Imagine my surprise when a hedge fund manager invited me to a retreat of the “Gratitude Railroad” rather than the typical finance conference centered on topics such as derivatives: aka highly complex products no one understands. With a conference name that intriguing, I had to find out more.
It turns out the Gratitude Railroad is a community of action oriented investors seeking to do good and do well (right up my alley as those of you reading along this year know). Two extremely successful guys, Howard Fischer and Eric Jacobsen, started the Gratitude Railroad after meeting in the Harvard Advanced Leadership Initiative.
I guess this is what happens when Wall Street executives and tech entrepreneurs go to Harvard, which makes me a proud HKS alumnus (yah, I slipped that in, such an obnoxious Haavaad thing, I know).
Having been in impact investing for 20 years, well before the term was coined, I’m delighted to see hedge fund and private equity fund managers, venture capitalists, investment bankers, corporate lawyers, and successful entrepreneurs devoting their amazing talent to this work.
They contribute their understanding of risk/return, financial acumen, and business savvy to solving the world’s most pressing problems such as climate change, social justice, and sustainability.
Since we met at Big Path’s Impact Capitalism Summit on Nantucket, I figured the retreat might be held someplace nice. Sure enough, they held the event in Deer Valley, Utah. We started our days with yoga and ended with hikes; now that’s my kind of non-conference conference. In between the exercise we heard from innovators and investors on subject such as:
Besides spreading the world through convenings, the Gratitude Railroad is launching tracks (get it? Choo choo!) to do impact investing. Their first track, the Builders Fund, is a fund investing in purpose driven companies. Most recently the Gratitude Railroad launched a Farmland track. I think it’s time to start laying the rails—perhaps for a medical device track—in Minnesota. What do you think?
These investment bankers gone good realize that we need to get more capital committed to impact investing. Being investment folks, once they get a good idea, they act on it. My main take away from the retreat was we need more funds; we need to invest in the funds that exist and—in general—talk faster and do more (oh, maybe they talk fast because many are from New Yawk).
In a hike down the mountain I think I convinced Howard to visit us here in the Twin Cities and have dinner with our investment bankers gone—or going—good. Interested in learning more about where the smart money is investing? Join us!
Tweet me your thoughts @susan_hammel.
Hope in the new year is our favorite team gratitude today and despite the very real challenges we face as humans, I’m positive about our future. People and place: they came up over and over again in our Investing for Positive Impact across the Midwest study and events. We care about where we live, whether that’s in a small town in Iowa or a major city like Chicago. We care about the people who live there. Imagine if impact investing in people and place was the norm. How different would our places look? My place is Minnesota and I care deeply that all our people have a chance to find their healthy place here. What’s your place? Who do you care about? Do your investments match? If not, there’s plenty of chances to invest. As one my colleagues said today, “it’s 2025: let’s thrive”.
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