Impact Interview: Josh Penny

Name: Josh Penny

Role/Function: Manager Of Corporate Citizenship, Mailchimp

What He’s Currently Working On: 

I work on the Corporate Citizenship team at Mailchimp, an all-in-one marketing platform for small businesses. Our team interprets Mailchimp’s purpose in the community. We empower the underdog by advocating for and investing in, what we call small world-changers — growing nonprofit organizations, social impact entrepreneurs, and creatives who are changing the world. We sponsor organizations financially, we help connect employees with volunteer opportunities, we build partnerships and programs, and we market Mailchimp’s purpose.

We are, of course, focused on the substance of community work, but we also emphasize the style. It’s not just about what you support, how you support a cause or organization can matter just as much. Our team is constantly trying to understand the “customer” experience, and specifically how hard it can be to lead a nonprofit or a social enterprise. So, everything we do with our community partners is service-oriented in the spirit of partnership.

Right now, we’ve been working hard to build our capacity for impact measurement. My team has had such fun working with Reconsidered to identify KPIs and build tools for data collection. We recently launched a new site, Big Change Starts Small, to report on the $12 million Mailchimp has invested in our hometown of Atlanta over the last 8 years.

Our big priority for 2021 is to connect more people, inside and outside of the company, to our team’s work. In Q1, we’re launching an employee donation matching program and are focused on how to make that benefit feel relevant to what our employees care about most. We’ll be retooling our Community College program, which helps our employees think deeply and broadly about equity and justice. I’m also working on a new grant program for social entrepreneurs that puts community members at the center of the decision-making process.

1. What was the “aha” moment that sparked your interest in social impact? 

When I was 10 years old, my grandfather died in the World Trade Center during the 9/11 attacks. I never had the chance to meet him — he served a prison sentence and lost contact with our family. My father searched for him for years with no success. A New York Times reporter just so happened to attend his funeral while covering the aftermath of the attack and tracked down my dad after noticing there was no family in attendance. Through her reporting, we learned that my grandfather had actually been homeless for many years.

My dad pieced together his life through records from a constellation of New York City nonprofits and shelters. In the months prior to his death, things were looking up for my grandfather. He had gotten a recycling job through a workforce development program and was renting a room. I remember being confused that so many people and organizations helped my grandfather over the years, yet it took more than a decade for him to escape homelessness. Why did the safety net take so long to work? And what was lost in the process? These questions stayed with me for a long time and I’ve endeavored to learn as much as I can about the systems that limit human potential. I’m particularly interested in shifting the cultural constraints we place on the social impact sector and how we can be more effective.

2. How did you break into the social impact space? 

I’ve known that I wanted to do social impact work for as long as I can remember. So when I graduated from Yale University, I moved back to Atlanta to work for education and college access organizations like the Posse Foundation. The neat thing about social change work is that you can do it in a variety of institutions and roles. I knew early on that I wanted to gain experience in nonprofits, philanthropy, and business.

Mailchimp has afforded me the opportunity to explore how brands can create value for communities, whether it be through impact partnerships or inclusive hiring practices. Our co-founders have always pushed us to “zig when others are zagging.” So, my team has always felt like a place where we could try out strategies and pursue opportunities that might feel offbeat to others.

3. What most excites you about the social impact space right now?

We’re in a moment of time where many in the field are rethinking long-held values and assumptions about how to achieve impact. For example, it’s often felt like the playbook for corporate social responsibility had been written decades ago. Many feel that the field hasn’t lived up to its potential and now the stakes are even higher. A new generation of leaders, within companies, and in other sectors, are re-examining the social contract between business and society. That makes me hopeful.

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