1. What Does “Social” mean in the context of Social Entrepreneurship?
If an entrepreneur creates value, then a social entrepreneur creates some sort of social value. This social value benefits people whose urgent and reasonable needs are not being met by other means. Typical value can be measured in economic terms, but the social value is much harder to quantify. However, it is apparent how social entrepreneurs benefit their communities. They may not be creating a ton of economic value, but they contribute greatly to the social value of the community. Social entrepreneurs focus less on profit and more on what can positively affect the community around them.
“Social entrepreneurs create social value”
2. What is Entrepreneurship?
Entrepreneurship can be defined in many ways, but many respected definitions of the term include the words opportunity, exploit creation, and solution. It can have many different origins and outcomes, but they all encapsulate a greater drive and mission to exploit misused resources to create some type of positive outcome. Entrepreneurship is allocating these resources to produces a new value, through the efforts and contributions of previously underutilized individuals. These efforts may come in the form of a leadership role, a supporting position, or general involvement in a community that challenges said pre-existing systems. Increased productivity is often the result of entrepreneurship, but does not have to be.
Qualifying the attitude of an entrepreneur is also just as important to define the term, as he is recognized as not only an inventor or problem solver but an individual with distinct qualities. The entrepreneur is a creative, problem-solving, and curious spirit that looks for gaps in a pre-existing or new system. He has a goal of not only filling said gaps but resulting with some benefit, be it be personal financial gain or improved social equalities. He possesses the courage to venture into new or rocky markets, the drive to see their mission through good and bad times, and tenacity to pick themselves up if they do fail. Entrepreneurship is more than a process of stabilizing unbalanced markets – it is a mission and a mindset that drives innovation and improvements in the world.
3. What is the relationship of SE to the market? What are some examples of SE problem with market relationships (e.g. Lottery, eco tourism, airbnb, Uber?)
Although the social entrepreneur’s primary goal is to support their mission, they do need to be financially stable in order to thrive long-term. Therefore, the relationship with the market is important. The formation of organizations to address social problems is an important feature of market economics as politicians and celebrities promote social entrepreneurship. This draws more public attention to the social changes and addresses difficult social problems. Additionally, SE is gaining momentum in contemporary market economics as consumers look for more ethically sourced and produced goods.
However, Problems do emerge in these market relationships, specifically with companies such as Uber and Airbnb.
Social entrepreneurs must understand the market they are attempting to reach in order to be successful in it. This includes creating a cause that your consumers can stand behind, making sure that the market understands the effect of your impact often through storytelling as opposed to statistics sharing and having an appealing product/service.
Uber has been criticized as a social enterprise because of the way they treat their employees (the drivers) and the large commision they take, 20% of their earnings. Airbnb hosts are considered social entrepreneurs by the company, but criticism of the company consists of questions as to whether or not these hosts are actually social entrepreneurs of if they are just people looking for creative ways to make a living.
Interaction with the market that employees and supports social enterprises is a crucial part of being successful. However, this relationship does have its pitfalls when it comes to maintaining the bond in a sustainable and positive way.
4. Is the relationship between Social E and creative individual “heroes” relevant?
Social enterprises offers an innovative way to create social change, headed by those who are driven by social justice and community building. Defining social entrepreneurs as individual heroes does not add to or clarify the definition of a social entrepreneur. Much of social entrepreneurship literature tends to glorify entrepreneurs as perfect, moral, individual heroes. Describing social entrepreneurs in this kind of narrative is problematic because it ignores the times that the social entrepreneurs inevitably failed, ignores the team around the individual social entrepreneur, and muddles the motives and missions of typical social entrepreneurs. Thus, describing social entrepreneurs in a heroic light makes it difficult to learn from other social entrepreneurs’ mistakes and to think critically about the pros and cons of individual social enterprises. It is also hard to qualify someone as a hero when we have yet to see the long-term effects of their social enterprises. Historically, many businesses that strive to create positive social change have, in retrospect, become more of a problem than a solution. Although social entrepreneurs are motivated by and have produced positive social outcomes, it is important see if this impact is sustainable. Relating social entrepreneurs to heroes can make it difficult for us to unbiasedly evaluate their long term impact.
5. How do you decide whether a venture/project qualifies as legitimate social entrepreneurship?
Similar to the lack of a cohesive definition for social entrepreneurship, defining a venture in the context of social entrepreneurship can be challenging. Since social entrepreneurship is a largely emerging and understudied field, there is no consensus around a single set of rules a social venture should have. Despite the ambiguity around the definition of social entrepreneurship, we believe there are certain essential characteristics of a valid social venture. At a minimum a social venture should include:
- Asocial impact driven mission
- An innovative approach that deviates from the norm
- An economically sustainable model
- The ability to make a change in regards to their social mission, whether it be at a local, national, or global level.
6. What are the key elements of Entrepreneurship most relevant to SE’ers?
Some important entrepreneurship characteristics that can be seen with social entrepreneurs are creativity and the ability to continuously innovate, adapt, and learn. Both entrepreneurs and social entrepreneurs identify a problem and create a unique way for solving it. Some of the most relevant elements of entrepreneurship that apply to social entrepreneurship are being able to create a successful business model that can grow and last. Its also important that there’s an economic aspect to it because without this the business can’t be sustainable.
7. How does social entrepreneurship differ from corporate social responsibility?
Social entrepreneurship is defined as a company whose intended purpose is to propose a solution to a societal issue and profit is simply a means of operation. Corporate social responsibility is the continuing commitment by businesses to contribute to its economic development while also improving the quality of life of the workplace as well as the community at large. Companies typically have separate CSR departments where social entrepreneurship-like thoughts are compartmentalized inside a separate department, not spread throughout the entire company’s goals and missions like in SE. CSR and SE have different value creation approaches. SEs base their entire businesses on creating social value while businesses with CSR base their companies off business-as-usual, monetary/profit-oriented goals and structures while engaging in socially valued actions on the side.
8. Is all profit equal?
No, all profit is not equal. Profit for the sake of profit is not nearly as complex or involved as profit as a means to an end of social change. Profit is one part of a social entrepreneurial endeavor, because without it there would be no business, but social entrepreneurs find a way to maximize their profit so that they can achieve their mission, where as general startups simply maximize profit for the sake of making money. It is also important to determine how a company defines value. If a company is only concerned with making money and basing their success on how much profit they earned, that is not equivalent to the value of a social enterprise because their value comes from the social cause they are working towards more than the money they make. In the case of social entrepreneurship, there are simply more variables in the equation that equals to profit.
9. Is it possible – and/or useful – to define Social entrepreneurship?
Yes it is possible but also somewhat subjective. It seems based off the readings that from author to author the definition varies slightly. We believe the definition will continue to change with time as the field evolves and adapts to the business climate. In terms of the usefulness of defining social entrepreneurship it is very useful. It can establish a focused area for additional research to be done. It also allows for models and theories to be further developed. Finally, the definition of the term will minimize the misuse of the term by companies who may manipulate the definition in order to receive funding.
10. Does social entrepreneurship necessarily have to be pointed towards directly helping a group of people, or are there other means of social entrepreneurship?
Yes because social entrepreneurs are said to be business owners who integrate social responsibility in their operations by helping a group of people. They mainly try to provide real improvements that will benefit their communities as well as gain a good response from their investors and stakeholders. Social entrepreneurs are inspired to alter the unpleasant equilibrium. They make sure they have correctly assessed the needs and values of the people they intend to serve and the communities in which they operate. SE’s purpose is to help fund and implement solutions for social, cultural and environmental issues that occur in the world.
Social Entrepreneurship Profile 