About Positive Ventures
Founded in 2007, our team brings a wide range of experience in the fields of philanthropy, social enterprise, nonprofit management and fundraising. Over the past three years Positive Ventures has specialized in climate change, and particularly efforts to slow emissions from coal.
Joanna Messing, Founder and President
Joanna brings over fifteen years of experience in the fields of nonprofit sustainability, social enterprise development, venture philanthropy and micro-enterprise. She has held a variety of roles, from being a social entrepreneur herself to consulting and investing in social entrepreneurs. Joanna is the author and co-author of several publications and articles in the field of social enterprise and nonprofit financial sustainability.
Prior to launching Positive Ventures, Joanna was Associate Director of REDF (previously Roberts Enterprise Development Fund), a leading venture philanthropy fund in the San Franciso Bay Area, California. She led REDF through a strategic planning process that is currently being implemented.
Previously she was Director of NESsT Consulting and Enterprise Development, where she led the business plan, startup and implementation of NESsT Consulting – an income generating venture for NESsT. NESsT Consulting provides consulting services in social enterprise development to clients in Eastern Europe and Latin America. Prior to this position she led the Central European office of the NESsT Venture Fund (NVF). The NESsT Venture Fund is a philanthropic investment fund providing financial and capacity-building support to a select portfolio of social enterprises owned and operated by civil society organizations in Central Europe and Latin America. All of the social enterprises in the NESsT Venture Fund portfolio are intended to generate revenues to help diversify the financing base and further the mission of the parent nonprofit organization. Through the NVF and NESsT Consulting Joanna provided capacity building and consulting to hundreds of social enterprises in over 16 countries.
Before coming to NESsT, Joanna worked in the field of social enterprise at Youth Industry , a nonprofit based in San Francisco, California that owns and operates businesses to train and employ homeless youth. At Youth Industry she was responsible for the business plan, start-up and first year of management of Nu2U2, a thrift store that is YI's fifth and largest business.
Joanna also has worked in the field of micro-enterprise and micro-finance. She worked as a Project Manager for Greater Holyoke Community Development Corporation, where she provided technical assistance to micro-entrepreneurs and started a youth entrepreneurship program for primarily Puerto Rican at-risk youth.
Ms. Messing holds an M.B.A. from the Isenberg School of Management, University of Massachusetts and a B.A. in Economics and Third World Studies from Oberlin College.
Jessica Haynie, Program Associate
Jessica’s career has taken her down the path of working with nonprofits, primarily in fundraising, but also with small businesses and entrepreneurs as she earned her M.B.A. from the Whitman School of Management at Syracuse University. It is here where she focused her studies on social entrepreneurship and nonprofit management.
Jessica comes to us with six years of experience working with and studying the nonprofit sector. Prior to joining Positive Ventures, Jessica was the Development Director of Conservation Voters New Mexico and Conservation Voters New Mexico Education Fund where she conducted and managed program design and grant writing for the two organizations.
As a native of New York, she began her career in fundraising as the Development Associate for Syracuse University’s School of Architecture and then as the Manager of Individual Giving for the Syracuse Symphony Orchestra where she managed a $1M Annual Fund with 9 supporting campaigns.
She has also consulted in the areas of fundraising, board development, and strategic planning for several environmental nonprofits including the Great Swamp Conservancy, Inc. and the Fenner Renewable Energy Education Center, both located in upstate New York.
Jessica currently resides in Santa Fe, New Mexico, where she blogs for the Global Center for Cultural Entrepreneurship and is an active member of Future Santa Fe, a giving circle for Santa Fe’s next generation of community leaders. She is also working on creating a Nonprofit Accelerator and Development Center that puts an emphasis on collaboration for greater impact.
In addition to her M.B.A., Jessica holds a B.A. in Integrative Physiology from the University of Colorado.
Phayvahn Luekhamhan, Executive Assistant
Phayvanh Luekhamhan is a poet based in Montpelier, Vermont, and works as Ms. Messing’s assistant. Phayvanh is juried in Poetry and Performance by the Vermont Arts Council, and has held readings and workshops throughout New England for over ten years. She has been supported by the Vermont Arts Council, The Vermont Folklife Center and The School for International Training. Her work has been published and/or anthologized by Chrysalis Books and BakkaMagazine.com, among others. She has performed poetry at Sandglass Theater, Middlebury College, and the Champlain Valley Folk Festival. Phayvanh has attended the Vermont Studio Center, Soul Mountain, and is a proud Kundiman fellow. She serves as treasurer of Kundiman’s Alumni Scholarship Fund. She currently volunteers with Montpelier Alive!, writing their weekly newsletter and coordinating Art Walk, among other events. Phayvanh maintains Vermont’s most comprehensive online poetry calendar on her website, where she also blogs: www.phayvanh.com.