#8 - Clair Deevy - Facebook & Corporate Responsibility: Women in Business, Tech For Good, Social Impact

Doing Good Podcast by Amra Naidoo

This is an episode that I have been wanting to do for a while. Everyone knows Facebook, but not many people would be aware about the work that Facebook is doing in the community to create social impact. In this episode, I interview Clair Deevy who is the head of Economic Growth Initiatives for Asia Pacific at Facebook. Clair is someone who really inspires me, and in this episode, we talk about some of the initiatives that she is looking after. One of the programs we talk a lot about is She Means Business - an initiative to support female entrepreneurs. Another one you may have heard of is Safety Check which has been used around the world for natural disasters and human tragedies. Clair is a seasoned professional in terms of executing high impact initiatives that not only create positive social impact in the community, but also are in line with business objectives. Something that is increasingly becoming more important as businesses take on a bigger role in creating impact in their communities and supply chains. We speak about the work that she is doing now, how she got to where she is, and her thoughts on how others can get started. If you are working in any type of business or multinational organisation, I highly recommend this episode as an example of things to consider when thinking about business and social impact. Enjoy!

Favourite quote from episode:

“Rather than just trying to inspire people about things that I care about is help people to find what they’re good at and what they care about and then get them to pass that on to the next person. Because I think that’s real inspiration. Inspiration isn’t like, you now think that my topic is the most important thing ever. Inspiration is you feel inspired to go and do something else yourself” – Clair [34:18]

People/ items mentioned in this episode:

She Means Business

Safety Check

Think Before You Share - Jakarta Online Safety Project

Infoxchange - Australia

Get in contact with Clair on Facebook

Show Notes

• What is economic growth initiatives? Clair explains some of the programs she works on such as Safety Check and She Means Business [03:10]
• Clair tells us about her career path [09:45]
• What kind of partnerships does Facebook have with different organisations to promote social impact? [15:30]
• How does Facebook think about social impact and measure it? [20:40]
• Clair’s advice for someone who wants to know how to get started in creating their own social impact [26:08]
• Three Things [27:52]
• What’s next for Clair? [30:53]
• “If you set out to try and inspire someone, you probably won’t. If you can work out what you actually care about, like what gets you excited and passionate about, you will inspire other people without even trying because it’s really infectious.” [34:18]

What was your favourite quote or lesson from this episode? Let me know in the comments!