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Running a Social Business: More Rollercoaster Than Mountain Climb
Some believe a perfect metaphor for running a social business is a huge mountain climb: lots of struggle and suffering, and reaching the summit is the way to recognition and "glory." However, riding endlessly on a roller coaster seems a metaphor closer to reality: ups and downs, fear, excitement, frustration, accomplishment, anxiety and relief.
- Categories
- Social Enterprise
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Tapping into the Talent Pool Within the BoP
Ashoka’s Changemakers, along with the Opportunity Project from eBay Foundation, is focused on employment and income generation for vulnerable populations via its open competition for systematic/disruptive market-based innovations. You have until June 15 to submit your ideas. Read on for more details on the competition and Tuesday’s Twitter chat.
- Categories
- Social Enterprise
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The Best of Both Worlds? Blending For-Profit and Non-Profit Models
Incorporating for-profit activities into the structure of social good organizations can have amazing consequences. It can, for instance, free these organizations from the maddeningly inconsistent funding cycle of the non-profit world. However Perennial questions remain. Can organizations do good and be profitable at the same time?
- Categories
- Social Enterprise
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Sankalp 2011: A Guide to What’s in Store at India’s Largest Social Investor Summit
Sankalp 2011, India’s largest social investment summit will take place in Mumbai between May 5-6, bringing together over 150 investors, 400-plus enterprises and several prolific thought leaders in the development and responsible business space. This year forum goes global with two forums lined up later in the year to be held in Africa and the USA.
- Categories
- Social Enterprise
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From Unite for Sight: Hearing the Pitch
From recycled MP3 players given new life as educational tools to creating health centers at truck stops, to employing women with HIV as craftspeople, one highlight highlight of year’s Unite For Sight Global Health and Innovation Conference was attending social enterprise pitches - ideas in the early implementation or brainstorming stages.
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- Education, Health Care, Impact Assessment, Social Enterprise
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19 Days, 6,600 km: ’Ride for Light’ Motorcycle Journey to Illuminate the Philippines
Solar technology-focused social enterprises in Africa and Asia have used many creative marketing/PR strategies to share their products with light deprived communities. Kicking off on April 16, "Ride for Light" riders will travel thousands of miles across the Philippines archipelago on motorcycle to spread the word about the power of solar.
- Categories
- Energy, Social Enterprise
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Unleash Social Impact: Ashoka’s Globalizer and Skoll World Forum
Felix Oldenburg is challenging the mainstream dialogue on social enterprise. I had an insightful conversation with Felix, Ashoka’s Europe and Germany director, and a speaker at the Skoll World Forum. He, along with Konstanze Frischen and Maria Zapata, organized Ashoka’s first-annual Globalizer program that accelerated Ashoka Fellow enterprises.
- Categories
- Impact Assessment, Investing, Social Enterprise
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Guest Post: What Aid Agencies Can do to Boost Social Enterprise
Aid agencies have the capacity to nurture this growing field into a powerful set of new partners in their efforts to rid the world of poverty. But if not handled with care, the growing interest in social enterprise may overwhelm a fragile, nascent network still finding its voice. Five ways aid agencies can constructively engage social enterprise.
- Categories
- Social Enterprise