In this panel discussion, social entrepreneur veteran Laura Scher and more recent entrants, Kirsten Gagnaire and Jenny Shilling Stein, offer advice on what it takes to create a successful for-profit or nonprofit organization with a social purpose. The key components, they agreed, are a strong leader, a clear social mission, consistency, and focus.
How did Patagonia make the transition to using 100% organic cotton in its product line? In this panel discussion from Bridging the Gap, the Stanford 2005 Net Impact Conference organized by the Stanford Graduate School of Business, Randy Harward discusses the challenges of garnering internal support, ensuring adequate supply of raw materials, and keeping prices affordable as Patagonia greens its supply chain.
Changing the status quo in major organizations may seem overwhelming. Debra Meyerson offers the 2005 Stanford Net Impact conference audience strategies to effect change from within through tempered radicalism. In this audio lecture, she shares findings from her research about incremental and bottom-up change strategies to impact corporate values and advance social justice and social responsibility within organizations.
Business execs may have difficulty entering the nonprofit arena.
Dean Kamen has literally changed the world by turning breakthrough ideas into practical products. In this audio interview with Globeshakers host Tim Zak, Kamen discusses the power of technology to change society. He also talks about what it takes to persevere in the face of public and professional resistance toward inventions and technology that can actually make people's lives better.
Professionalism has become coded language for white favoritism in workplace practices that more often than not leave behind people of color. This is the fourth of 10 articles in a special series about diversity, equity, and inclusion.
Social entrepreneurship is attracting growing amounts of talent, money, and attention, but along with its increasing popularity has come less certainty about what exactly a social entrepreneur is and does.
Conventional wisdom says that scaling social innovation starts with strengthening internal management capabilities. This study of 12 high-impact nonprofits, however, shows that real social change happens when organizations go outside their own walls and find creative ways to enlist the help of others.
Business leaders play vital roles in the nonprofit sector – as board members, donors, partners, and even executives. Yet all too often they underestimate the unique challenges of managing nonprofit organizations.
The deep changes necessary to accelerate progress against society's most intractable problems require someone who catalyzes collective leadership.
