NESsTERs

A major challenge of the emerging field of social enterprise is that of identifying individuals with the mixture of skills needed to understand the unique cultural, ethical and management needs of social enterprises.The NESsT Entrepreneur-in-Residence (NESsTER) program was launched in 1999 to address this shortcoming by providing opportunities for recent graduates of business and nonprofit management programs and for other young/mid-career professionals to work on distinct initiatives with NESsT and the social enterprises we support.

The ultimate goal of the NESsTER program is to build a cadre of professional leaders prepared with this unique set of management skills to further the fields of social enterprise around the world.

Since its inception, NESsT has hosted nearly 100 graduates of business and nonprofit management programs and other young/mid-career professionals to work with NESsT on distinct initiatives in our offices across Europe, North America and Latin America. Coming to NESsT for as short as a summer or for as long as two years, our NESsTERs have included many MBAs but also students of international development, sociology and social work, as well as mid-career professionals and professors.

NESsT has hosted NESsTERs from over 15 of the world’s most esteemed universities, among others UC Berkeley, Central European University (CEU), Columbia, Dartmouth, HEC, Oxford, Stanford, University of Geneva and Wharton. Similarly diverse are the nationalities of our alumni, including NESsTERs from Canada, Chile, Colombia, Czech Republic, Hungary, Italy, The Netherlands, Poland, Slovakia, Ukraine, the UK and USA.

NESsTERs are fully immersed in the daily work of NESsT, learning first-hand the unique set of management skills and gaining hands-on experience in social enterprise management and development. NESsTERs have contributed significantly to all areas of NESsT’s work, including to the early stages of new projects that ultimately have grown into significant initiatives at NESsT. NESsTERs have also contributed to NESsT research and co-authored books and reports. They have worked on organizational projects from developing elements of our communications strategy, fundraising research, knowledge management tools or human resources policies.