In the Fall of 2014, Acorns launched a mobile app that made small automatic investments of "spare change" from each daily transaction made on a credit or debit card.  The app was beautifully designed and simple to use and I signed up to see how it worked.  After a couple of months I had invested around $60 - not a huge amount for me but good for someone just starting off in investing possibly.

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It occurred to me though that this same mechanism could be applied to charitable giving.  Wouldn't it be awesome to know that for every purchase - necessary or frivolous - a small of money would be donated to a good cause! And so the idea for GiveSimply began to brew in my mind.  I jumped into research on non-profit world and existing services for online and mobile donations, and started to design the framework of my new app.

At about the same time I learned of a startup founder bootcamp called Founder Institute that holds a 4 month long class with a chapter in New York City.  What better way to test and develop my idea than among a class of other motivated and creative people, and with weekly seminars on various topics given by other New York based entrepreneurs.

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FI (Founder Institute) was intensive and asked a lot of each of the class member.  The class started with 36 and ended with 12 graduates as people dropped out or were asked to leave for not keeping up.  Weekly seminars consisted of presentation by other entrepreneurs, Q and A, then pitch practice and critique.  Topics covered ranged from Customer Development, Revenue Models, Legal, Team Building, Product Development, Traction, Marketing and Fundraising.

 

Although the lessons learned by the entrepreneurs who shared their founder story were often contradictory, a common theme centered around the idea that passion is a requirement for a startup founder to endure the long hours, lack of income or security and extreme ups and downs of running a new company.  I was one of the leaders in the class, with the most polished presentations and thoughtful questions for speakers and classmates alike, but I was called out more than once for a lack of convincing passion for the product I was pitching.  I also found I enjoyed asking my colleagues about their progress and workshopping new ideas and strategies to help their journey, more than discussing my own product.  I loved thinking about all of the ideas in the room and it became clear to me that my passion lay in working with creative people and helping them push a new and exciting idea forward.

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GiveSimply and Founder Institute was a profound journey for me and pushed me to do some of my best work.

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