I'm sitting here at my desk at work, with no one around. Finally, a busy day comes to an end. Peace and quiet to think about Givology. What's been exciting for me is actually clicking the refresh button on the website every hour or so. It's respite from the daily tasks at work that are often mentally strenuous and stimulating but does not offer the same depth of fulfillment that working for a rapidly changing social venture does. There are 5 partnerships in the pipeline right now. Each one unique in their mission and outreach. And Givology has the potential to help and connect all of them. A formidable challenge, however is going to be finding translation help as the pace of accepting partners increases and our geographic scope widens. I have been doing some simple Chinese template translations, but thinking about the potential volume of Spanish, Hindi, Chinese profiles coming in makes me a bit worried about the capacity of the team. Work allocation has been daunting, as at the "entrepreneurial" stage, no one truly specializes in any one thing despite their official assigned committee. Nonetheless, I'm finding that amidst what seems like a chaotic workflow, there is a type of order and trust. I have been a bit vague thus far, but tomorrow and the subsequent days, I will be meeting with Annie Zhou from Rural China Education Foundation. She not only works at Lehman as well, but sits right on my floor. Heather and Natalia have also been great contacts... at least I'm happy to be introduced to them. They are part of social/professional philanthropy and venture organizations in NYC. Megan from Wokai introduced Natalia, who then put me in touch with Heather. It's really a great web, ... figuratively and literally I suppose ;) This weekend, I'm going to Penn (oh alma mater) to see the Penn team. I'm really looking forward to seeing them again. They each have brought so much spunk and jive- namely, the amazing brochure that Maria made... no one that I've shown the brochure to will believe that our team member is not a professional and furthermore, that she is a student. Catherine has been working on 3 mini projects on and off campus--- ranging from setting up an academic-community service class project with the Wharton School to coordinating student organizations to begin non-profit work wtih us--- to finding vendors and pro bono merchandise sponsors. Jiying and Linda, our expert translators have done a great job targeting Chinese organization partners going forward. Outreach and networking like pros. Kathy and Kunal, the killer duos--- bringing the geographic depth and color and escalating Givology to its next platform. India, Vietnam, hope you are ready for Givology!
30 OCT 2008