Description
Improving job quality doesn’t just benefit workers; it can also strengthen small businesses themselves and the broader communities they serve. Yet, many small business owners lack the resources and knowledge needed to improve the quality of their jobs. Trusted partners, like community development financial institutions (CDFIs), can make a meaningful difference.
Join the Aspen Institute Economic Opportunities Program on Zoom on Thursday, June 26, from 3:00 to 4:00 p.m. Eastern time, to learn more about the guide, hear from CDFIs about their approaches to building job quality advising into their work, and share your questions and comments. We are eager to hear what you think!
Through our Shared Success demonstration, we’ve had the opportunity to learn about the range of strategies CDFI business advisors have employed to encourage job quality among their small business clients. Our Job Quality Advising Guide was developed in collaboration with business advisors based on this experience. Centered on business value, this guide provides tools, resources, and success stories that can help organizations working with small businesses coach clients on potential job quality improvements that can also enhance business resilience.
Job Quality Advising Guide
The Job Quality Advising Guide from the Aspen Institute Economic Opportunities Program helps organizations working with small businesses coach clients on improvements that can enhance business resilience.
Speakers
Opening Remarks
Vice President, The Aspen Institute; Executive Director, Economic Opportunities Program
Maureen Conway serves as vice president at the Aspen Institute and executive director of the Institute’s Economic Opportunities Program (EOP). EOP works to expand individuals’ opportunities to connect to quality work, start businesses, and build economic stability that provides the freedom to pursue opportunity. Maureen founded EOP’s Workforce Strategies Initiative and has headed up workforce research at the Aspen Institute since 1999. Maureen also curates a public discussion series at the Aspen Institute, Opportunity in America, which brings together voices from business, labor, policy, human services, media, academia, and others to discuss the challenges experienced by many in today’s labor markets and new ideas for addressing these challenges. In addition, Maureen oversees EOP’s leadership development programs, which connect innovators, both within communities and from across the country, to peers working to help low- and moderate-income Americans access opportunity.
Chief Strategy Officer, Northern Initiatives
Amanda serves as chief strategy officer for Northern Initiatives, a community development financial institution (CDFI) providing loans and business services to Michigan entrepreneurs. With over 20 years in the CDFI industry, she contributes to strategic planning and organizational effectiveness initiatives that support innovation and growth. During her time as director of business services, Amanda helped develop Initiate, Northern Initiatives’ online business education portal that aims to provide support to borrowers. This platform has been adopted by other CDFIs and entrepreneurial support organizations. Amanda has progressed through multiple roles at Northern Initiatives and has completed the Aspen Institute’s Job Quality Fellowship (2018-19) and Emerging Leaders of Microbusiness programs. She currently serves on the Board of the CDFI Coalition and as a policy committee member for the Michigan CDFI Coalition.
Senior Program Director, Workforce, Coastal Enterprises, Inc.
Cynthia is the senior director, Workforce Solutions at Coastal Enterprises, Inc. (CEI), a Maine-based community development financial institution with a mission to build just, vibrant and climate-resilient futures for people and communities in Maine and rural regions by integrating finance, business expertise and policy solutions in ways that make the economy work more equitably.
Cynthia leads CEI’s Good Jobs work, expanding opportunities for marginalized job seekers and helping employers create a people strategy that delivers competitive advantage. Working individually with business leaders, Cynthia crafts a multi-year workforce roadmap that is mutually beneficial: good for the business and their workers.
Cynthia also leads CEI’s child care sector work, including policy advocacy and our signature program – the Child Care Business Lab, a cohort-based program that helps people start child care businesses by integrating small business start-up education with guidance on how to deliver high-quality child care programming and coaching through the licensing process.
Prior to joining CEI, Cynthia led commercial operations for subsidiaries of Thomson Reuters, a global information business. She had the great fortune to co-lead a joint venture start-up in London, then work on a turnaround team for a North Carolina-based business that had been in decline for a decade, and then grow a Detroit-based business faster than the market rate.
Cynthia grew up in Lewiston, Maine, at a time when the mills were closing and saw firsthand how important it is to harness the collective strength of a community to enable people to reach their full potential and to stimulate the local economy.
Loan Officer/Business Advisor, African Development Center
Delphine Ntegeye is a Business Loan Officer and Advisor at the African Development Center (ADC), a nonprofit dedicated to addressing disparities faced by African immigrants. In her role, she provides access to capital, technical assistance, and financial guidance to underserved entrepreneurs across Minnesota. Her work has given her deep insight into the economic, educational, and social barriers impacting African immigrants and other underrepresented communities. Delphine is committed to advancing equitable opportunities by supporting small businesses and improving job quality through community-driven solutions.
Moderator
Senior Research Associate, Economic Opportunities Program
Bryn Morgan is a senior research associate at the Aspen Institute Economic Opportunities Program. Bryn is passionate about how research can be leveraged to address inequality and advance economic equity efforts. Before joining the Institute, she completed a Master of Science in Gender, Development, and Globalization at the London School of Economics and Political Science. Her research interests centered around investigating intended and unintended consequences of policies, from a feminist economist perspective. She particularly focused on how neoliberal conditions have intersected with gendered violence, precarity, and political extremism. During her studies, Bryn also worked for a nonprofit aimed at addressing domestic violence, and she aided in research efforts for a volunteer project on violence against women abroad. Prior to graduate school, Bryn worked in the sociology department of Colorado College, contributing to research on racial bias in local family court cases and developing a youth community organizing program. She holds a bachelor’s degree in sociology from Colorado College. Bryn enjoys cooking plant-based food, weightlifting, playing board games, and doing crossword puzzles.
Learn More
About Shared Success
Good jobs and strong businesses are vital to the well-being of communities across the country. Yet millions of workers struggle with poor-quality jobs, and small business owners often struggle to find and retain the employees they need. Shared Success, a project of the Aspen Institute Economic Opportunities Program (EOP), shows how building better jobs can uplift both sides at the same time. Supported by a $12 million investment from the Gates Foundation, EOP partnered with 11 community lenders to integrate job quality programming into their small business support services, supporting the needs of employees while helping small businesses succeed.
About the Economic Opportunities Program
The Aspen Institute Economic Opportunities Program hosts a variety of discussions to advance strategies, policies, and ideas to help low- and moderate-income people thrive in a changing economy. To learn about upcoming events and webinars, join our mailing list and follow us on social media.
