Leadership Team
Rick R. Little
Founder and President, ImagineNations Group
Chair of Executive Committee and Board Trustee, Silatech
Founder, International Youth Foundation
Rick Little is a "serial social entrepreneur." During 35 years of work, he has envisioned and established numerous initiatives that promote economic opportunity, job creation and positive youth development operating in more than 100 countries. His work focuses on building practical and sustainable solutions to large-scale challenges by galvanizing relationships among social entrepreneurs, thought leaders and investors from various disciplines. Together they are finding new and better ways of doing business — approaches providing opportunities and incentives that foster respect and human dignity.
Rick Little is Founder and President of the ImagineNations Group — a catalyst for positive change — partnering with entrepreneurs, leaders, investors, philanthropists and organizations. Together, they inspire and develop practical strategies that change the odds for people where they work, live and learn. Working primarily in Africa, the Middle East and South Asia, ImagineNations is helping to bridge deep divides (e.g. economic, cultural, race and faith), and address complex, large-scale challenges such as youth employment and economic opportunity. With its expansive network of entrepreneurial partners, ImagineNations champions innovative ideas, talent and resources that inspire positive change.
Based on his successful track record, in 2008 Her Highness Sheikha Moza bint Nasser of Qatar invited Rick Little to design and build a strategy that addresses the daunting challenge of youth employment across the Middle East and North Africa. Under the leadership of Her Highness, Little developed Silatech, where he is currently Chairman of the Executive Committee and a founding member of the Silatech Board of Trustees. Silatech and its partners have helped tens of thousands of young people learn critical skills, connect to job opportunities or create their own small enterprises. Silatech envisions a world in which every young person is prepared to succeed, engaged in decent work, and actively pursuing their dreams.
Little is also Founder of the International Youth Foundation (IYF). In 1989, he led a process involving hundreds of leaders from dozens of countries that resulted in the establishment of the International Youth Foundation (IYF) in 1990 with the largest charitable investment ever made by the W.K. Kellogg Foundation at that time (the first ten years). Today, IYF is among the world's largest public foundations focused on finding and supporting "what works" for young people. It now operates in more than 80 countries, and its global network of partners invests in hundreds of projects in education, health, leadership, employment, and bridging the digital divide. Little served as IYF's CEO from 1990 to 2002, and remains involved in its efforts as founder and member of its international board.
Currently, Rick Little is a member of the board of Mercy Corps and serves on the international advisory councils of the Nike Foundation, the International Center for Religion and Diplomacy and Qatar University's Social and Economic Survey Research Institute.
From 2000 to 2004, Little led the design and creation of a pioneering new approach to improving the workplace experience and life opportunities of young adult workers in the global manufacturing supply chains of companies including Nike, Gap and Inditex. Called the Global Alliance for Workers and Communities, the effort spread across more than 60 factories in China, India, Indonesia, Thailand and Vietnam reaching over 125,000 workers with direct health services, skills training and financial services and incentives.
Rick Little was the founding president and member of the founding board of America's Promise — the organization that emerged from the historic President's Summit for America's Future convened and chaired by General Colin Powell gathering together all living US Presidents in common support of America's children and youth.
Formerly, Rick Little was co-chair of the United Nation's High Level Panel of the Youth Employment Network (YEN), a partnership of the United Nations, International Labour Organization, and World Bank to mobilize action for decent and productive work for young people. In 2008 he was appointed by the World Economic Forum as Chair of its Global Agenda Council on Empowering Youth. He was also Chairman of the Second Annual Middle East Summit on Corporate Social Responsibility held in Dubai in 2005. Little was a member of the distinguished National Task Force on African-American Men and Boys chaired by Ambassador Andrew Young, which produced a seminal report detailing over 60 recommendations and a 20-year plan to reclaim our streets and rebuild our communities called Repairing the Breach.
At age 19, Little created and established Quest International where he served as CEO from 1975 to 1989. Through Quest — his first organization — Little developed a highly successful approach for teaching life skills, leadership and character education that has since been translated into 31 languages and implemented in thousands of primary and secondary schools in 65 countries, impacting millions of young people.
Through the writings of noted developmental scientist Dr. Richard Lerner (including: Concepts and Theories of Human Development; The Good Teen; and America's Youth in Crisis), many of Rick Little's theories and approaches to fostering positive youth development are now taught in dozens of universities.
Little has received numerous awards for his life's work, including the Presidential Award of the International Association of Lions Clubs—the largest humanitarian service organization in the world. He was named one of the world's 100 Global Leaders for Tomorrow by the World Economic Forum, and in 1997 Rick was selected by his peers to receive the Robert W. Scrivner Award from the US-based Council on Foundations—an award recognizing risk-taking leadership as a philanthropist and grantmaker. He also received an Honorary Doctorate degree from Anderson University in 2000 and was named an International Fellow in Applied Developmental Science at Tufts University in 2001.
When he was only 19 years old, Little conceived his first book, You Are Somebody Special. The book was based on his interviews with 2,200 young people across the United States, and included contributing authors such as entertainment legend Bill Cosby, Teen Magazine advice guru Dr. Charlie W. Shedd and best-selling author Richard Bolles (What Color is Your Parachute).
Rick Little is also a contributing author to several books including The Blackboard Fumble, Finding Your Voice, and The Community of the Future. Articles about his work and life have appeared in the New York Times, Foreign Policy, Time Magazine, the Financial Times, and the New York Times best-selling books Success Principals by Jack Canfield (2006) and the original Chicken Soup for the Soul (1993).
On a personal note, Little and his family live on the Chesapeake Bay in Maryland. He has traveled to more than 130 countries, flies airplanes, plays the piano and enjoys skiing.