Building an Entrepreneur-centric Impact Ecosystem – Brigit Helms

Brigit Helms is Executive Director at the Miller Center for Social Entrepreneurship, the premier university-based social enterprise accelerator dedicated to eliminating poverty. For 30 years, Brigit has created and delivered solutions to social and environmental challenges in 45 countries across Africa, Asia, and Latin America, in both the private and public sectors. As vice president for the global development company, Development Alternatives, Brigit led a team of experts in economic growth, governance, environment, and results management to help design and implement solutions to complex development problems around the world. Previously, she led the Multilateral Investment Fund (now IDB Invest), the innovation lab of the Inter-American Development Bank that invests $85 million per year in social enterprises across Latin America and the Caribbean. At McKinsey, she helped build a global financial inclusion practice, providing mobile financial services for the under-served, and supporting the development of a smart card-based agent banking network. Brigit spent around 14 years with the World Bank Group, including launching banking, agriculture, and forestry programs to benefit small and medium enterprises in Indonesia through its International Finance Corp (IFC). She also served as sector leader for IFC’s East Asia and the Pacific region, leading the Access to Finance program from her base in Cambodia. She was a founding member of the Consultative Group to Assist the Poor (CGAP), a global center of excellence for financial inclusion, where she supported microfinance institutions and their ecosystems across the globe.