In my Oct. 25 post, I referred to an artice by Dan Mascai, in Fast Company‘s October 2010 issue.  He offers a great example of  the financial industry engaging in what I call Customer Social Responsibility. Alexa von Tobel, a former Morgan Stanley employee after graduating from Harvard, started LearnVest. It targets women under forty, who are very often out-earning their male counterparts around the nation. And yet they have no idea how to stay out of or manage debt much less how to plan for retirement. It is a stressor a major proportion for this group. But the few services available were not hip, as Mascai reports, or speaking to them as intelligent adults. And it did not bring confidence and predictability into their financial lives. The team at LearnVest, followed up with responses to my questions which are enclosed here.

What do you think your business makes possible for women, in their lives beyond the site, that has been missing?

For women today, financial literacy is the first step to ensuring financial independence. Why does money matter? Money is our lifeline. If you are sick, you will want access to the best healthcare. If you miss your children, you will spare nothing to travel around the world to see them. No matter what your personal goals are, a firm understanding of your finances is crucial to achieving the greatest level of happiness.

On average we make 6-10 financial decisions a day yet personal finance is not taught in the majority of high schools, colleges, and graduate schools across the nation. While there are books, media personalities like Suze Orman, and various financial blogs that cater to women, there is no robust, online platform that combines advice, community, and the ability to execute on accessing financial products. LearnVest fills this need.

LearnVest provides trusted content and tools to make personal financial information accessible to millions of women. Whether you’re buying a home, saving for grad school, or simply trying to become a better ‘budgeter,’ we will help you achieve maximum financial health through our dynamic LearnVest Checklists, fun “bite-size” daily newsletter, and straightforward, easy-to-read content.  Here are is a quick overview of some of our tools:

  • Budgeting Tool: The tool helps calculate how much money you can save, spend, and play with each month. The tool breaks out expenses so you can better understand where your money is (and should be) going every month.
  • Financial Bootcamps: LearnVest 2-4 week long Bootcamps bring thousands of women together to tackle specific financial challenges, such as taxes or investing, via daily action-oriented orders.
  • LV Daily Newsletter: Think Daily Candy Meets Personal Finance. LV Daily is our free, bite-size email that delivers practical tips for living a hip lifestyle on a budget.
  • Community: Our goal is also to get women talking about their finances with each other. Personal finance has always been a taboo subject, but we want women to open up and learn smart habits from other women.

We wanted help women get organized around their money and encourage them to take a proactive approach to budgeting, saving, and responsible money management.

2. What would you say is your underlying philosophy that makes this possible? e.g What do you believe about women and humans? What tells you that you are crossing the line to an inappropriate offering or irrelevant?

At LearnVest, we believe that everyone deserves access to trusted personal finance education. Thus, it is our mission to provide women nationwide with unbiased financial information and empower them to gain greater control of their financial future.  At the same time, we hope to raise awareness on the state of financial literacy in America and the need for personal financial education across all age groups and gender.  Money is the lifeline to everything and everyone deserves trusted help!

How might your philosophy heal the creation of financial disasters that keep being created around us and help the world of business?

We created LearnVest to solve a real problem: a nationwide education disaster. Last year, the average college senior graduated with $4,138 in credit card debt, up 44% from 2004. And this year, more than a million women will declare bankruptcy — more women than will graduate from college.  These statistics needs to change.

As our nation strives to find solutions for the dire state of the economy, many recent graduates attempt to find solutions for their financial burdens without any educational background in personal finance.  By teaching twenty-somethings year olds responsible debt management practices, we can help them create a balanced lifestyle and find peace of mind through increased financial awareness, smart saving and long-term investing. As a result, we can create a new generation that is both financially savvy and financially positive – a generation financially empowered to take on the future.

Already in the wake of the financial crises, we’re seeing Americans save more. We know the nation’s savings rate has gone up as people try to rebuild their finances. At present, Americans put an average of about 6% of their disposable personal income into savings. That may not seem like much, but in 2008, when the recession hit hardest, Americans were putting away less than 3% on average (BEA). Our guess is it will stay high for a while — for years — because a lot of people have basically lost whatever they had saved up. We hope that our philosophy helps keep this spirit alive; that women get smart about saving now, while they have time to build their financial futures.

3. How might this relate to a Responsible Capitalism model?

While LearnVest is a for-profit company, its core mission is to educate as many women as possible about their personal finances and ultimately, improve the state of financial literacy across the nation. We recognized that there were limited resources available to help women forecast their financial future; LearnVest’s goal from the beginning has been to end that problem.

Carol’s thoughts: part of what caused the crash was the duplicity which is only possible when people or ignorant of how the financial system works and how they own life is effected by seemingly straightforward decisions. I believe that LearnVest is creating a nation of investors who will be harder to fool and will stand up for their themselves and others. Hopefully it transitions across generations and LearnVest if around along time and more and more income levels are served by its mission. Financial Effectiveness if not about how much money you have as much as it is about what you do with it through time.