Aaron Hurst

Jim Koch, brewer and founder of Samuel Adams at the Boston Beer Company, found himself painting a community center in South Boston in 2007 and vowed to find a smarter way to add value. His program, Samuel Adams Brewing the American Dream, is working to create jobs and provide pro...

Matt Lonner grew up in San Francisco and took his first job in high school selling shoes to business men in the financial district. Today he oversees the global philanthropy program of the third largest company in America and works to impact the lives of people around the world. Matt...

Pablo Alvarado came to the United States from El Salvador in the 1990s and worked for five years as an undocumented laborer. Today he works for the National Day Laborer Organization Network (NDLON) and helps to fight for the rights and dignity of day laborers. I learned of his story...

Wowed by a singing barista and a great place to bring her two daughters, Cecilia Carter joined the Starbucks team as their Vice President of Global Diversity, Community and Government Affairs, for Starbucks Coffee Company. In between toffee-nut lattes Cecilia was able to speak with me about the Starbucks approach...

Claire Dixon uses her skills as a trained actress every day to tell the stories needed to drive social change around the world. She recently moved within GlaxoSmithKline to become Vice President of Corporate Responsibility. GSK has make a pledge to A Billion Plus Change, providing a total of over...

Like me, Paula Davis didn't last long in her first job out of college. But, she ended up working at some of the leading brands in the world -- even for Michael Jordan at one point. Today she runs the Alcoa Foundation, which recently pledged to contribute one hundred thousand...

South Carolina-based RIGGS Partners may be the only marketing firm in the country that has paying clients stop by to feed them breakfast in the middle of the night. The secret? CreateAthon, a program dreamt up by Teresa Coles in the shower one morning. Teresa recently...

In a blog last year, I wrote about a trip to China as an advisor to BSR's Ci Yuan (http://ciyuan.bsr.org/). On that trip, a leader in their nascent philanthropic community asked if China should introduce the idea of boards to their social sector. The question caught me by...

An avid animal lover and past guest on Ellen, Shannon Schuyler directs corporate responsibility activities for Pricewaterhouse Coopers. I recently had the honor to speak with the driven, unrelenting and generous Shannon about the role of business in driving social change.

Despite high unemployment, companies are still having...

On numerous occasions I have written to the New York Times Ethicist columnist with ethical dilemmas arising from my job and personal situations. They were never selected for publication. While failing to use my questions was not an ethical lapse on their part it was very disappointing on this end.

Based in London, Jenny Davis-Peccoud serves as the global leader of Bain & Company's Social Impact Practice. Having spent most of her career at Bain, Jenny has been able to watch the evolution of the firm's investment in social impact from the incubation and subsequent launch of Bridgespan in 2000...

Interview with Markus Hipp: Executive Director of the BMW Foundation

Markus Hipp is the Executive Director of the BMW Foundation, headquartered in Germany. He began his career in philanthropy at the Robert Bosch Foundation. I recently spoke with Markus about his work and his perception of German vs. American leadership.

Stanley Litow serves as IBM's Vice President of Corporate Citizenship & Corporate Affairs and President of IBM's Foundation, with a career spanning the public and private sector. Bringing this depth of experience to play, he has helped lead and create innovative social responsibility programs, including The...

Three years ago I posted my user manual on the Taproot Foundation blog. Inspired by an article by Ben Dattner in Business Week, it has been a wonderful way to help Roots (i.e. our staff) understand my flavor of craziness.

I just updated my manual with the latest insights...

This weekend I had the honor to sit down with Kris Kringle, aka Santa Claus, CEO of the North Pole. Perhaps the world's most well-loved philanthropist, few know that Mr. Kringle is also a social responsibility visionary -- we were eager to hear about his latest pro bono...

Edmund Phelps, a Nobel-prize winning economist believes the "natural rate" of unemployment in the medium term is likely to be around 7.5 percent and most economists seem to agree. This is certainly lower than the current unemployment rates north of 8 percent , but a...

Is 2012 the year for you to go beyond writing a check and attending a gala and toward really investing in a nonprofit in a deep and meaningful way? Are you looking to move from casual dating to a serious and meaningful partnership with your favored organization? Take our quiz...

Prior to starting the Taproot Foundation, I worked in two technology start ups in the Bay Area. As anyone who has worked at a start up knows, it's a lot of hard work -- you constantly make quick decisions with incredible consequences. Yet, over the last ten years as President...

There is something almost magical about CEOs. We aren't held to the same laws of science as other professionals. Here is one magic trick I can share with you: 50% of my job doesn't even require one minute of work each week. Not bad, eh?

By simply knowing a CEO...

Full disclosure: Aaron Hurst sits on the Board of BoardSource, a current Prudential grantee.

Mary O'Malley wanted to be a nun when she was ten years old. Or a spy. Or a concert pianist. Today, she's none of those things, or, as she puts it, a little of all three....