• Strengthen. The visionary sets the agenda for customized assistance – not limited to a predetermined program menu.
• Local. The expert is the insider living the challenges day-in and day-out – not the visiting outsider professional.
• Visionaries. “Positive deviants” swim upstream against the odds for sustainable transformation – not surrendering to apathy or despair.
• Hard Places. The “edge of chaos” is where human need is most desperate and innovation most likely – not in stability where the “tried-and-true” is good enough.
• The Poor. Those in need welcome the dream as “good news” – not a good but irrelevant idea to their aspirations.
• Thrive as God intended. The aim is lasting, holistic well-being offered to all – not merely survival of the fittest.

Our mission emerged from the cauldron of two decades’ development work in contexts of sectarian violence, chronic poverty, human rights abuses, and compromised rule of law.  Years of professors’ probing and practitioners’ debates sharpened that mission.  Each phrase reflects our determination to think harder and work smarter for more significant impact alongside dreamers who dare to defy the odds.

Our values matured from reflection and action on becoming worthy of the trust of people who have been burned a few times too many. Practiced values are the DNA of human development. With no short-cuts or time off from the consistent practice of these values, dreams serving the common good become possible. The ensuing trust ensures the stability and allows the flexibility to collaborate at “the edge of chaos.”

Values are the DNA of human development.

Review of historical trends suggests it. Business management research supports it. International development studies demonstrate it. And our decades of experience in hard places confirm it.

The field of social entrepreneurship is awash in “value propositions” and “social value creation.” Yet social entrepreneurs and academics alike are struggling to translate amorphous social value into specific values, measurable against a clear standard.

We recognize that getting specific about social entrepreneurship values is touchy. Assessing values alignment is challenging. And actually living by values can be controversial – especially in contexts impacted and polarized by globalization, pluralism, and relativism.

But values are actions, not words. Behaviors, not sentiments. Decisions, not slogans.

We have chosen the life of Jesus Christ as the model by which we measure our values in practice. We respect others’ models and values, and state ours up front to facilitate understanding, build trust, and encourage collaboration.

Five core values guide and propel our efforts with social entrepreneurs. Each is a critical discipline for effective social entrepreneurship against the odds. Practiced in creative tension as an integrated set, these values balance and sustain innovation “at the edge of chaos.”

Our Leadership Team

Our leadership team has as its ambition to become servant leaders. We’ve been taught about leadership by seasoned mentors, professors, employers, colleagues. But we really learned to serve from other teachers – street kids, garbage sorters, the mentally challenged, leprosy sufferers, illegal aliens, genocide refugees. They patiently help us grasp what it really means to be human.

David L. Haskell

Chief Executive Officer

David Haskell strengthens social entrepreneurs inside hard places as Dreams InDeed’s co-founder and CEO. His resolve to empower those in hard places started as a graduate student stunned by an explosion in Beirut. David has thirty years’ entrepreneurial experience directing six start-ups and four turn-arounds, including as founding director of Habitat for Humanity in the Middle East and East Africa. His best teachers have been the mentally challenged, genocide survivors, garbage sorters, HIV/AIDS widows, street children, and subsistence farmers. David has shared their wisdom at the Skoll World Forum on Social Entrepreneurship, Grantmakers for Effective Organizations, Monitor Institute, Social Enterprise Alliance, Social Venture Partners, and at the American University of Beirut, Adelphi, Berkeley, Duke, Harvard, Notre Dame, Oxford, Princeton, Stanford, Tufts, and Wheaton. David earned a Harvard MPA in Leadership, Negotiation and Conflict Resolution; a UCLA MA in Applied Linguistics; and a Wheaton BA in Communications magna cum laude. A Pforzheimer Nonprofit Fellow at Harvard and Fulbright Scholar at University of Jordan, David received an Outstanding Teaching Award at UCLA.

Janice Hayashi Haskell

Vice-President of Program Development

Janice’s passion to empower the marginalized grew from her heritage scarred by Hiroshima’s devastation and U.S. internment of Japanese-American citizens. For over twenty years, Janice has tapped the power of love and wisdom to elicit transformative potential – from life-coaching Stanford students and innovating curriculum with abused children in the USA to strengthening street children mentoring and support of the mentally challenged in the Middle East. As Dreams InDeed VP of Program Development, Janice develops indigenous social entrepreneurs, weaves strategic networks, and assesses mapped outcomes. Janice earned her MA in International Affairs from Tufts Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, an MS in Education summa cum laude from Portland State, and a BA in Psychology cum laude from Lewis and Clark.

Brian J. Wakley

Associate for Europe and Africa

Brian loves a daunting challenge, whether cycling a 100-mile race or grappling with a wicked problem. His Dutch relatives’ example of harboring WW2 refugees inspired him early on. Then, three pivotal years living in a Ugandan mud hut taught newlywed Brian and his wife how to strengthen local leaders to overcome legacies of conflict and trauma. Brian applied those people and systems development insights as an executive of a peace and reconciliation agency in post-conflict contexts of Burundi, Cambodia, Chad, Laos, and Uganda. For over two decades, Brian has guided start-up enterprises through strategic change to collective impact, strengthening local leaders for lasting transformation. In addition to the school of hard knocks, Brian earned his MBA in Business Administration and BEng in Civil Engineering from Loughborough University, UK.

Our Governance Team

Our governance team also aims to lead as servants. That means shouldering the weight of public trust – not wielding rubber stamps. Volunteers, they roll up their sleeves as policy governors, professional advisors, resource sponsors, and stakeholder ambassadors. Board foresight and stability help to position Dreams InDeed to strengthen social entrepreneurs at risk in hard places.

U.S. Board & Officers

Thomas F. Darden, MRP, JD
Chief Executive Officer
Cherokee Investment Partners
Raleigh, NC

David L. Haskell, MPA, MA
Co-Founder and President
Dreams InDeed International
Amman, Jordan

Janice L. Hayashi Haskell, MS, MA
Co-Founder and Vice President of Program Development
Dreams InDeed International
Amman, Jordan

Jennifer W. Kwong, MALD, JD
Senior Counsel, Private US 501(c)(3) Foundation
Menlo Park, CA 

A. Becker Polverini, BSE
Chief Executive Officer, Hacktera Corporation
Knoxville, TN

Thomas S. Shou, MS
Senior Principal Software Engineer (Retired)
Santa Clara, CA