Social Entrepreneurs and Accountability - Audris Campbell

Accountability is so important in the world of social entrepreneurship. As a social entrepreneur, you are asking people to contribute towards your organization in the form of time, finances, or partnerships. These contributions are critical to the functioning of your organization, but they do not come without a price. When someone makes the decision to contribute to your organization’s success, in return they are asking that you be accountable for their time and resources by practicing good stewardship. If by any chance they learn that you have not been a good steward, rest assured that you have lost that person’s contributions along with other potential contributors.

Social entrepreneurs can exercise good stewardship habits by effectively and efficiently serving their target population and pursuing their mission. These days, many social entrepreneurs are practicing transparency as a way to illustrate their accountability to contributors. Some example of transparency are posting financial documents online, holding meetings where stakeholders are updated on financial decisions, and involving stakeholders in the actual decision making processes of the organization. In the wake of nonprofit scandals, such as Angel Food Ministries, social entrepreneurs cannot over look the need for being transparent to stakeholders. People have literally become hesitant to support organizations without a strong assurance that their contributions are going directly to the fulfillment of an organization’s mission.

Another way social entrepreneurs can demonstrate accountability to stakeholders is by creating performance measures for their organization and being sure to evaluate their organization on a consistent basis. These performance evaluations can be posted online or discussed at the organization’s annual meetings. Additionally, performance measures are great because not only does it help the organization demonstrate accountability to its stakeholders, but it also keeps stakeholders motivated within the organization. Contributors are able to keep track of the progress of the organization, which gives them opportunity to celebrate accomplishments and look forward to achieving future success.

Limitations to SE-Katy Bernhardt

As I read some of the other blog posts about starting from the mission and beginning there with social entrepreneurship. I start to think about my internship, Hope Haven of Northeast Ga. Many nonprofits receiving a large amount of the funding from the federal and state governments. Hope Haven receives a significant amount of their funding from the Medicaid Waiver program.

The government places many restrictions on what agencies can bill, even just setting up money for a client is a difficult and lengthy process. The government sets up the guidelines for what is included in programs offered and agencies are allowed to provides services in the different programs. There are many limitations that agencies face by following these mandated guidelines.

So I pose the question how do SE's handle these sort of limitations to still be entrepreneurial while sill providing services and following guidelines? In this economy it is especially difficult to depend solely on fundraisers or grants to provide funds for all services. Some of the rules and restrictions placed on agencies doesn't always make much sense and can be costly for organizations to follow, which leads to poorly paid staff, and a high turnover. It is difficult to be innovative with a high turnover rate. Is it really possibly to be true entrepreneurs while receiving government funding?

I realize that not all government funding is the same and many do not have the restrictions like the Medicaid waiver program. But for organizations like Hope Haven and number of clients that are served this is nearly impossible. What are approaches that can be made to make an organization more entrepreneurial?

Finding Motivation & Avoiding Burnout :: Liz Kazeck

As we find ourselves in the middle of the semester, I am having trouble finding the motivation I need to get through what's left of it. This past week, we discussed burnout in class and I cannot seem to shake that idea. With social entrepreneurial endeavors, I imagine this is a huge morale issue/risk that can be debilitating to many individuals hoping to start something new. As these entrepreneurs pour their hearts into new organizations I can imagine how demoralizing it must be to see few results from all their efforts. So what can we, and other social entrepreneurs do to get past this hurdle?

I found an article with a few tips to help us maintain our sanity as we begin to feel the effects of burnout (even if you are not experiencing any of these feelings, the tips may help you understand some things that may be important to volunteers or co-workers in your organizations). The article highlights 12 things we can to do protect ourselves from losing motivation. A few are described here.

First, take care of yourself. Our work won't be able to continue at a high level if we are working ourselves sick: sleep well, eat right, and exercise to reduce stress on the body. We can also take care of ourselves by making sure we schedule time to do nothing. As we are in the middle of working, this can be a hard thing to do. We just have to remember the importance of taking time to unwind from the stress of our endeavors.

We also need to set realistic expectations for what we hope to accomplish (day-to-day and overall). Practical steps can be taken to ensure this happens by shortening our to-do lists and prioritizing what we do actually have to get done. If we do happen to drop the ball or overlook something... we cannot beat ourselves up. We must learn not to blame ourselves or others for things that may fall through the cracks. Instead, the article tells us to learn from our mistakes and carry on. We also need to learn how to say no. As social entrepreneurs we want to give. Sometimes, we give so much that we find ourselves running on empty. This can be overcome if we establish boundaries on what we can and cannot commit to do.

Finally, we have to be honest with ourselves. We have to deal with our emotions. We're not in any of this alone. We have friends, family, and coworkers supporting us in our work as students and social entrepreneurs. Turn to them and let it all out! Let the people around you know what you are feeling. Need more than just a good venting session? Ask for help. Others will see and understand the value in what you are doing and will be willing to help, they may just not know how.If they cannot help, at least they know not to add to your stress.

Good luck staying motivated through the rest of this project and the rest of the semester. I hope these tips on burnout will help you avoid/overcome it! They have already helped me to get a better hold on what I am feeling.

And remember: the work you are doing is worth every second you are pouring into it... so enjoy it! Whether it is all easier or stressful behind-the-scenes, you are making a difference and you deserve to smile about that!

(Source: http://www.business-sanity.com/resources/articles/avoid-burnout/)

Capital Structure or Profitability - Which would an SE think is most important?

My presentation a couple of weeks ago was on measuring nonprofit success, growth and financial health using ratios from 990 forms. Those ratios were divided into three categories: Liquidity, Capital Structure and Profitability. After class, I thought all are important but which would a social entrepreneur (SE) value most? Which would he/she watch more closely or use more in making decisions? Is Liquidity is easy to take out - important but not more than the other two? Just thinking of the existing nonprofit - every nonprofit needs capital to get a new venture off the ground. But then profitability can help you achieve that capital structure instead of needing a loan, investor or increasing long-term debt/liabilities. But being able to pay all your bills at one point in time (liquidity) would also help make expanding to a new venture easy. Or maybe as I am writing - the SE can't look at one ratio or ratio category in a vaccum.

Will Richardson - Innovative NPO Start Up

This is somewhat in response to Ryan's post, but it's more than just minor commentary so I figured I would create a new posting.

I think innovation, the topic of the Dees chapter I am presenting in class this coming week, is the key to understanding why social enterprise works better than the traditional model of NPM in many cases. Dees defines innovation as "establishing new and better ways for accomplishing a worthwhile objective." Maybe the traditional non-profit model (defining an objective, then using multiple strategies to generate funds for that objective) is simply less effective than new models of social enterprise.

All non-profit founders are generally trying to meet some worthwhile objective, right? Some want to fight poverty, some fight homelessness, still others seek to be advocates for issues like public health - and the list goes on. But, I think the real trick is trying to figure out how to meet a real need by tapping into an existing desire to help that certain group of people. For example, the project we are working on (Trinity Effect) seeks to build a connection between Christian donors (who consistently give money to missions centered around helping impoverished countries) and micro-lending organizations that already have systems of effectively alleviating poverty in 3^rd world countries. The demonstrated desire to give is already there and so is the means for achieving the “worthwhile objective” of alleviating poverty. The entrepreneur’s job is have the foresight to marry the two.

Maybe the traditional non-profits are fighting an uphill battle because they start with a cause the have a passion for and then do their best to “sell” the cause and generate funds. Maybe an innovative way of setting out to solve the world’s needs through an entrepreneurial lens could be to first examine the public interest and figure out what cause donors want to support. What cause has interest but lacks current organizations to support it? What social concern is not getting enough attention? Could there be a throng of interested parties just waiting to give, but that have no organization to give to?

I think it’s at least an interesting way to think about the creation of NPOs.

Corporate Responsibility and Its Motives-Erin Porter

As current and future social entrepreneurs, should we be concerned with the motives behind a company’s move toward social responsibility? For instance, our class went into a fairly lengthy discussion regarding the greening of Walmart. Walmart is not the first company to practice corporate responsibility, other examples include: McDonalds (Ronal McDonald House), Shell Oil Company (Flower Valley, South Africa), Starbucks (fair trade coffee), ExxonMobil (malaria prevention-insecticide treated mosquito bednets), Marathon Oil Company (malaria prevention-indoor spraying and drug therapy), and numerous others.

Oftentimes the above-mentioned organizations are accused of participating in corporate responsibility to draw attention away from questions regarding unethical practices, increase their public reputation, or to increase profits for their organization. For instance, in 2004 the reputation of Shell took a heavy hit when the public learned they had misrepresented their oil revenues. Since then, Shell has become involved in Flower Valley and numerous other projects around the world.

Should other social entrepreneurs be concerned with the motives behind corporate responsibility? Or, should they simply be satisfied with surface-value corporate responsibility? Is a greater good truly being served when selfish motives are involved? I cannot help but wonder if corporate responsibility can exist without selfish motives.

defined by business...tracie sanchez posting

Terry Entrepreneurs is a program/club i just stumbled upon even though i work at Terry. they have an executive-in-residence and have incorporated SE into their typically just entrepreneurship club.
http://www.terry.uga.edu/entrepreneurship/social.html

they also have a blog and have started a wiki page to offer a definition.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_entrepreneurship

both of these land pretty solidly on the definition. so with that combo as my definition, i'm sorta feeling my two worlds collide; i can work at a business school, have 20 years of time in corporate america, and study nonprofit and make a switch that combines strengths from both experiences to make an impact on a social need. hmmm.