Criteria: Impact & Leadership
Mission for Social Impact
Joshua Venture Group funds ventures that provide greater capacity for Jewish communities to offer opportunities to:
- Work toward social and environmental justice
- Care for their members and their surroundings
- Connect to other Jews throughout the world
- Embrace and celebrate diversity
- Engage with the State of Israel and its residents
- Explore multiple paths to reverence and spirituality, intellectual challenge, and culture and cultural expression
Leadership Capability
Just as an entrepreneur in the business world does, the Jewish social entrepreneur identifies a void or significant opportunity in society and acts to address it with the aim of effecting positive social change. The entrepreneur develops a creative solution and a sound business plan to shift the status quo by implementing a venture that is sustainable and significantly impacts the current landscape. Social entrepreneurs may utilize new technologies and innovative program and funding models to dramatically alter efficiency and outcomes.
Selection Criteria for Candidates:
- Leadership and entrepreneurial skills
- Strength and persistence of vision and the capacity to transmit it to others
- Ability to reflect and learn from experience
- Intelligence and intellectual capacity
- Perseverance in the face of adversity and ambiguity
- An openness to share learning with others
- Capacity and motivation to identify and bring in resources to support vision
- Background and thorough knowledge of the field of endeavor
- A passion for social betterment in the context of Jewish values, identity, and community
All Candidates Must:
- Be the leader of the venture
- Be at least 18 years of age
- Be able to commit to two years of full-time work on their venture (minimum 35 hours a week) for the duration of the program
- Have no plans for graduate school, living abroad, or full-time commitments for the two-year period
- Be willing to work toward raising the additional funding beyond the two-year period
- Agree to full participation in the Joshua Venture Group community by attending its semi-annual retreats, providing ongoing feedback and metrics, and engaging fully with peers, mentors, and coaches