Social Enterprise - Most Popular

Innovative ways that organizations are using and adapting business strategies to advance social and environmental well-being (more)

Podcast

Lynne Patterson - Empowering Women in Latin America

One of the best methods proven to alleviate poverty is microlending to women, who have a great track record for using loans wisely to create small business enterprises that sustain their entire families. Host of the Center for Social Innovation at Stanford, Lynne Patterson talks about the creation of Pro Mujer, an international microfinance and women's development network in Latin America. She details the mission, objectives, methods, and progress, illuminating the organization's empowering impact on the lives of its many clients.

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Baked Goods

By Abby Fung

Dancing Deer Bakery helps most when it keeps its eye on the bottom line.

Podcast

Brij Kothari - Literacy Through Entertainment

What do you get when you combine a love of Bollywood music videos with widespread illiteracy? Brij Kothari sees an opportunity to make the world a better place. By subtitling popular entertainment, he helps millions learn to read in a fun way. He's also creating multiplatform stories that will be seen on TV, read on mobile phones, and printed in books. Talking to Design for Change host Sheela Sethuraman in this audio interview, Kothari describes how he improves lives by incorporating education into everyday entertainment.

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The Funding Gap

By Michael Chertok, Jeff Hamaoui, & Eliot Jamison

Social enterprises combine the best of the nonprofit and for-profit worlds, but that very innovation has made it difficult for them to raise money. Philanthropists are reluctant to give grants to profit-making organizations, and commercial investors are wary of investing in organizations that are driven by a social mission. The authors explore the social enterprise capital market and offer short- and long-term solutions to this funding gap.

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Cultivate Your Ecosystem

By Paul N. Bloom & J. Gregory Dees 1

Social entrepreneurs not only must understand the broad environment in which they work, but also must shape those environments to support their goals, when feasible. Borrowing insights from the field of ecology, the authors offer an ecosystems framework to help social entrepreneurs create long-lasting and significant social change.

Podcast

Hannah Jones - Corporate Social Responsibility and Innovation

Nike has traveled the full range of the corporate social responsibility movement, from the campaigning days when it was a poster child for all things to do with poor working conditions through the era of multistakeholder partnerships. It has now moved into the next phase where corporate responsibility becomes part of the business model. Speaking at the Stanford 2007 Responsible Supply Chains Conference, Nike's VP for corporate responsibility, Hannah Jones, looks at the future of corporate responsibility as the focus shifts upstream.

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Working All Fronts

By Catherine Potter

How Sustainable Conservation unites all sectors for the environment.

Podcast

Supporting More Social Enterprise - Skoll World Forum 2007

How do we foster more social enterprise and innovation? In this panel discussion, panelists John Elkington, Bill Drayton, and Ed Milibrand consider the question. They explore what's needed on the local, regional, national, and international levels, and acknowledge the role that governments and entrepreneurs play in improving the social landscape.