News/Events

It’s a new era when it comes to cooperation between some of the world’s largest corporations, governments and nonprofit organizations working together to address some of the most pressing social and environmental challenges.

So argued Tami Kesselman, an expert in impact investing and WDI’s Global Impact Speaker in January. Kesselman followed her University of Michigan campus discussion with a video interview at WDI’s offices.

Kesselman, the founder of Aligned Investing Global, works at the intersection of corporate, government, entrepreneurial and investor communities. Among the topics Kesselman addressed in the video include:

• What helped overcome centuries of mistrust and misaligned priorities between business, government, philanthropic and impact investing communities?
• What is working well and not working well in how businesses are linking their impact to the Sustainable Development Goals?
• In 10-15 years, how do you think the private sector will be assessing and managing its impact?

Kesselman’s WDI talk to U-M students gave them a behind-the-scenes look at how the business, government, philanthropic and investing communities overcame years of mistrust and misaligned priorities to begin a shift toward collaborative investments. She also discussed whether this large-scale, multi-sector collaboration in every part of the world is here to stay. And she also shared why she thinks businesses should consider the Sustainable Development Goals as a whole, rather than focus on individual ones.

Kesselman earned her bachelor’s degree in Industrial Relations at the University of Michigan with a triple minor in business, economics, and communications. She then went on to earn her Master of Public Administration degree at Harvard Kennedy School, with a dual concentration in business and government.