W. Michael Short | Managing Director

Award-winning Entrepreneur & Management Consultant with a 14 year track record of successfully planning, launching, managing, and scaling mission-driven and investor-backed companies, real estate ventures, technology platforms, cross-sector public / private / foundation / university partnerships and programming, national campaigns, non-profits, community engagement initiatives, and economic development programs that are projected to have over a billion dollars in economic impact when fully implemented. 

Mr. Short currently serves as the Managing Director of Firefly Innovations, the premier public health entrepreneurship platform of the City University of New York's Graduate School for Public Health & Health Policy (“CUNY SPH”), which operates several programs including the CUNY Public Health Innovation Accelerator. 

Mr. Short also serves as a Senior Director at the CUNY SPH Center for Systems & Community Design, as a Program Director at Medgar Evers College School of Business, as president of a university-based institute focused on supporting the growth of high impact social entrepreneurs worldwide, as CEO of several startups, and as Principal of a boutique management consulting firm.

To date, Mr. Short’s high impact community and economic development ventures and initiatives have attracted 100+ media stories including, but not limited to, highlights at the White House, Clinton Global Initiative, & United States of Women Summit for economic impact and job creation, as a Forbes Editors’ Pick for leveling the playing field for small business, at the New York Stock Exchange, in “What’s Working: Small Business” by Huffington Post and Goldman Sachs 10K Small Business Initiative, and by CBS News Radio New York City Small Business Spotlight for making “economics and finance interesting, fun, and understandable” and for creating an online funding platform designed to provide entrepreneurs a trusted alternative to online predatory lenders.

Mr. Short has also advised, assisted, and / or represented clients in pursuing over $320 million in economic, community, and real estate development funding, financing opportunities, grants, tax benefits, incentives, & various other related funding equivalents.