorization (which she calls "obfuscation") especially when it comes to herself. Is she a venture capitalist? Is she a social advocate? How about entrepreneur? Novogratz, it seems, is a natural blend of all three.

Admittedly, she has a different kind of spirit – one that doesn't necessarily lend itself to conventional capitalistic cultures. After graduating from the University of Virginia in 1983, she began working as a banker at Chase. Her job was to analyze the credit worthiness of outstanding loans during the Latin American debt crisis. "Why doesn't the bank experiment with lending to the working class who contribute to the country and might be more likely to repay," she recalls asking?

The answer brought her to Rwanda in 1986, where she worked in a micro-finance institution that loaned money to the "truly poor." Years later, Novogratz learned that a small group of close female colleagues in Rwanda were involved in the genocide of the nineties. Some were victims, some were bystanders and some even became the perpetrators. "It shakes your view of human nature," she says. "I worked with them on an issue of social justice for three years. Human beings are very complicated."

Novogratz applies these hard-earned lessons to all her work at building enterprises at Acumen Fund, a private equity company she founded in 2001 that has invested in 32 entrepreneurs who are building systems to bring affordable basic services to low income people in India, Pakistan, Kenya and Tanzania. She says her bottom line is change, which is why she tosses aside the rubric and focuses on people.

For any entrepreneurial venture to work, it must make sense to the individuals whom it will affect. She learned for instance, that people don't want technology per se; they want services. Understanding what services are in demand requires an accurate perception of the people who will use them—even if they are poor.

"We do not treat the poor as passive recipients," she says. "Instead, we see them as customers and we use the market to understand their preferences. The market is the best listening devise we have."

Acumen Fund is not a micro-lender. Its investments range from $300,000 to $2 million and the intent is to create business models that can be duplicated and scaled up. One recent success is A to Z Textile Mills. The Tanzanian company makes insecticide-treated mosquito nets to protect people against malaria. Acumen Fund invested $325,000 to entrepreneur Anuj Shah to help the company set up a factory which today produces more than 15 million bed nets a year. It is now the country's second largest employer; And the investment? Acumen Fund got it back.

Shifting business practices to accommodate unconventional venues means injecting a little creative disturbance into the marketplace, searching for serious innovators who cross sectors, locating the right entrepreneurs and the gutsiest local talent. "How do we take lessons we've learned about design and ultimately influence government, corporations, and private manufacturers to take it to scale," she asks? "We have to create systems that are not dependent on random good will."

But a system that mitigates the effects of human error (bad psychology, ego, random good will) is really just another rubric, isn't it? Perhaps. But for Jacqueline Novogratz, that rubric must be flexible. On the Acumen Fund website, she publishes her private journaling to engage readers and solicit comments.

A recent entry chronicled her journey to Karachi, Pakistan where she was approached by a Pakistani gentleman who said he was so glad Acumen Fund exists, but '"how do we really know you can solve the water crisis that threatens this nation?"

"I told him it wasn't a question of Acumen solving the water crisis. Instead, the only way the water problem will be solved is if citizens go from 'I' to 'We' thinking. Each person must stand and ask themselves 'what could I be doing?'"

Novogratz understands the tough job in front of her. To make Acumen Fund investments work, she must lift them as real models of what enterprises are doing for themselves to make their situation better. People often ask her why she wants to change the world. "I really believe that we can hold the discipline of the market and deep compassion at the same time," she responds. "It's all about emphasizing the dignity of work."