Defining purpose: How do you define the term ‘purpose-driven entrepreneurship’, and what elements or values do you consider crucial for a business to be categorised as such?

For me, ‘purpose-driven entrepreneurship’ means nailing the intent behind your business right from the start, and the intent is two things. It's the purpose beyond money and the values.

For an entrepreneur to be ‘purpose-driven’, they must be motivated to positively impact society and/or the environment and solve a problem – ideally whilst enjoying the process because they are following their passion. The bigger the problem you're solving, and the more people you can help, the more purpose-led your business is – and the more valuable it will become.

How do go about building, and raising capital, for a ‘purpose-driven business’?

To build a purpose-driven business, you need absolute clarity on the problem you are working to solve and who your customer is – what they need, their pains and their gains – so that you can design unique solutions for them. This helps you not only attract customers but keep them as well. 

With clarity on your purpose and understanding of your customer's needs, you will need to ensure you have the right team around you. You need a team that cares about the problem you're working to solve as much as you do, shares your values, and is equipped with the right skills. Only when you have these elements in place will you be ready for your fundraising strategy. 

This strategy is your game worth playing – win lose or draw. Money is a means to an end, so work out how much money you need to achieve your key milestones and then decide how you will raise that capital. For example, customer funded or raising money from investors. 

Two businesses I have co-founded, Redington and mallowstreet, initially grew thanks to a customer-funded model. Customer-funded models only work when you understand what your customer needs, you are clear on your value and what differentiates you from the competition. 

What motivates you to build businesses that prioritise societal impact beyond monetary gains?

Making money is important when you're an entrepreneur, but it's worth remembering that it's just one measure of success. I believe having a purpose beyond money and focusing on making a difference is more important.

As an entrepreneur, I have co-founded Redington, mallowstreet, Rebalance Earth, and the financial education charity RedSTART. As a charity, RedSTART will never make me money. Still, it's the initiative I'm most proud of because it stands to make the most positive tangible impact socially – benefitting millions of young people.

My life's purpose is to empower everyone to have financial freedom, which means having the skills and confidence to help break the cycle of debt we are struggling with as a society and enable people to save for their future. Currently, over half of UK adults are struggling with debt, and our role in helping solve this problem is to lobby the government to include high-quality financial education in the primary school syllabus. 

There are nearly five million primary school children in the UK. Currently, we are working with King's College Policy Institute to run a longitudinal study over the next seven years, tracking the lives of over 15,000 pupils attending over forty-five of the poorest schools in the UK to create the research proving the substantial social return on investment of teaching young children about money and how it works.

When RedSTART delivers its strategy, it will 'change the game' for nearly 5 million young people in the UK. This is why founding a charity that could impact people's future lives is so important to me.

I've always been driven to help empower everyone to have the financial freedom they deserve; I've also always believed that there is no point if the world's not worth living in. 

At Redington, I was an early adopter of ESG; what motivated me to move to wealth manager at St. James Place(SJP) was to put into practice what I had been advising clients. At COP 26 in Glasgow, I realised that it wasn't enough to focus on climate and energy transition – and that a world worth living in meant protecting and restoring nature loss.

After two years, side of a desk, listening to podcasts, reading papers, and watching documentaries proving the extent of the biodiversity and nature loss crisis, I knew I didn't want to get to 2050 and reflect on my life wishing I had done more for this issue, especially when I knew the extent of the problem.

So, in 2022, I asked myself, what do I want to do with the next 10 years? I thought, "I've got 25 years' worth of financial markets experience; how can I redirect the flow of capital to help address this problem?

My big decision was to go all in with the purpose-driven mission of creating a solution to this problem – and that was the genesis of Rebalance Earth, where I have been for the last year.

What advice would you give a new entrepreneur looking to raise funds for their business – purpose-driven or otherwise?

Being an entrepreneur is incredibly hard. Yes, money is a means to an end, and while fundraising is important, it’s just one component of building a remarkable business.

The biggest challenge is to find the energy and optimism to keep going when the going gets tough. You will need resilience. Remember, find your purpose, make an impact, build a brilliant team, don’t forget to have fun and the money will follow. Good luck.