Founder Stories
Becoming a charity founder is no small feat.
In Founder Stories, you’ll hear directly from our entrepreneurs about the journey from ‘before’ to ‘after’—what inspired them to take the leap, and what everyday life looks like now as a founder.
Mid-career transitions
From Google to Battling Deadly Diarrhoea:
Martyn James
This is the story about Martyn's transition from over a decade at Google in technical partnership roles to co-founding Clear Solutions, a nonprofit tackling child mortality from diarrhoea in sub-Saharan Africa — a shift from big tech to global health.
Based on an interview, written by Frances and told in Martyn’s own words.
Mid-career transitions
From Private Equity to Shrimp Welfare:
Andrés Jiménez Zorrilla
This is the story of how Andrés went from a career in investment banking and real estate private equity to co-founding the Shrimp Welfare Project — from one of the most glamorous, sought-after jobs out there to one of the most obscure.
Based on an interview, written by Frances and told in Andrés’ own words.
Why Found? - Haven - Fish Welfare Initiative
Why Found? - Keyur - Healthy Futures Global
Why Found? - Charlie - Clear Solutions
Why Found? - Nikita - Fortify Health
Why be a Charity founder?
A Day in the Life of Supriya - Founder of Ansh
A Day in the Life of Haven - Cofounder of Fish Welfare Initiative
A Day in the Life of a Founder
From Google to Battling Deadly Diarrhoea:
Martyn James | Co-founder of Clear Solutions
Frances Lorenz
Martyn spent more than a decade at Google in technical partnership roles before exploring a career transition, realising that he was starting to feel a bit restless in his career. “Life was good,” he recalls, “but I wanted to do something a little more worthwhile.”
Martyn first heard about effective altruism (EA) in passing around 2013 from a colleague, though he wasn’t initially interested in the space. “I remember Googling it and thinking, ‘it’s a bunch of Oxford philosophers, probably not for me.'” Years later, in 2020, Martyn was at home on parental leave. He began listening to the 80,000 Hours podcast and the ideas resonated. Eventually, he joined the EA Introductory Program. “It was the first time I found a structured, evidence-based path for people who wanted to do good.”
Though still sleep-deprived and caring for a newborn, Martyn kept exploring EA. The first concrete opportunity came when he encountered the Charity Entrepreneurship (CE) incubation program which provides funding, ideas, and training to help participants found their own charities. “It was the only EA-related job I ever applied for,” he says. “And I wasn’t even sure I’d be a fit. But as I made it through each individual round, I started realizing: maybe this is for me.”
He was accepted, and in 2023, co-founded Clear Solutions, a nonprofit tackling child mortality from diarrhea in Nigeria and other Sub-Saharan African countries. In these areas, diarrhea can result in fatal dehydration, so the nonprofit equips community health workers to deliver oral rehydration salts (ORS) to households. Caregivers have it ready for when a child gets sick, making the treatment cheap and effective. “From a standing start, we’ve reached around 65,000 children,” Martyn says. “We’re really proud of that.”
But as the organization grew, Martyn and his co-founder noticed a shift in the ecosystem. Other NGOs, spurred in part by positive evaluations from GiveWell, were starting similar interventions. Rather than compete, Clear Solutions adapted. “We didn’t want to duplicate efforts just to claim credit. We wanted to make a difference counterfactually. So we’re now focusing more on partnerships and layering ORS distribution onto existing health infrastructure.”
Martyn says his background at Google translated well to this new space. “I was always operating in complex systems with lots of unknowns, just like now,” he says. Skills in strategic thinking, people management, data analysis, and navigating ambiguity were useful. His tech skills, which were “pretty mediocre” by Google standards, became more advanced in a nonprofit context. He also credits his co-founder Charlie with covering essential gaps, bringing both medical and public health expertise.
Running a global health charity while raising two kids is challenging, especially given the sleep deprivation in early parenthood. Travel is a challenge too, with Charlie taking on more of the fieldwork in Nigeria so that Martyn can remain home. But the flexibility of entrepreneurship has also been a huge advantage, “I do school pickups a couple days a week. I work from home. In many ways, it’s eased our day-to-day life.”
Martyn also took a substantial pay cut, going back to his 2004 graduate salary. “It’s a rewind of 21 years of pay increases,” he jokes. But he doesn’t feel regret. “For me, the loss in earnings has been more than compensated by the sense of meaning and fulfilment. I feel like I’m doing the right thing with my career.”
He’s also found that being mid-career was an asset. With a strong skill base and financial stability, he could take a calculated risk. “People often let loss aversion stop them. But if you can tolerate a pay cut, you can try something new. And if it doesn’t work, you can often go back.”
Today, Martyn is more comfortable than ever with uncertainty. “I used to think of my career like a tower, something quite narrow. The further I got, the more constrained I was. But it doesn’t have to be like that. I’ve realized I have more options than I thought.” Having worked in both tech and global health, he also now gets to work at a rare intersection. “There are lots of people in tech and lots in global health. But not many who have worked in both.”
Martyn’s advice for others considering a mid-career pivot:
You don’t need everything figured out. If you’ve been successful in one environment, you probably have more transferable skills than you think. Just don’t let fear or lost salary keep you from something that could be far more fulfilling.
Andrés's advice for others considering a mid-career pivot:
Take it seriously, but don’t wait forever. Save if you can. Talk to people. Reach out. I feel like my life is so much better from having made this switch. I really want to encourage people to consider it.
From Private Equity to Shrimp Welfare:
Andrés Jiménez Zorrilla | Philanthropy Consultant at Open Philanthropy, Co-founder of Shrimp Welfare Project
Frances Lorenz
Andrés Jiménez Zorilla originally spent 15 years in investment banking and real estate private equity, leading the Iberian business for a European real estate fund and working in global finance hubs like London, New York, and Qatar. While the work was intellectually demanding in some ways (structuring deals, scaling companies, negotiating complex transactions), he also found that the bulk of his time was spent on presentations and red tape. More importantly, there was a growing dissonance between his values and his day-to-day work.
“At first, the financial rewards made me not care about many other things,” Andrés recalls. “But over time, I couldn’t ignore the fact that I was just making rich people richer. It didn’t feel like my calling.”
In 2018, he left finance in search of something more meaningful. With a longstanding interest in animal welfare, Andrés initially explored working with alternative protein companies and briefly considered starting a farmed animal sanctuary. Then, one day, his wife, a social worker who’d spent her career supporting refugees and incarcerated women, forwarded him an email about Charity Entrepreneurship. Run by Ambitious Impact, the program provides funding, ideas, and training to help participants found their own charities. “This sounds like you,” she said.
The program’s emphasis on evidence and cost-effectiveness immediately resonated. Andrés started working his way through EA reading lists and eventually applied to Charity Entrepreneurship’s 2021 incubator cohort. Though originally skeptical about one of the more neglected ideas, shrimp welfare, he changed his mind after reading the data. “Three pages into the research, I was hooked. The scale, the tractability, the complete lack of existing work, I thought, ‘I need to do this.’”
And so, he co-founded the Shrimp Welfare Project (SWP) with Aaron Boddy that same year.
Launching such an unusual nonprofit was challenging. Shrimp were a species he knew nothing about. The animal advocacy sector was new to him. He didn’t know his co-founder. But Andrés brought with him skills from finance that proved surprisingly relevant: analytical thinking, stakeholder engagement, corporate communications, and the ability to negotiate. These skills shaped the project’s early strategy of engaging large retailers on welfare reform, rather than confronting industry head-on. “We had to tread carefully. If we came in too aggressively, we risked setting the entire cause back. But we found a way to open doors.”
Andrés is proud that shrimp welfare is now a regular topic at industry conferences, and that multiple approaches to reform, including corporate campaigns, are gaining traction. “We didn’t want to accidentally cause harm,” he says. “For example, one possible intervention would have involved increasing oxygen levels in ponds to improve the environment for shrimp. But, we realised this would potentially just allow the environment to sustain more shrimp, encouraging farmers to increase breeding. Being strategic about risks was crucial.”
In 2025, after stepping back from SWP, Andrés began a new role at Open Philanthropy, where he helps connect philanthropists to high-impact opportunities in animal welfare and AI safety.
He credits his wife for encouraging the switch long before he made it. “We had this strange dissonance at home,” he says. “She was working to make the world better, and I was at Morgan Stanley. Sometimes I’d leave work and see her outside at Occupy Wall Street protests.” By the time he finally quit, she was fully on board, and their financial planning over the years meant the risk felt manageable. “Having a financial runway really helped. It made the leap psychologically and practically possible.”
Looking back, Andrés describes the move into EA as life-changing, both professionally and personally. “The meaning I get from my work now more than makes up for any sacrifices. I didn’t expect how good it would feel.” He also discovered something he didn’t realize he’d been missing: community. “In 15 years in finance, I made maybe three close friends. In EA and the animal movement, I’ve made dozens. These are people I trust, admire, and love seeing at events. They’re uber collaborative, honest, supportive, intellectually curious. I feel like I found my tribe.”
The CE program connected me with ambitiously altruistic people leading incredible projects, turning founding a charity from a distant dream into a real possibility. Without it, I don't think I'd never have taken the leap!
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Laura Sofia Castro
Co-founder, ACTRA
Non-profit professional with MEL and public policy experience