What does an impact career look like from every seat at the table? Vivian Gee has sat in most of them. After Silicon Valley and an INSEAD MBA, she chose impact over the finance or consulting path. She convened social entrepreneurs at the World Economic Forum, built a central bank network for financial inclusion, ran Temasek’s corporate philanthropy, and designed donor education at Stanford. Most recently, she led the Fair Employment Foundation through a post-pandemic turnaround.

If you think impact means a UN job or a nonprofit, this episode widens the map. Vivian explains what each type of impact organisation offers, which one brings you closest to the people you want to serve, and where funders can do more. She is frank about the trade-offs. Pay in the impact sector varies as much as the roles themselves, and running an impact organisation is anything but a soft landing after corporate life. Her message to anyone still weighing the move is simple: there has never been a better time to start.

Resources mentioned:

• Trust-Based Philanthropy Project: https://www.trustbasedphilanthropy.org
• Nonprofit Employment Data Project, George Mason University (US nonprofits as the third-largest employer): https://nonprofitcenter.schar.gmu.edu/category/nonprofit-employment-data-project

Abbreviations:

• SDGs: United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, https://sdgs.un.org/goals
• ILO: International Labour Organization, https://www.ilo.org
• IOM: International Organization for Migration, https://www.iom.int
• WEF: World Economic Forum, https://www.weforum.org
• CSR: corporate social responsibility