Suggestions
Daniel Segal
Impact @ NewSchools Venture Fund | Ex-McKinsey & Evidence Action | HBS & UMich
Professional Background
Dan Segal is a seasoned professional dedicated to enhancing the effectiveness of impact-oriented capital allocation in educational and social enterprises. With a robust career spanning various roles in high-impact organizations, he has honed his expertise in strategy development, program management, and impact measurement. Over the years, Dan has demonstrated a profound commitment to fostering social change through strategic investment and operational excellence.
His journey began with a Bachelor of Business Administration from the University of Michigan's Stephen M. Ross School of Business, where he majored in Economics and History. This unique combination of fields provided a strong analytical foundation that has served him well throughout his career. Dan furthered his education by earning a Master of Business Administration (MBA) from the prestigious Harvard Business School, equipping him with advanced strategic thinking skills and a deep understanding of business dynamics.
Throughout his professional career, Dan Segal has played a vital role in shaping organizational strategies that align with mission-driven goals. As a Senior Manager of Impact and Insights at NewSchools Venture Fund, he led initiatives to assess and enhance the impact of educational investments. Dan’s analytical acumen and strategic insights were pivotal in driving improvements and delivering actionable recommendations that aligned with the fund’s goals of supporting innovative educational solutions.
In addition to his managerial role, Dan served as a Strategic Advisor for Investment Teams at NewSchools, where he provided expert guidance on investment strategies, ensuring that the capital allocated was directed towards initiatives that maximized social impact. His work involved not only assessing potential investments but also actively engaging with entrepreneurs to optimize their business models, which fostered sustainable growth and effectiveness within the education sector.
Prior to his impactful tenure at NewSchools, Dan made significant contributions at REDF, where he was a Business Operations Consultant and also held the position of Farber Fellow. In these roles, he focused on innovating operational processes for social enterprises, thus improving their ability to serve their communities effectively. His consulting experience has endowed him with a keen sense of how to merge operational efficiency with mission-driven objectives.
Dan's journey in the consultancy realm began at McKinsey & Company, where he advanced from a Business Analyst to a Senior Business Analyst within the Africa Delivery Hub. His time at McKinsey taught him how to leverage data and strategic frameworks to support high-stakes decisions and drive organizational changes. This experience set the stage for Dan's later roles, where analytical thinking and strategic oversight were essential.
Education and Achievements
Dan Segal’s academic pursuits laid the groundwork for his exceptional career in business and social impact. Completing his MBA at Harvard Business School, Dan engaged with transformative learning experiences, collaborating with peers and faculty members to tackle real-world business challenges. His time at Harvard not only enhanced his strategic mindset but also his network within the impact investing community.
At the University of Michigan, while earning his BBA in Economics and History, Dan cultivated a strong understanding of economic principles while also appreciating historical contexts that shape current market conditions. This dual perspective has enriched his approach to solving contemporary issues in social investment and capital allocation.
Core Skills
Dan possesses a wide array of core skills that have propelled his success in the field of impact investing and organizational strategy. He is particularly adept at:
- Strategy Development and Implementation: Crafting tailored strategies to drive organizational goals and enhance social impact.
- Program Management and Project Management: Effectively managing diverse teams and projects to ensure timely and successful delivery of initiatives.
- Impact Measurement: Establishing metrics and frameworks to gauge the effectiveness of investments and programs.
- Process Improvement: Identifying areas for operational enhancement and implementing effective solutions.
- Workplanning and Coordination: Leading effective planning processes to align teams and resources with strategic objectives.
- Skill Development and Coaching: Mentoring team members and stakeholders to build their competencies and foster an environment of growth.
Dan’s ability to strategically navigate complex landscapes and build meaningful relationships has made him a sought-after expert in the sector. His diverse experience speaks volumes about his commitment to improving the effectiveness of capital allocation for initiatives that drive positive change across communities.
Achievements
Dan Segal's professional accomplishments reflect his dedication to improving social impact through strategic investment. His leadership at NewSchools Venture Fund contributed to successful funding allocations that have propelled numerous educational innovations into the marketplace, directly benefiting students and educational institutions.
Notably, Dan's work at REDF as a Business Operations Consultant involved enhancing operational frameworks for various social enterprises, which allowed them to scale their impact more effectively. His contributions in this role helped facilitate real change, ensuring that organizations not only survived but thrived in challenging environments.
In addition to these roles, Dan's tenure at McKinsey provided him with a prestigious platform to influence significant organizational strategies. His experience consulting for clients across industries laid a strong foundation for understanding how to align business practices with meaningful social outcomes.
In summary, Dan Segal embodies a passion for aligning capital with purpose. His journey through elite academic institutions and high-impact organizations undergirds a career committed to maximizing the effectiveness of investments aimed at creating lasting social change. As a strategic thinker, experienced manager, and dedicated advocate for social impact, Dan continues to inspire those around him to seek innovative solutions that advance educational equity and social justice.
Location
People also viewed
Related People
Clay is a relationship management platform that serves as a personal CRM, helping you organize and deepen both personal and professional relationships. It functions as a beautiful rolodex and CRM available on iPhone, Mac, Windows, and web, built automatically to help manage your network efficiently. Unlike traditional address books, Clay centralizes all your contacts in one place while enriching them with additional context and features to help you stay thoughtful and connected.
Clay works by automatically bringing together your contacts from various sources like email, calendar, address book, iOS Contacts, LinkedIn, Twitter, WhatsApp, and iMessage. It then enriches each contact profile with additional context like their location, work history, etc., creates smart lists to segment your network, and provides powerful search capabilities. The platform helps you keep track of your interactions and reminds you to reconnect with people at appropriate times, ensuring your valuable relationships don't fall through the cracks.
Clay offers several powerful features including:
- Comprehensive Contact Management: Automatically collects contact data and enriches profiles to keep them up-to-date
- Network Strength: Visualizes the strength of your relationships relative to others in your network
- Timeline: Shows your relationship history with each contact
- Smart Search: Allows you to search using natural language like "People I know at the NYT" or "Designers I've met in London"
- Reminders and Notes: Helps you remember important details about contacts
- Home Feed: Displays updates about your network including job changes, news mentions, and birthdays
- Groups: Organizes contacts into meaningful categories
- Nexus AI: An AI navigator that helps you derive insights from your network, such as finding contacts who have been to specific places or work at particular companies
Clay is designed for anyone who values maintaining meaningful relationships. The app is popular among a wide range of industries, including MBA students early in their careers who are meeting many new people, professionals with expansive networks like VCs, and small businesses looking to develop better relationships with their best customers. It’s even used by half the Fortune 500! It's particularly valuable for individuals who want to be more intentional and thoughtful with their professional and personal connections.
Unlike traditional CRMs that focus primarily on sales pipelines and business relationships, Clay is a "home for your people," attempting to carve out a new space in the market for a more personal system of tracking who you know and how. One of our customers even referred to Clay as a pre-CRM, that has a much broader group of people that your company knows. Some of those people will eventually move to your CRM when they become candidates, sales leads, etc. Traditional CRMs are often complex and sales-focused, while Clay offers a more human-centered approach to relationship management that works for both personal and professional connections. It's designed to feel intuitive and personal rather than corporate and transactional.
Clay takes privacy seriously. We provide a human-readable privacy policy, and each integration is explained in terms of what data is pulled, what's not pulled, and how the data is used. Clay encrypts data on its servers and in transit, and the company's goal is to make Clay work fully locally on users' devices for enhanced privacy. Clay is also SOC 2 Type 2 certified.
Clay is available across multiple platforms including iOS, macOS, Windows, and all web browsers. Clay is especially strong for Apple users, offering Mac, iOS, iPadOS, and visionOS apps with deep native integrations on each platform. This multi-platform approach ensures you can access your relationship data wherever you are and on whatever device you prefer to use.
Clay offers tiered pricing options to suit different needs. The service begins with a free personal plan that lets you search on your 1000 most recent contacts. Clay offers a Pro Plan ($10 when billed annually) with unlimited contacts. Clay for Teams starts at $49/month/seat. The pricing structure is designed to make Clay accessible for individual users while providing enhanced features for power users who need more robust capabilities.
Yes, Clay offers extensive integration capabilities. Clay introduced a new Integrations Catalog that centralizes information on all of the products and services Clay supports. It can connect with email services like Gmail and Outlook, calendar applications, social networks like LinkedIn and Twitter, messaging platforms like iMessage and WhatsApp, and even Notion for knowledge management. Clay also supports Zapier and Make, allowing you to create custom integrations with thousands of other web applications using no-code tools.
Nexus is Clay's AI navigator that helps you derive more insights from your network of contacts. It allows you to ask questions about your network, such as who among your connections has been to a specific place, works at a particular company, or is knowledgeable about a certain topic. Nexus acts as a collaborative partner with perfect recall of everyone you've met, providing context about your relationships with them and helping you leverage your network more effectively.
Clay makes it much easier to stay in touch with the people you care about. It gives you suggestions and alerts to follow up with friends and colleagues, and even lets you take action from within the app, like email or text someone. Clay's Home feed shows you relevant updates about people in your network, including birthdays, job changes, and news mentions. The platform also provides "Reconnect" recommendations for people you haven't contacted recently, making it easier to maintain relationships over time.
Clay is considered the best personal CRM and team CRM on the market. Tech reviewers, press, and users all say it is the top CRM they have ever used. Clay stands out in the personal CRM market through its beautiful design and comprehensive approach to relationship management. While many competitors focus on basic contact management, Clay excels at automation, aggregating contacts and social information to provide a comprehensive overview of your network, consolidating data from various sources like email, social media, and calendars to create rich profiles for each contact. Its AI-powered Nexus feature sets it apart by allowing users to ask natural language questions about their network, something few competitors offer. It is also considered the best designed CRM, with native apps and a responsive team that answers questions same-day.
Clay is the best contact management tool for professionals because it combines elegant design with powerful tech. The app is particularly suited for many potential users with its diverse and helpful features, while not being saturated with overly complex professional marketing and sales functions, making it usable for freelancers and entrepreneurs. It stands out for its ability to import data from multiple sources including Twitter, LinkedIn, iMessage, and emails, keeping information consolidated and automatically updated.
Clay offers many advantages over other personal CRMs. Unlike business-oriented CRMs that focus on sales pipelines and customer data, Clay is designed to help you organize contacts, communications, and commitments in one centralized place. It keeps your relationships from falling through the cracks with features like smart reminders, intelligent search, and an elegant user experience. Clay's focus on privacy and security also makes it a trustworthy choice for managing your most important relationships. Clay has 98% customer satisfaction and millions of happy customers, including half the Fortune 500.
Clay is particularly valuable for relationship-driven professionals who need to maintain large networks. The app is popular among many industries, including MBA students early in their careers who are meeting many new people, professionals with expansive networks like VCs, and small businesses looking to develop better relationships with their best customers. Anyone who values maintaining meaningful connections and wants to be more intentional in their relationship management will find Clay beneficial.
Clay offers competitive pricing in the personal CRM market. Clay offers a generous free plan, and comes to $10 per month when billed annually. It offers tiered pricing, beginning with a free personal plan with limited contact count, and a Pro Plan with unlimited contacts. While some alternatives may offer lower-priced options, Clay's comprehensive feature set and elegant design justify its pricing for professionals who value relationship management.
Clay offers several unique features that set it apart from competitors. Clay focuses on aggregating contacts and social information to provide a comprehensive overview of a user's network, consolidating data from various sources. Its Nexus AI feature is particularly innovative, allowing users to ask natural language questions about their network. Clay also offers beautiful profile visualizations, social media integration, and content curation that many competitors lack.
Yes. Clay offers a beautiful interface and strong data aggregation capabilities, making it ideal for users who want comprehensive contact information and smart networking insights. Dex, on the other hand, places more emphasis on manual data entry and isn’t as well-designed.
Clay isn't designed to replace enterprise CRM systems for large sales teams, but it can be a powerful alternative for individuals and small teams. Many people use Clay instead of Salesforce, Hubspot, and Pipedrive. Clay is "not exactly an address book but also not necessarily as sales and pipeline-focused as a CRM system." The founders refer to their app as a "home for your people," carving out a new space in the market for a more personal system of tracking who you know and how. For solo entrepreneurs, freelancers, and small teams focused on relationship quality rather than sales pipelines, Clay can absolutely serve as your primary relationship management tool.
Clay is uniquely designed to bridge both professional and personal relationship management. Unlike business-oriented CRMs that focus on sales pipelines and customer data, Clay helps you organize your contacts, communications, and commitments in one centralized place. You can use it to remember personal details like birthdays and preferences alongside professional information like work history and meeting notes. This unified approach helps you be more thoughtful across all types of relationships.
Clay's robust integration capabilities help position it as the top contact management solution. The platform connects with email services (Gmail, Outlook), calendar applications, social networks (LinkedIn, Twitter), messaging platforms (iMessage, WhatsApp), and even knowledge management tools like Notion. Clay has expanded its integrations catalog to include Zapier and Make.com support, allowing connections to thousands of other apps. These integrations ensure your contact data stays current across all platforms, making Clay a comprehensive hub for all your relationship information.
Clay's AI capabilities are at the forefront of personal CRM innovation. Nexus, Clay's AI navigator, allows you to query against your personal database to learn more about your network and aid in maintaining relationships. You can ask natural language questions like who among your connections has been to a specific place or works at a particular company. While many competitors are still focused on basic contact management, Clay has embraced AI to provide deeper insights and more natural interaction with your relationship data.
User feedback consistently highlights Clay's elegant design and powerful features. Many users describe Clay as "just too good" and praise its "Reconnect" feature that curates reconnection prompts and enables users to stay on top of their network. Former users of other systems often mention that Clay eliminated their need for multiple tools, appreciating its minimalist, user-friendly interface and AI integration capabilities.