Melanie Rieback is a cybersecurity entrepreneur and the founder of Nonprofit Ventures, an organization dedicated to supporting post growth entrepreneurs. She runs an incubator to support post growth entrepreneurs and teaches a course at the University of Amsterdam on post growth entrepreneurship. Her lectures are available on YouTube, linked below.

This episode builds on a long series of conversations on this podcast exploring economic reform: stakeholder capitalism, steward ownership, co-ops, post-growth economics, to name a few. While it's called pot growth entrepreneurship, really this conversation is about non-extractive entrepreneurship. PGE rejects the typical silicon valley model of capital, scale, exit, in favor of bootstrapping, flat growth, and non-extraction.

In this conversation Jenny and Melanie discuss:

Melanie's path from cybersecurity entrepreneur to post growth entrepreneurship
Why not all forms of steward ownership ensure profit serves purpose
Why Melanie believes business is one of the most effective forms of activism
Defining post growth entrepreneurship (PGE)
Why PGE is a leverage point for systemic change
Issues with the Silicon Valley model of capital, scale, exit
Issues with status quo social enterprise and impact investing
Principles of PGE: bootstrapping, flat growth, non-extraction
Asset locks and stable steward ownership implementation
Policy initiatives in Europe to create a steward owned business entity
How to think about fair compensation when implementing PGE
Thoughts on the cultural component of this work
Business as spirituality

Resources:

Nonprofit Ventures website: https://nonprofit.ventures/
Post Growth Entrepreneurship: three minute explainer video
"Putting Post Growth Theory Into Practice" Medium post
Melanie's post growth entrepreneurship course at the University of Amsterdam; 8 YouTube lectures

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