Speaking Topics

Below are a few topics we put together, gleaned from hours upon hours partnering with remarkable people around the world, from new farmers in Sierra Leone to young men and women aging out of orphanages in Honduras and looking for their first job.

In every talk, our goal is not to ask your group for financial support. Instead, we want to share what we’ve learned in our years giving people a hand up, not a handout, and provide practical application for your audience. We’d also welcome the opportunity to stay in touch via email for those who want to learn more.

Want to chat about Just Hope’s work, and how it intersects with your organization’s mission? Email us at info@justhopeinternational.org or complete our form to request a speaker. We’d be happy to learn more about you and how we can partner together.

You can also learn more about our speakers: founder Karen Bruton, and president Ben Turner.

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5 Life Lessons from the Field

Through our “Hand Up” partnership with people around the globe — from farmers in Sierra Leone to teen orphans in Honduras — we learn a lot about the human spirit. First, it is strong and rooted in dignity. Second, there are so many more commonalities we share than we sometimes realize! In this talk, we’ll share 5 life and/or business lessons we have learned from some of the strongest people we have ever met — men and women who are changing their lives for generations by pursuing a personal income. Their tenacity in the face of extreme poverty drives everything we do at Just Hope. Audiences will hear inspirational stories of the people who taught us those lessons, and be challenged to apply them in their own lives, families, careers, and businesses.

3 Questions to Ask Before You Click Donate

We all donate our time and money. Sometimes, it’s spur of the moment to respond to a need; and other times, it takes a thought-out strategy, or at least a few key questions before hitting the donate button to make a truly lasting impact. In this talk, leaders from Just Hope International – who have spent countless hours in the field from Sierra Leone to Honduras – will help audiences think through how they give. What questions are important to ask and why? What does it look like to build a giving strategy for your family, business, or personal time and resources? And what impact does an American’s intentional giving have on a farmer in Africa? Inspirational stories of successful local farmers and business owners in Africa and Central America will give audience members a glimpse of how their “game plan” can have a lasting impact.

Business Is Good: Overcome Fear and Eliminate Greed to Make an Impact That Lasts

There are two things that Karen Bruton, founder of Just Hope International, leaves out of her life’s work: fear and greed. Neither, she says, will get you anywhere. Further, they only chip away at what she believes is missing from today’s business rhetoric: the sheer fact that Business is Good, and can be used as a tool to impact the world right where it is. During this talk, Karen will share the detrimental impact of fear and greed, tips to get over them in both business and philanthropy, and how to chart a course toward positioning your Business as a Good and impactful organization.

Three Words We Love: “I Got This.”

Partnership. Friendship. Even business ventures. We develop all of these in our work at Just Hope. But we have come to realize — and build our work on — the incredible success that comes through parting ways with our global partners. And by that, we mean leaving a partner who can confidently say, “I got this.” It means they are not dependent on us. In this talk, we’ll discuss a process that works to tap people’s confidence and skill so that they can live life more fully. This issue is celebrated in international documentaries like Poverty Inc., and Just Hope is one example of a local organization with international relationships that believes human dignity matters, and fostering dependence is a hindrance to that.

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