“Professional Mentor” Helps Students Re-imagine Entrepreneurship and Social Change
Robert Gehorsam ’76 might be called a modern renaissance man. His career has spanned the entire arc of digital platforms and entertainment from the infancy of interactive online experiences through the introduction of generative artificial intelligence. His decades of leadership in innovative organizations in games, digital media, and educational technology – along with his experience as a venture partner and advisor for early-stage companies – has made him a valued advisor and mentor to entrepreneurs.
He sees teaching Entrepreneurship and Social Change at Grinnell College as an outgrowth of his career as a “professional mentor”. Originally asked to participate in as an alumni lecturer in the Learning from Alumni course at the Wilson Center by the late Doug Caulkins, professor of anthropology, Gehorsam found that he loved the connection to Grinnell and to students. His involvement with students and their careers expanded to service on the leadership council of the Donald ’25 and Winifred ’27 Wilson Center for Innovation and Leadership and to the short course, last offered during the Fall 2024 semester.
“The way contemporary businesses must focus on shareholder value has created a bit of a misconception that all profit-oriented business is detrimental to addressing society’s most pressing problems. The reality is that there are ways to structure enterprises to innovate in addressing many of the world’s complex problems, often in ways that neither the public sector nor the philanthropic world can. We know that technology and innovation create effective solutions that can be implemented quickly and can be scaled up quickly. And very much in keeping with Grinnell’s tradition of social responsibility, we know that there is a lot of positive innovation possible in the systems that define the private sector. At a small scale, this is what the short course addresses,” said Gehorsam.
The course asked students like Elias Brotman ’25, a religious studies major from St. Paul, Minn., to imagine a business with some measurable impact on a social good and to reflect on concepts learned through journal entries. His idea, a non-profit that has the knowledge and technical capabilities to endow neighborhoods with the ability to eat from their backyard and preserve food, “is a way to circumvent a lot of the toxicities that exist in a food system based on shareholder capitalism.”
“In a short course, I found that my peers are really tuned in to massive business structures,” said Brotman. “I know nothing about it, but my classmates are asking sharp questions about concepts like the economics of mutuality and funds that create their own form of capital to measure and distribute resources,” Brotman added.
Gehorsam has put these principles to work himself as a contributor to The Carbon Almanac a set of books and educational guides, website, podcast series, and online courses created by a world-wide network of volunteers who came together to create a collection of essays, graphs, data, tables resources – and even cartoons – to provide accessible, credible and authoritative information on and the effects of human activity on the planet, along with real-life actions that people can take to make a difference.
The core of the course featured guest speakers – including many Grinnell College alumni – who helped students explore how organizational structures like C-corporations, public benefit corporations, and 501(c)3 entities can impact the psychology of the founders of an organization and drive its mission. Speakers like Ham Serunjogi ‘16, who with Majid Moujaled ’14 founded Chipper Cash, demonstrated how their platforms drive financial equity by providing financial and technical services to more than 5 million registered users on the African continent. Abby Rapoport ’08 shared her journey from journalist to publisher, creating a publishing and events platform to explore how politics, power and culture impact people’s lives.
“I learned that there is never one right way of doing things and that if you follow your interests and stay true to your principles, you can make good things happen,” said Brotman. “Hearing from alumni who have made their own careers through a combination of knowing the system and critical thinking opened my eyes to how we can decide how we want to work with, around, through, for, or under the system to create impact. It’s inspiring because they are successful people who do the right thing, but they have no illusions that it’s an easy process. That’s super valuable and Robert is intentionally doing that,” he added.
“I was impressed with Grinnell students and their ideas. While this is just a short course, I hope it provides some insight into how principles from business and entrepreneurship can impact health, education, inequality, climate, and good government,” said Gehorsam. “It’s been inspiring to work with them and see how their eyes are opened to the possibility of doing good and doing well.”