In this episode, Joy Anderson reflects on invitation as a foundational practice for leadership, collaboration, and systems change. Moving beyond calendar invites, she reframes invitation as a form of power that determines whether participation is passive or meaningful. When people are explicitly invited into roles that matter, where their presence is needed and their contribution is clear, progress is made. In complex systems where hierarchy is unclear, invitation becomes the mechanism that supports coordination and shared purpose.Joy then reframes the notion of “handholding,” a common phrase in investing that often implies lack of capability. What is really being described, says Joy, is about trust, proximity, and power. Advice in investing is rarely neutral, especially when tied to capital, and what is presented as support can become control without permission and alignment. Drawing from work with the Mastercard Foundation African Growth Fund, she outlines four conditions that make for better and more balanced investment relationships: permission, boundaries, protection of vulnerability, and moments to recalibrate. Together, these help us to rethink how relationships are built and how influence operates within financial systems.Episode Highlights00:00 Introduction to the episode and themes01:49 Invitation as a form of power04:14 Invitation in complex collaborations and consortiums06:18 From presence to contribution: what invitation makes possible08:40 Practices of invitation in leadership and systems change10:03 Rant: unpacking the phrase “handholding”12:30 Trust, vulnerability, and investment relationships14:57 Permission, advice, and power in investing17:03 Capacity, timing, and misalignment in support19:02 Conditions for “handholding” as trust infrastructure21:17 Reflection questions on relationships and influence22:26 Ways to engage with Criterion InstituteRelevant LinksCriterion Institute Website and LinkedInJoy's LinkedInDive DeeperDisrupting Fields: Addressing Power Dynamics in the Fields of Climate Finance and Gender Lens InvestingThis report examines how power operates in emerging financial fields and how actors navigate existing systems while trying to change them. It highlights the tension between advancing new ideas and working within entrenched power structures, making it highly relevant to this episode’s focus on invitation, influence, and participation.Addressing Power Dynamics in Investment ProcessesA deep dive into how investment processes reflect and respond to power dynamics, including how trust, transparency, and engagement shape relationships between investors and companies. The report emphasizes the role of intentional design in building more equitable investment relationships.Process Metrics that Analyze Power Dynamics in InvestingThis report introduces tools for identifying and measuring how power shows up in investment processes—moving beyond representation to examine whose knowledge is valued and how decisions are made. It directly connects to the episode’s discussion of influence, control, and whose perspective shapes outcomes.Advanced Practice in Gender Lens InvestingA framework for identifying and shifting power, privilege, and bias within financial systems by focusing on how investments are made. It highlights how changing processes—not just outcomes—can transform relationships and redistribute power in finance.Other episodes you might also like:#74: No Permission Required: Volunteerism as a Power Shift#68: Clarity is Relational: Leadership in Complex Systems#52: Reimagining Resourcing for Social Transformation – Part TwoPart of the ImpactAlpha Podcast Network
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