Mark E. Van Ness Biography -2007

Mark E. Van Ness is a catalyst for sustainability in both the business and not-for-profit sector.

He is the Co-founder and chief executive officer of Sperry Van Ness (www.svn.com), commercial real estate advisors. Since its founding in 1987, Sperry Van Ness has grown to provide exceptional opportunities for a staff of over 1,400 in 37 states and $10 billion in sales a year. By nurturing an environment that embraces diversity, minorities and/or women now represent 60% of the leading advisors at Sperry Van Ness. He established the Sperry Van Ness Legacy Foundation which finances charities to expand as social enterprises, and led has led the creation of the company’s Corporate Social Responsibility Programs including the Core Covenant since 1991.

Van Ness has benefited from peer group education for over 18 years as a member of TEC/VISTAGE (www.vistage.com), the largest CEO organization in the world, as well as ongoing participation in Young President’s Organization (www.ypo.org), whose mission is to create better leaders through education and peer forums. Within YPO, which has over 10,000 presidents in 80 countries, Van Ness founded the Social Responsibility Network, co-championed the Strategic Philanthropy Network and the Economic Development Network, and is a charter member of the Micro-Finance Action Forum and the Peace Action Network.

In addition to founding the Institute, Van Ness founded the Social Enterprise Loan Fund (SELFund), a syndicate of donor advised funds providing credit enhancement and financing to social enterprises. The SELFund has participated in over $22 million in financing for charitable organizations since 2006. He also serves on the Advisory Board for Good Capital (www.goodcap.net), an investment firm that accelerates the flow of capital to innovative ventures and initiatives that harness the power of the market to create sustainable solutions.

Ernst and Young named Van Ness as a finalist of their Entrepreneur of the Year Award. Additionally, Sperry Van Ness has been named one of the Top 10 Most Innovative Brokerage Firms in North America by Realcomm for its “visionary implementation of a nationwide brokerage organization utilizing non-traditional infrastructure.” He has been a featured speaker for the Building Industry Association (BIA), Pepperdine University MBA Program, YPO, Alliance for Non-profit Management, Hong Kong Council of Social Service and has been featured in recent articles in Business Week and Forbes magazines. He is an Orange County Community Foundation Ambassador, a member of the Los Angeles Social Venture Partners (www.LASVP.org) and the Social Enterprise Alliance (www.se-alliance.com).

Jerr Boschee

Jerr Boschee has spent the past 25 years as an advisor to social entrepreneurs in the United States and abroad. To date he has delivered seminars or conducted workshops in 41 states and 13 countries and has long been recognized as one of the founders of the Social Enterprise movement worldwide. Nonprofit Times named him to its 2004 nonprofit sector "Power & Influence Top 50" list.

Mr. Boschee is Executive Director of The Institute for Social Entrepreneurs, which he created in 1999, and is Chairman and CEO of Peace Corps Encore!, Inc., a nonprofit he co-founded in 2003 to re-deploy former Peace Corps Volunteers and staff members on short-term assignments in their areas of professional expertise. He also served from 2001 to 2004 as an advisor to England's Department of Trade and Industry and is currently teaching a series of master classes throughout England, Scotland and Ireland.

Mr. Boschee joined The National Center for Social Entrepreneurs in 1984 and served as President and CEO from 1990 to 1999. He has also been the catalyst and co-founder of The Forum for Nonprofit Leadership (1987), The Affirmative Business Alliance of North America (1989), The National Gathering for Social Entrepreneurs (1997), The Red River Academy for Social Entrepreneurs (2001) and The Executive Academy for Social Entrepreneurs (2002). The Alliance and the Gathering were the first two membership organizations created for entrepreneurs in the field of Social Enterprise Institute.

Russ Phillips

Russ served as President and CEO of SHURflo in Cypress California, a company that he grew from $28M to $100M in revenues under ten years. In his thirty-five years of manufacturing leadership he has studied the many attributes of successful strategic leadership and created the unique perspectives that are contained in this presentation.

Russ has presented this and other topics that include, turnaround strategies and building a positive business culture to several national organizations including the Association for Manufacturing Excellence (AME) 2004 annual conference, The Employers Group, Hydraulic Institute CEO Roundtable as well as many Orange County business leadership groups.

He sits on several business advisory boards and served as the president of the Hydraulic Institute a national organization that sets standards for the pump industry.

He has been a TEC member (50) for the past ten years and has recently founded Transom Partners a unique consulting practice for CEO’s that assists in the navigational coaching and unleashing of dreams, strategies and potentials that lie within leaders and their businesses.

As part of the Institute he leads the Social Enterprise Leadership Forum, a peer group learning environment comprised of Executive Directors committed to creating a legacy of self-sufficiency.

Andrew Horowitz

Andrew Horowitz is a former entrepreneur and currently an angel investor. Mr. Horowitz founded and sold a telecommunications business that provided integrated voice and data communications products and services to tenants of multi-tenant office buildings in Southern California. Since the sale of his business in 1995 to a U.S. public company, Andy has invested in an assortment of high-tech seed ventures and has provided consulting and mentoring services to local startups.

Mr. Horowitz is a founding partner of the Los Angeles chapter of the Social Venture Partners, and a member both of the Tech Coast Angels, a group of 250 Southern California angel investors, and of Investors' Circle, a national organization of socially responsible angel investors. He also serves as chairman of the Advisory Board of the Venture Finance Institute of the Peter F. Drucker School of Management and a member of the advisory board of the Anahuac del Sur business school in Mexico City. Mr. Horowitz graduated from Stanford University in 1968 with a B.A. degree in Political Science.