Jacqueline Novogratz really has an amazing story to tell in The Blue Sweater. This book is a first hand account of her journey from being a international banker to a social activist and entrepreneur. Specifically giving her account of tackling the world crisis of poverty. When Jacqueline was hired by Chase Bank, her job was to travel the world and review the loans that her bank had given out. Upon her travels learned more and more about the world's poverty and also learned how little of a roll banks had in helping poverty. The books title, all started in Jacqueline's childhood when she had a blue sweater that was a prized possession. When she outgrew the sweater her family gave the sweater to GoodWill. Twelve years later, she saw a young African child wearing a blue sweater just like the one she had when she was young. It was her very sweater she had when she was younger and it really made Jacqueline realize how connected we are all in the world.
Novogratz knew that trying to help global poverty was not going to be an easy fix, obviously. She knew that she couldn't just throw money around hoping that problem would just fix itself. She took a job at a non-profit bank to help create loans for low income women in Africa. Jacqueline wanted to help the women of Africa and help them run their businesses in proper fashion. When she was in Africa, she saw all the problems the African women faced and their inability to run their own business. The African women didn't respond well to Jacqueline's help, she had to come to realize that things were run very differently in Africa.
Jacqueline had to go through many obstacles as she transitioned from working at the well payed job at Chase, to helping fight poverty in Africa. Many unexpected things and times where she had to persevere and show some real mental toughness. It is going to be interesting to see how she continues to fight this uphill battle in the rest of the book.
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