Margot Brandenburg

Margot Brandenburg is a senior program officer on the foundation’s Mission Investments team, focused on building and strengthening the infrastructure of the impact investment market—with an eye to shaping the broader capital markets. She has spent two decades working at the intersection of philanthropy, capital markets, and social and environmental justice.

Prior to joining Ford, Margot served as founder and CEO of MyStrongHome, a benefit corporation delivering resilience finance services to homeowners across the Southeast and Gulf Coast of the US. Before that, she helped design and lead the impact investing initiative at the Rockefeller Foundation. She co-authored the book The Power of Impact Investing with former RF president Judith Rodin. While at Rockefeller, she also focused on job creation and issues of economic security for low-wage workers.

Margot began her career in international microfinance and has worked with several community development finance institutions in the US. She serves on the boards of the Workers Lab, Brooklyn Cooperative Credit Union, and the Woodcock Foundation, and as an adviser to the National Domestic Workers Alliance as well as the National Energy Improvement Fund.

She received a master’s in public affairs from the Woodrow Wilson School at Princeton University and holds an undergraduate degree from Stanford University.

Education

• Bachelor's degree Stanford University (1997 — 2001)
• Master's in Public Affairs Princeton University (2004 — 2006)

Companies

• Senior Program Officer Ford Foundation (2020)
• Senior Advisor National Energy Improvement Fund LLC (2020)
• Board Chair The Workers Lab (2016)
• Trustee Woodcock Foundation (2015)
• Senior Innovation Advisor National Domestic Workers Alliance (2014)
• Board Chair Brooklyn Cooperative Community Development Credit Union (2008)
• Founder and CEO MyStrongHome (2015 — 2020)
• Adjunct Assistant Professor NYU Stern School of Business (2014 — 2016)
• Fellow Nathan Cummings Foundation (2013 — 2014)