What social business means to me

By Emily Nordquist

For thirty-five years my dad ran a sign manufacturing company on Lake Street in South Minneapolis. The neighborhood was, and still is, one of the most underserved in the city. I remember being amazed at the manufacturing process and at how many people it took to construct a sign. At its peak, the company employed 50 people, some of whom were immigrants from the surrounding community, and paid living wages. I didn’t know it at the time, but watching my dad grow this business shaped my future in meaningful ways.

Critically hurt by the 2008 recession, we had to close the doors in 2011 when I was a young teen. Losing our family business not only significantly impacted our own financial wellness, but it affected the families of everyone we had employed. Instead of a manufacturing plant on Lake Street providing needed jobs, we watched as the building fell into decline. It was devastating.

This is how I started to understand business. It was something very serious and it was about people, their families, and their communities. I wrote my college essays about the need to reimagine business with a deeper understanding of its human consequences. Without the proper language to talk about social enterprise, I dove into why I felt it was important to integrate social justice and hard business skills. I wasn’t sure whether my message would get across. Luckily it did. In 2013, I enrolled at Loyola University Chicago.

I spent the next four years exploring the intersection of business and humanity — diversity and inclusion, sustainability in the supply chain, and purpose-led entrepreneurship. I eventually landed a job in community development finance. There, I was able to see how this reimagined idea of business, that I had written about four years prior, could truly come to life. I had the opportunity to use creative finance to help low-income communities in profound ways.

When I heard Loyola was opening a new center dedicated to social enterprise during my senior year, I decided to pursue my MBA at the Quinlan School of Business. I spent my MBA years dedicated to the Baumhart Center’s efforts - serving on its Student Advisory Board, moderating events, and even helping to imagine and shape the Baumhart Scholars program. Baumhart gave me the space, network, and support I needed to grow my vision for social business and to become a confident, connected young leader in Chicago business and civic circles.

My education and my life experiences have led me to live with a greater purpose and to dedicate my career to reimagining business for good. Baumhart Center is reminding Chicago and the world that business is not to be taken lightly, and that at the end of the day, it is about people and how we decide to build a future together.

I am ecstatic to be a part of building that future.