Blue Haven Initiative Welcomes New Strategic Partnerships Manager
The Blue Haven Initiative team is growing. We’re excited to welcome our newest team member, Megan McCarthy, who will help redesign BHI’s strategy for the philanthropic giving portfolio. Megan recently sat down with BHI Co-Founder and Principal, Liesel Pritzker Simmons, to chat about her new role, a recent trip to Kenya and Uganda for BHI, and her previous work experience in private sector consulting and impact investing.
Liesel: Megan, welcome to Team BHI! Tell us about how you found our family office.
Megan: Prior to joining BHI, I worked on the impact investing team at Omidyar Network. One component of our team’s mandate was to help families starting their impact investing journeys navigate the process. When advising families, we shared Pam and Pierre Omidyar’s story to demonstrate how they built a philanthropic investment firm. As I looked to other examples, I found myself regularly referencing Blue Haven as a shining example of a single-family office that strategically aligned 100% of its wealth with its mission. Before meeting the team, I had a lot of respect for their willingness to use not only their capital and time, but their public voice to do good.
Liesel: You previously worked in Myanmar’s private sector — wow! What did you learn working in that kind of frontier environment?
Megan: I started my professional career in consulting — first as a financial risk consultant with Deloitte, and then as a consultant in Myanmar with a corporate advisory firm focused on market entry, stakeholder engagement, and political risk. I value this private sector experience because it taught me how to quickly draw conclusions on new sectors, as well as how to map market assumptions, risks, and regulatory environments.
Myanmar was opening up to increased levels of foreign investment while I was working there, and I saw the importance of engaging with the appropriate stakeholders from the beginning and consciously practicing sustainable operations that are in the community’s best interests. Although I was advising multinational companies, there was a startup feel to these consulting projects because many of our clients — their brands, products and services — had limited or no presence in the market. Without perfectly mapped and proven business models to replicate, we had to think outside the box. These experiences taught me to maintain a flexible mindset and prepare for regular changes to the plan. Being comfortable listening, learning, and pivoting based on new circumstances was a critical component to my success. This will likely prove useful as I continue to work in an emerging market setting.
Liesel: While we’ve always supported the impact investing space through grants, we’ve never had dedicated, full-time staff to oversee a process. Thank God you’re here! Tell us what you’ll be working on.
Megan: I stepped into this role about two months ago, so it’s early days! I look forward to collaborating with you to redesign our strategy for the portion of our philanthropic giving portfolio that seeds catalytic new models, supports ecosystem and infrastructure development, elevates organizations targeting system-wide social challenges and invests in opportunities that may be considered too risky to fit into our other portfolios. In addition to strategy development, I am also helping to oversee all aspects of our grantmaking process.
Liesel: We just shipped you to Uganda and Kenya for a few weeks. How was that experience?
Megan: The trip was wonderful! Our team had a lot of time to get to know each other during infamous Nairobi traffic jams. But the real highlight was meeting and learning from our partner organizations and portfolio companies — our extended BHI team. The color that comes from doing a site visit and seeing how each business operates can’t be replicated by any number of emails or investment memos. I had the opportunity to hear secondary school scholars discuss their business plans at an Educate! partner school; celebrate the Spire/Shortlist merger with their Kenyan and Indian teams; walk through a plot of Karibu affordable home units on the outskirts of Nairobi; and visit Twiga’s central packhouse where fresh produce is processed, packed and stored before it is delivered to street vendors. According to the BHI team, spending a few weeks in Nairobi is the mandatory “Welcome Aboard,” and I am so grateful this trip was embedded into my onboarding experience. It was interesting, too, to learn the specifics as to how our direct investment team works, employing equity and debt to scale for-profit, commercial rate investments in this market, with a focus on fintech, renewable energy and last mile distribution.
Liesel: You mentioned it’s early days with the philanthropic strategy, but what is your early take, especially after this trip?
Megan: One pain point we’ve experienced working with our portfolio companies in East Africa is the disconnect between the availability of skilled labor and the skills required by employers. Employees need access to quality learning before entering the workforce, and employers need to invest in ongoing talent and organizational development activities to build durable teams. On a macro-level, economic reports forecast a dramatic shift in the type of skills, jobs, and talent profiles necessary as the workforce evolves. After many meetings in Nairobi, this talent supply and talent demand challenge was reiterated time and time again.
We are conducting a landscape review and talking with an array of stakeholders to determine the piece of the talent puzzle we want to target. We are considering shaping our strategy around the development of relevant, transferable skills through quality training programs, while simultaneously building a movement of companies adopting thoughtful human capital practices. Taking a page from BHI’s historical grantmaking, we will support knowledge creation and distribution efforts, as we believe generating data, sharing insights, and convening stakeholders is a crucial part to building a healthy ecosystem.
In addition to the talent aspect of our strategy, we intend to use philanthropic capital to continue supporting impact investing field building efforts. We are narrowing down this focus area to primarily seed catalytic blended capital models in the impact space and engage with networks cultivating vibrant impact investing communities. Ian and Liesel will also continue to be meaningful supporters of US youth civic engagement, voter turnout, and democracy reform work.
Liesel: What are you most looking forward to in your work at BHI?
Megan: I’m thrilled to be part of a team that emphasizes peer-to-peer learning. BHI has made it a priority to share its successes, failures, and reflections with everyone interested in impact investing — even skeptics. You, Ian and the team have mentored other families on complex, early-stage questions, from “How do you determine your unique impact investing asset allocation?” to “What’s the best way to define your collective family vision?” You’re gaining new insights as you go and making a point to talk about lessons learned.
I am excited to shape a new strategy together, too! I believe our grantmaking efforts can be instrumental in helping to build a thriving impact investing ecosystem in the areas we operate in. Although we are a small team, we have a lot of flexibility to run with innovative ideas and make quick, hands-on decisions.
Lastly, I am particularly looking forward to developing strong relationships with social entrepreneurs in the field and learning from their impressive efforts — even more so now that I’ve met some of them in Kenya and Uganda.
Liesel: Thank you for joining the team! This is going to be fun…
