Good Fortune

Writing about sustainable startups and interviewing Impact Founders to inspire your next impact project, startup, or side hustle. 

Good Fortune will help you:
🌱 Discover sustainable businesses
🧠 Learn from Impact Founders
🌍 Meet likeminded change makers

Founder

Swinburne Design Factory Melbourne

Developing new products, services, and experiences for the innovation world.

Working with Industry, Government, and Individuals to better understand their world and design new solutions to make it a better one.

Senior Product Development Manager

Create Kaizen

I design tools, workshops, and learning programs for tech leaders to:
- Build innovative teams
- Improve creative collaboration
- Build human-centered organizations
- Create systems to navigate uncertainty
- Develop creative problem solving practices

Strategic Designer & Facilitator

Designit

- Lead discovery research, persona building, and journey mapping for transformation projects
- Designed and facilitated AI enablement workshops for exploration and implementation
- Partnered with BizDev to identify customer needs across partner orgs
- Implemented Design Thinking to tackle creative business transformation problems

Strategic Design Lead

NOBA

NOBA partners with companies to build and launch new products, services, or business models.

I supported digital, innovation, and marketing teams in different stages of the development and launch of new products:
- Defining the value propositions and business model for new products and services
- Testing and learning through business prototyping - building and launching an alpha version of the business, gathering metrics, and iterating with real customers
- Driving a soft market launch to start growing the customer base before scaling

Business Designer

NerdWallet

- Software development planning and visibility at all levels of management
- End to end quarterly planning for cross-functional pods
- Manage communication touchpoints between Product, Engineering, Design, Data
- Agile coaching for NerdWallet feature teams
- Program Management for Content Design team

NerdWallet is on a mission to provide clarity for all of life’s financial decisions. We provide consumers with expert, personalized, and actionable guidance across a range of personal finance topics. Whether you’re shopping for a new credit card or mortgage, hoping to refinance a student loan, interested in learning more about investing, or just want to stay on top of your money, we do the homework for you, simplifying complex ideas so you have the information and tools you need to make the right decision for you.

Backed by IVP, RRE Ventures, iGlobe Partners and Silicon Valley Bank, among others, NerdWallet has been certified a Great Place to Work and named one of the Best Workplaces in the Bay Area™ 2020 by Fortune. We’ve been recognized for our stellar benefits, too, from world-class health, vision, and dental insurance to our matching 401(k) program to our generous time off and parental leave policies. 

Based in San Francisco, we have more than 400 passionate “Nerds” around the country, and we’re growing every day. Whether you’re committed to helping consumers or  excited about working for a profitable tech company or interested in growing professionally—or all of the above!—we’d love to hear from you. Check out our job openings here: http://www.nerdwallet.com/careers

Program Manager

- Project manager for Content Design team, creating graphics, illustrations, animations and editorial videos
- Certified ScrumMaster, Scrum Alliance
- Refine and streamline department processes to maintain efficiency and scalability in a fast growing startup environment
- Facilitate projects for a stakeholder team of 90 Content Strategists, Assigning Editors, Copy Editors, and Writers in team operations and communication
- Develop and oversee quantitative success metrics and key performance indicators for Content and Content Design teams
- Advise Content team on institutional knowledge, the fluid inner workings of startup company operations and their position in it

Content Operations and Project Management

Interscope Records

- Coordinated photo shoots and graphic design work for 100+ artist roster
- Oversaw and refined end to end project portals for photographers, stylists, graphic designers, etc.
- Created and resolved photography and art contracts for all creative services provided to Interscope artists
- Organized and facilitated all travel, setup and production operations  for Interscope directors, photographers, producers, and stylist  teams
- Refined organizational strategy, including artist archiving, scheduling, and soliciting promotional materials

Creative Marketing

Opus Bank

- Consulted high net-worth banking clientele, managing accounts $500k-$1mm in balances
- Spearheaded sales team who aquired $50mm in deposits since inception 10.17.2011
- Integral part of opening and growing de novo banking office
- Integrated new sales, appointment, and follow up pipelines for Opus Bank de novo offices
- Generated qualified large acquisition meetings for VP/Retail Banking Manager

Client Services

Want to build a business that makes money AND makes a difference?

I break down exactly how successful impact founders are doing it.

Through conversations with founders and detailed case studies, I uncover the strategies and tactics that actually work in social impact.

At Good Fortune, I'm creating:
🎙️ Deep-dive conversations with impact founders sharing their playbook
📧 Weekly newsletters breaking down successful impact businesses
🛠️ Free, actionable tools for bootstrapped teams (like our Tactic Cards)

Everything I make is designed to help you:
- Validate your impact business idea
- Find and connect with your first customers
- Grow sustainably while maximizing impact
- Navigate the unique challenges of social enterprise

Want actionable insights for your impact business?

→ Subscribe to my weekly newsletter
→ Download free Tactic Cards
→ Listen to the latest founder deep dives


A bit more about me and why I love doing this:
🏄 I've always been an "experience channel surfer" (look at my work history)
💭 I love finding the overlap between creativity, strategy, and impact
🙏 I want to create things that enable others to do their best work

Give me a follow 🔔 for free content and learnings shared daily, or reach out if you want to talk strategy and social innovation (whatever that means to you).

Jake Carroll

Careerfully

Careerfully partners with post-secondary Business Schools to enable their Career Services team to level-up the quality and personalization of the coaching they deliver students, empowering them to get quality jobs fast in a rapidly changing workforce. Our AI-powered platform solves key problems such as personalized coach development, automated session prep and debrief, powerful insights for team performance, and more.

Director of Team Performance & Learning Programs

Youthfully

Youthfully is Canada's go-to destination for premium 1:1 coaching to help students and families navigate key educational challenges, especially during high school and the early years of post-secondary.

Youth Coach

NorthPeak Coaching

Founder & Lead Coach

BrainStation

BrainStation is The Digital Learning Company. Focused on empowering individuals and businesses with the skills required to prepare for the future of work, BrainStation delivers premium learning experiences to help individuals and teams upskill and to guide professionals through career pivots into digital.

I led the expansion and growth of the EMEA region.

Our rapid growth led to the opening of a +15,000 square foot campus to deliver in-person learning to London-based students while continuing to deliver courses online.

Head of Enablement, Training & Performance - EMEA

Manager, Enablement, Training, & Performance - EMEA

Team Lead, Enablement, Training, & Performance - EMEA

Global Head of Career Development

Clearday Communications

Community Manager, Amplify Community

Learning Designer and Course Facilitator

MEI International Academy

MEI Academy is an experiential education-focused high school that delivers on-location learning to high-achieving students.

By placing students in environments relevant to what they learn, students are engaged in unique ways and the connections between their experience and what they're learning are much stronger than in traditional school.

As a lead teacher, I designed bespoke curriculum and programming and then assembled and trained teaching teams to deliver the programmes with me. 

The programmes I led spanned Central America, Europe, Australia, North America, and Asia and I retained a +95% student rating throughout my 3 years with MEI.

While not designing curriculum and leading programmes, I led the team in new teacher training, creating a new onboarding program, which improved teacher retention and student reviews.

Lead Teacher & Curriculum Development Manager

BioSolar Ltd

Client Education Programme Manager

Discovery Harbour Resources Corp.

Data Manager

Western Potash Corp.

Research Assistant

Teaching Assistant

Great learning experiences change everything.

I learned this at 18 (ask me about it!) and have spent the past 15 years helping people develop the skills, confidence, and high-performance mindset to do great work.

Too often, learning is seen as a box to tick—a training session, a course, or a one-off workshop—when it should be a strategic driver of performance, retention, and business success. My work focuses on shaping learning cultures that build talent density.

I design and deliver high-impact learning programmes that help organisations scale, develop leaders, and embed learning into everyday work. Whether it's revamping onboarding, rethinking performance assessments, or rolling out new learning technologies, my goal is always the same: to make learning relevant, engaging, and measurable.

I started my career as a teacher, but I’ve since worked across talent development, hiring and onboarding, sales enablement, and career development—always with a focus on helping people grow.

Where I Deliver the Most Value

🔹 Scaling Learning in Fast-Growth Teams – Designed learning programmes that kept pace with rapid business expansion, supporting teams across North America & Europe.

🔹 Building & Leading Learning Teams – Developed and supported high-performing teams, embedding learning strategy, coaching, and leadership development.

🔹 Designing Learning That Sticks – Created blended learning experiences that incorporate AI-driven personalisation, microlearning, and hands-on application to make learning engaging and practical.

🔹 Making Learning Measurable – Led needs assessments to uncover skill gaps and workforce readiness challenges. Used learning analytics, behavioural tracking, and performance data to show tangible business outcomes.

Some Wins I’m Proud Of

✅ Scaled a learning & coaching team 3x, improving service quality, learner engagement, and client ratings (NPS 69, 4.87/5 stars from clients).

✅ Designed & launched a coaching certification for 350+ professionals, leading to 28% YoY revenue growth, higher retention, and repeat business.

✅ Led EMEA expansion and developed a team from scratch that delivered 300% growth.

✅ Co-led the rollout of a custom-built LMS, making onboarding, training, and performance tracking smoother and more scalable.

Shoot me a message if you want to talk shop about the neuroscience of learning (what I'm nerding out on right now), building high-performance teams, coaching and helping young people launch successful careers.

taplio

The Battle

Jake Carroll

Derek Plewes

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