WEconomy

“The way I saw it back then, society gave two choices: I could harm the planet at work and give back in my spare time, or I could follow my dream of social impact and forfeit job security.”

Part One: Chapter 3From the Slaughterhouse to Social Enterprise

By Marc Kielburger

After a few detours, I was set to graduate from Oxford with a law degree. Debt weighed on me like a stack of used textbooks, and I was tired of eating instant ramen noodles atop furniture I'd rescued from the street. Thankfully, I was entertaining several job offers. I could accept the very lucrative gig I'd been offered by the jet set, or I could help run a small charity out of my parents' living room with my little brother. I mean this sincerely: it was one of the most difficult decisions of my life.

Most of my classmates were taking offers in Manhattan or London with Lehman Brothers, Goldman Sachs, or JPMorgan, heading up the kind of acquisitions chronicled in the Wall Street Journal. Others went to Silicon Valley and sold software to other companies that sell software, working on multimillion-dollar patents. In those days, everyone wanted to be Steve Jobs with more wardrobe variation. Meanwhile, our charity's entire staff fit into two rooms; everyone shared one phone line. It was a long way from Wall Street.

I'd been involved in the WE Movement from its earliest days. I'd written grant proposals, traveled ...