Fresh Perspectives. Stronger Connections.
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Sometimes progress starts with a better question. Sometimes it takes another draft, a different perspective, or permission to play. This month, our FINNOVATION community has been making room for all of it. We’re sharing three candid founder reflections, a look inside the Fellowship, alumni connections, and new research we participated in.
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FINNOVATION Founders’ Stories
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Seeing Familiar Work Through a New Lens
Clarinda Solberg, founder of Tended Roots Collaborative, didn’t expect a lesson on business models to change how she understood years of work in collective impact. Then she encountered multi-sided platforms. Her reflection explores the often-invisible value of connecting partners, resources, and communities, and why making that value visible matters.
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When Confidence Takes a Dive
What happens when your business concept keeps changing and your confidence can’t keep up? Chao Yang offers an honest reflection on navigating the Discovery Module alongside parenting and a new job. A lesson from her toddler’s parenting class helped her reconnect with her purpose and approach the work differently, one imperfect draft at a time.
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Looking Again at the Problem
Shannon Steven’s idea for Wonder Wander began with a question about missing public art signage. She thought she understood the problem. A “5 Whys” exercise prompted her to reconsider. Her reflection explores what happens when research challenges a core business assumption, and why a founder’s first explanation shouldn’t have to be the last.
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FINN Debate Lab:
Making the Case for the Other Side
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Should every social enterprise try to scale? Should mission or financial sustainability come first?
On October 3, Caitlin and Carmen took on the question of scale, while Shannon and Laquita debated mission and margin. Their assignments called for more than defending an opinion: each debater had to understand both sides, anticipate pushback, and connect the argument to real founder decisions.
The positions were assigned, so they weren’t necessarily personal beliefs. That was part of the point. Building a venture means understanding people who see the tradeoffs differently, then making a thoughtful case for your next move.
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Pete Is Back...Cookie Monster, Too.
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Pete K. Wong returned as Cookie Monster with his workshop, The Importance of Play in Our Day to Day, which invited Fellows to play games, laugh, and give themselves permission to enjoy the moment. When the work feels serious, fun can become something we keep postponing. This session made room for it.
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We use AI in the program to accelerate research, support thought partnership, and explore strategic decisions. So, our cohort brought a little Fellowship humor to Halloween by dressing as Google Gemini “GEMs.” The costumes were a fitting nod to a familiar phrase coined by Cohort 7: “There’s a GEM for that.”
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Community Beyond the Classroom
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Coffee, Conversation, and Alumni Connections
On Thursday, October 22, FINNOVATION alumni and current fellows gathered at Dunn Brothers Coffee in Arden Hills. The Fellowship may have an end date, but staying connected doesn’t have to. We’re glad to make room for the relationships that continue beyond the program.
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Building Businesses and Building Trust
Some of the most valuable connections happen between curriculum days. Our Fellows self-organize to work on their businesses and think through challenges alongside one another. Those moments help turn a cohort into a trusted community, where people can ask honest questions and feel comfortable saying, “I’m stuck.”
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Alumni Spotlight:
Dr. Shelia at NAMI Minnesota
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We’re celebrating FINNOVATION Cohort 7 alum Dr. Shelia Sweeney, founder of The KinetiCalm Collective, and her speaking engagement with NAMI Minnesota!
Congrats Shelia!!!!
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Mission-driven organizations need strong foundations. But the support they need and the funding available don’t always line up.
FINNOVATION Institute participated in the study behind Closing the Capacity Gap, Catalyst Exchange’s inaugural State of Capacity Building report.
Among its findings: only 19% of nonprofits received grants specifically designated for capacity building in the past year. The report examines gaps in support, why organizational context matters, and what it could take to better resource the work behind the mission.
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The FINNOVATION Fellowship program is made possible through generous support from the Bush Foundation, whose mission is to invest in great ideas and the people who power them.
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