A Columbus' Egg to the Challenges of effective Impact Investing - during and after the COVID-pandemic
“A Columbus' Egg” is a popular expression derived from a story about Christopher Columbus documented by a friend. The story goes that some Spanish noblemen were less than impressed by Columbus’ discovery of the Americas, pointing out that given time, anyone could have done it and that it took no great skill on his part. They expressed so in the presence of Columbus. Rather than take offence Columbus picked up an egg and placed a wager that none of his companions would be able to make it stand up on its end without any help. When they had all tried and failed, Columbus simply cracked the end slightly and balanced the egg on the now flattened end. The story itself was not generated by Columbus. A similar story was told 15 years earlier about architect Filippo Brunelleschi, who went on to design the Florence Cathedral. Some say the Dome of the Cathedral has a flat tip in reference to the egg-conundrum, which Brunelleschi too posed to sceptic officials, who demanded his solution to the construction of the dome.
The moral of the story is that a challenge is only simple once you know how to pull it off. The CRUX is to have the courage to try something new and be the one to succeed.
The conundrum of making effective impact investing happen requires a break with common perceptions on how equity capital can be assembled from many and managed according to the stakeholders' understanding of purpose.
Like in the Case of building the Dome of the Florence Cathedral - arriving at effective impact investing requires catalysts and sponsors, who share a purpose and entrust creative initiators to scale-up the initiative. The Dome-analogy is relevant, because effective impact investing requires a so-called “No-Group-Structure” with a strong foundation and independent pillars - functioning in concert, but always at arm's length, as to separate roles.
Please look to the Page: "The Value Chain". It has a Pdf for downloading on: "Role-divided Value Chain by a No-Group-Structure for Impact Investing".
OPTIONAL READING - on solving the conundrum of effective Impact Investing - and on scaling-up the solution in maritime regions
The first initiator of the concept, S.T.Evensen c/o Bankier.co, arrived at a solution to the conundrum of effective impact investing during an Owner/President Management Program at HBS.edu 1997-1999. However, nobody wanted to listen at the time, because the US Glass-Steagall Act was repealed in 1999 inspired by similar deregulation in Europe 1987/-88. The financial crisis of 2008 was in its making caused by regulators' laissez-faire policy - allowing transaction-driven cross-selling strategies fueled by securitization of structured products without investors' benefit.
After years of efforts for real financial reform S.T.Evensen and his fellow initiators chose to participate in HBS.edu New Venture Competition (NVC) 2017. As already mentioned above - their entry was: "A Social Enterprise for Impact Investing - organized as a Collaborative Value Network (CVN)".
Shortly after the NVC-entry a Global Industrial Company contacted S.T.Evensen at Bankier.co with an intention to seek coopetition with other alliances and scale-up a CVN-Approach for Impact Investing with REACH into the real economies of maritime regions. A Case was built for the Scaling-up.
But, suddenly the Global Industrial Company was attacked by one of the Barbarian Establishment of Private Equity...
Therefore, Summits on the Power of Collaboration will be arranged - step by step - in 12-twelve maritime regions. The above-mentioned Case on the Power of Collaboration to achieve effective Impact Investing in a maritime region will be discussed. That Case is a Chapter in a book by S.T.Evensen: "The Altruistic Gene", which appeared early 2019. The CVN-Approach for Impact Investing can be applied in several contexts. These applications are inter-linked and will result in synergies. As mentioned above - there are applications of the CVN-Approach for Impact Investing relevant to e.g.:
A) Water/Food/Health; B) Basic Infrastructure; C) "Liberation" of Sea-Sides and River Banks troubled by Acts of Nature and Man.
Other forces than Bankier.co will call for effective Impact Investing - even Nature itself due to dramatic Changes of Climate and fast deterioration of Oceans' Health - as well as needed reconstruction in the wake of a COVID-pandemic. Capitalism with a purpose beyond profit will be demanded by stakeholders and leaders of public- and private sector alike.
“A Columbus' Egg” is a popular expression derived from a story about Christopher Columbus documented by a friend. The story goes that some Spanish noblemen were less than impressed by Columbus’ discovery of the Americas, pointing out that given time, anyone could have done it and that it took no great skill on his part. They expressed so in the presence of Columbus. Rather than take offence Columbus picked up an egg and placed a wager that none of his companions would be able to make it stand up on its end without any help. When they had all tried and failed, Columbus simply cracked the end slightly and balanced the egg on the now flattened end. The story itself was not generated by Columbus. A similar story was told 15 years earlier about architect Filippo Brunelleschi, who went on to design the Florence Cathedral. Some say the Dome of the Cathedral has a flat tip in reference to the egg-conundrum, which Brunelleschi too posed to sceptic officials, who demanded his solution to the construction of the dome.
The moral of the story is that a challenge is only simple once you know how to pull it off. The CRUX is to have the courage to try something new and be the one to succeed.
The conundrum of making effective impact investing happen requires a break with common perceptions on how equity capital can be assembled from many and managed according to the stakeholders' understanding of purpose.
Like in the Case of building the Dome of the Florence Cathedral - arriving at effective impact investing requires catalysts and sponsors, who share a purpose and entrust creative initiators to scale-up the initiative. The Dome-analogy is relevant, because effective impact investing requires a so-called “No-Group-Structure” with a strong foundation and independent pillars - functioning in concert, but always at arm's length, as to separate roles.
Please look to the Page: "The Value Chain". It has a Pdf for downloading on: "Role-divided Value Chain by a No-Group-Structure for Impact Investing".
OPTIONAL READING - on solving the conundrum of effective Impact Investing - and on scaling-up the solution in maritime regions
The first initiator of the concept, S.T.Evensen c/o Bankier.co, arrived at a solution to the conundrum of effective impact investing during an Owner/President Management Program at HBS.edu 1997-1999. However, nobody wanted to listen at the time, because the US Glass-Steagall Act was repealed in 1999 inspired by similar deregulation in Europe 1987/-88. The financial crisis of 2008 was in its making caused by regulators' laissez-faire policy - allowing transaction-driven cross-selling strategies fueled by securitization of structured products without investors' benefit.
After years of efforts for real financial reform S.T.Evensen and his fellow initiators chose to participate in HBS.edu New Venture Competition (NVC) 2017. As already mentioned above - their entry was: "A Social Enterprise for Impact Investing - organized as a Collaborative Value Network (CVN)".
Shortly after the NVC-entry a Global Industrial Company contacted S.T.Evensen at Bankier.co with an intention to seek coopetition with other alliances and scale-up a CVN-Approach for Impact Investing with REACH into the real economies of maritime regions. A Case was built for the Scaling-up.
But, suddenly the Global Industrial Company was attacked by one of the Barbarian Establishment of Private Equity...
Therefore, Summits on the Power of Collaboration will be arranged - step by step - in 12-twelve maritime regions. The above-mentioned Case on the Power of Collaboration to achieve effective Impact Investing in a maritime region will be discussed. That Case is a Chapter in a book by S.T.Evensen: "The Altruistic Gene", which appeared early 2019. The CVN-Approach for Impact Investing can be applied in several contexts. These applications are inter-linked and will result in synergies. As mentioned above - there are applications of the CVN-Approach for Impact Investing relevant to e.g.:
A) Water/Food/Health; B) Basic Infrastructure; C) "Liberation" of Sea-Sides and River Banks troubled by Acts of Nature and Man.
Other forces than Bankier.co will call for effective Impact Investing - even Nature itself due to dramatic Changes of Climate and fast deterioration of Oceans' Health - as well as needed reconstruction in the wake of a COVID-pandemic. Capitalism with a purpose beyond profit will be demanded by stakeholders and leaders of public- and private sector alike.