Social Enterprise is at a distinct disadvantage, some might say, because at the end of the day they rarely turn as high a profit or have as big margins. These are very real problems for social entrepreneurs because without these big factors attaining startup capital is rather difficult. However, these factors are as ancient for measuring a businesses ability to succeed as are those bankers that continue to use them. The success of a business has very little to do with profit, and more to do with people. Successful entrepreneurs are those with passion and an unwillingness to fail that will win out in the end. It is these same qualities that social entrepreneurs have (for the most part) in abundance. Entrepreneurs who decide to start a business with the hopes of improving society are more likely to push for success than are those who start for reasons to do with profit. I don't intend to claim that there are not extremely passionate entrepreneurs, or very successful entrepreneurs, who are only in it for the money. What I am saying, however, is that the risk of an entrepreneur failing is much more likely to come from this pool than from the social enterprise pool of candidates.
What if instead of measuring a companies success by profit we measured it by how much it has or will improve the human condition? or the amount of lives it has or plans improve/save? What about the old adage for investors about risk vs. reward - the reward is making a difference in the world, and the risk is lower to invest.
In the future I can forsee these changes taking place and I can also see the gap in profit between social enterprise and their corresponding for-only-profit ventures closing as more and more consumers start to spend their money on products and services that serve a greater good.
Business is all about being able to look into the future and see what is going to be the next big hit. I challenge anyone to contend that social enterprise is not going to be one of the next big trends. So as investors and consumers lets abandon our archaic methods for analyzing success and realize that their will be lot more reward for putting our money into businesses with a goal of making a difference. You can be apart of the future or you can watch it happen, it is your choice.
Tuesday, November 6, 2007
Thursday, November 1, 2007
The Student Challenge
The students of the today are becoming an increasingly difficult market to reach. Students, let’s define them as a person between the ages of 17 to 25, are smarter than ever before with more experience as consumers. Television advertising no longer holds the same captivation as it did with prior generations while newspapers and magazines become less read by younger individuals. When on a quest for information, we, as young adults, do not look to the printed media or chance television advertising. Rather, we turn towards our first love – the Internet.
I’m sure it comes as no shock that the Internet is quickly becoming a crucial factor in communication. The information superhighway is well charted territory for most major organizations with hundreds of thousands of dollars being spent on websites. The tricky part becomes using the internet effectively.
Any company can have a website, actually any person can. What must be considered when creating a website is functionality and aesthetic appeal. When I go to a company’s website looking for information about their newest product and find an ugly page, I am immediately disheartened. That isn’t to say that a site must be a symphony of motion and colour; simply visually appealing to make a potential customer feel at ease that the company may understand the internet. Functionality is even trickier and even more important. If a website is too difficult to navigate, students will give up and find their information elsewhere online, where the message cannot be controlled. Fashion at the expense of functionality is not acceptable.
By their nature, students are social creatures. More than this, they are capable of moving, gracefully, between different and distinct social groups. Spending one night with high school friends and the next with the friends met in residence comes to them as naturally as breathing. That socializing has come to an art through the internet. Online social networking tools have become an instant hit for organizing young people. Facebook has spun into a web of interconnectivity, allowing users to create detailed profiles of themselves as well as groups for likeminded individuals to gather and share opinions. Drawing students to an event has become precarious due to social networking, as students can use Facebook and instant messaging services like MSN to communicate across great distances to organize large groups. For example, two special events running simultaneously at two separate businesses would, in the past, have split the local student population for attendance. The two operations now must contend with online social networking pre-organizing people as well as instant messaging being used by opinion leaders to sway multiple individuals at once to come with them to their event of choice.
Now we come to the crux of it all – opinion leaders. Word-of-mouth has always been the most effective form of marketing; reference from a friend adding more legitimacy to a recommendation than that of a television advertisement. Now, more than ever, we must rely on the opinion leaders of target markets to effect change in behaviour. This signals a shift in the marketing strategies of some companies, who have previously rested comfortably on their advertising budget. By shifting a focus to online marketing with a strong representation by specifically targeted opinion leaders, companies can take advantage of the changes in the trends of student life rather than combating them.
Students will always be an ever-changing target market. Difficult to pin down, they present constant challenge to marketing managers across the country. Despite the problems, they are well worth the effort. Students represent the catalysts for change in the coming future and having impact on them in the formative stages of their adult lives can be extremely lucrative, leading to extended brand loyalty in the future.
Wednesday, October 31, 2007
A Book That Is Definitely Worth The Read
It is nearly impossible to ignore the impact that facebook has had on the world as we know it. This seemingly overnight sensation has taken the Internet by storm and as of October 2007 consists of over 42 million users worldwide, most of whom are teens and young adults either in or entering the work force. Considering that this service has only been online since early 2004, I believe this is a clear indication that Facebook is and will remain the World’s premier social networking tool for years to come.
Now you may be thinking “great, a lot of people use this website, but what benefit is that to me?” Well, the truth is that facebook is a massive and essentially untapped resource when it comes to employee morale and productivity. It is no secret that many corporations have begun using facebook to screen potential recruits before they are granted interviews, and some are even reprimanding those who prove to be violating company policy within its pages. While these practices definitely help improve a company’s ranks, there is still something missing from the equation.
The personal information that the pages of facebook contain should also be used to develop and encourage those who are already an integral part of the business. If I were to log on to any person’s facebook page, I would more or less have instant access to information about their interests, hobbies, dislikes, hopes, dreams, and everything else in between. But it doesn’t stop there. I would also have access to a list of that person’s friends (only those that use facebook themselves, but then again pretty much everyone does) and their personal information, pictures that people have uploaded and so on. In short, one could essentially learn about someone’s entire life in minutes, with only a few clicks of a mouse. While this is a scary thought for many, at the same time it proves to be a valuable tool in developing good working relationships between people, more specifically managers and those who work under them.
Such vast amounts of personal information could be and should be used by companies to get to know their employees on a more personal level and allow them to relate to their lives as much as possible. Building such relationships is key as it will encourage people to communicate more effectively with their managers and executives as well as improve morale by showing them that they are valued and belong to a team. Essentially this creates a much more positive and welcoming work environment where people are able to enjoy themselves and therefore be more productive. I know that when someone knows what is going on in my life and is able to talk to me about it, I feel cared for and am much more driven in life.
Facebook is also a useful tool to develop targeted incentives and events that are based on the common interests of those within the company. These incentives and events are then easily posted on facebook as a group or event to which people can be invited to and attendance can be tracked. This feature is also helpful in planning these events as each person’s page also shows every advertised event that they are planning on attending and even those that they have attended. Using this information would definitely be beneficial in making sure that attendance at such events is as high as possible.
Imagine that all this information is utterly free for anyone to access. Well, that’s not entirely true. Facebook employs a system whereby only users within the same network have access to each other’s pages without being friends with them. These networks are organized into different university and colleges, high schools, geographical areas and even workplaces. In fact networks are set up for most major corporations around the world. The only thing people need to join them is an affiliated email address. Interestingly enough, once people access these networks, their email accounts are most likely to become neglected as they will check their facebook pages as often as they need to eat or sleep.
In all, the more you know about your employees, the better you are able to serve them and the better you are able to serve them, the better they are able to serve your customers. Facebook is rapidly growing every day and is projected to have over 60 million users by the end of 2007. By no means should facebook ever be a substitute for direct human interaction; however, as we become increasingly disconnected in our physical world, it is a valuable tool that should not be ignored.
Tuesday, October 30, 2007
HR? We Got to change it!
To many times I have come across friends, other fellow employees, and relatives that have come back from an interview from a dream job, and felt they did something wrong. Either they said the wrong thing, sat the wrong way, or sweat to much. Any of these things are reasonable thoughts that are an outcome of a conventional interview. What if we could totally change the way an interview was performed and thus created better preceptions of candidates and make better decisions. Business would be more productive and effective when it comes to the most important part about business, PEOPLE. People are the fuel that can take us to our organizational goals and meet our production targets each year. But, it also happens that this is the most complex part of any business, so why can't we have a system where we simplify this complexity and make the right decisions when it comes to HR.
A new system of recruitment and training can change the way we participate in HR. This system involves a three step process which includes a group interview, then after a formal interview, then finishing with a personal interview. The process may be long, but there lies the commitment to the business. If a successful cannidate can go through the whole process, they will have no unrealistic expectations about the company and the socialization to the organizational culture would also start within the interview. Lots of people do not like the jobs they work partly because the culture of the organization does not match them specifically. Working at a good company and making money is a significiant part of people's lives, so you want a cohesiveness that can last a long time, so the employees can be as useful as possible to the organizational goals.
More about the process, the group interview can let raters and evaluators judge people in a very reasonable group inevironment. Knowing that business is a place where group work is almost unavoidable, this would be neccessary to see how cannidates communicate with others. The only difference is that, their would be no evaluations being written at the time, whereas, the would come together afterwards and discuss the pros and cons of each applicant. If successful in the group interview, then comes the first of two one on one interviews. The first would be formal interview, asking about past work experience etc. However, in the group interview, each cannidate can learn a little bit more about these people interviewing them, and accordingly, not be as nervous to go into the interview. The last interview, is a less formal, casual meeting of the evaluator and cannidate. This is an interview and discussion about their goals of the working with the company, what their expectations are, and what the company expects from them. As well, more personal information such as where they went to school, and what sort of things they learned that would be of value to the company. This last interview would be extremely confortable because it is in a less formal setting and also, the cannidate and interviewers could build a little bit of relationship before.
I feel that this process of hiring and training can really prepare the cannidates for work. As well, it educates the employer about the people they are hiring on and would give them a better perspective on who to hire. HR needs to change to reduce the amount of miss hires and thus created a better organizational culture within the business.
Small changes like these, can affect the organizational greatly in the long run and thus contribute to a better organization environment. But has to start with HR.
A new system of recruitment and training can change the way we participate in HR. This system involves a three step process which includes a group interview, then after a formal interview, then finishing with a personal interview. The process may be long, but there lies the commitment to the business. If a successful cannidate can go through the whole process, they will have no unrealistic expectations about the company and the socialization to the organizational culture would also start within the interview. Lots of people do not like the jobs they work partly because the culture of the organization does not match them specifically. Working at a good company and making money is a significiant part of people's lives, so you want a cohesiveness that can last a long time, so the employees can be as useful as possible to the organizational goals.
More about the process, the group interview can let raters and evaluators judge people in a very reasonable group inevironment. Knowing that business is a place where group work is almost unavoidable, this would be neccessary to see how cannidates communicate with others. The only difference is that, their would be no evaluations being written at the time, whereas, the would come together afterwards and discuss the pros and cons of each applicant. If successful in the group interview, then comes the first of two one on one interviews. The first would be formal interview, asking about past work experience etc. However, in the group interview, each cannidate can learn a little bit more about these people interviewing them, and accordingly, not be as nervous to go into the interview. The last interview, is a less formal, casual meeting of the evaluator and cannidate. This is an interview and discussion about their goals of the working with the company, what their expectations are, and what the company expects from them. As well, more personal information such as where they went to school, and what sort of things they learned that would be of value to the company. This last interview would be extremely confortable because it is in a less formal setting and also, the cannidate and interviewers could build a little bit of relationship before.
I feel that this process of hiring and training can really prepare the cannidates for work. As well, it educates the employer about the people they are hiring on and would give them a better perspective on who to hire. HR needs to change to reduce the amount of miss hires and thus created a better organizational culture within the business.
Small changes like these, can affect the organizational greatly in the long run and thus contribute to a better organization environment. But has to start with HR.
Where is Social Enterprise Taking Us?
Everybody and their mother are claiming to be green, but why? What is it about this 'green' movement that has everyones head spinning? The answer is that it appears consumers are beginning to care what footprint their purchase leaves behind, they care about where it came from, and what the business that created it is doing to make a difference. Alas, the green movement. What does this mean for the future of business? Well alone it might mean very little, but expectations are rising - we expect big business to have a heart. More than ever before companies are seeing the need to create and publish Corporate Social Responsibility Reports to potential investors, as well as potential consumers. We expect our clothing not to be made by the hands of a child in a sweatshop, we expect pollution will be curbed, we expect, we expect, we expect. The truth is this is just the beginning. The generation currently making its way up the population tree is extremely socially conscious (for which I am apart of) and they are aware of the problems that plague the world. The expendable income that business is fighting for is about to become tied. If you want it then you had better make damn sure you deserve it. (As an aside and estimated 6 Trillion dollars is going to pass down to this upcoming generation over the next 30 years - that is a lot of expendable income) Up until now companies have reacted to the future business climate - the few that didn't and went ahead and built their business on socially conscious values have enjoyed a fruitful existence. If a company wants to succeed in the future then it might be pertinent to have some vision and plan for a future where social enterprise is not just a small segment of businesses but one which all businesses will be expected to prescribe. If you're a business why not see the opportunity in getting out ahead of the pack. A business need not look any further than the list of global threats over the present and future to see what might just be the next 'green' movement: Health (AIDS, Malaria, TB, Avian Flu, etc), resource shortages (water, petroleum), Poverty (a certain factor in terrorism). A business could find a real niche - one that fits in well with their brand. The social movement is here to stay ladies and gentlemen, so lets get a move on before we're left behind.
Warning: This first post is merely my opinion, even if it is an educated one, so if you disagree with my opinion then I certainly welcome the discussion. I do plan to expand on all that I write about and back it up with more fact in the future, it is just too much to start with now.
Warning: This first post is merely my opinion, even if it is an educated one, so if you disagree with my opinion then I certainly welcome the discussion. I do plan to expand on all that I write about and back it up with more fact in the future, it is just too much to start with now.
MIT/Health Canada - Ideas are the Currency of the Future
Finally, we see some movement, right in Canada, that suggests that open access to information really is happening.
http://www.thestar.com/Business/article/254701
"The Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR), the federal government's health research granting agency, unveiled a new open access policy for the research that it funds.
The new policy – the first of its kind for Ottawa's three major research granting institutions that dole out hundreds of millions of dollars each year – will revolutionize access to health research by mandating that thousands of articles published each year be made freely available online to a global audience.
This marks an important step in the "open access" movement in Canada, which had been falling behind peer institutions in the United States, Europe and Australia."
Could we somehow fit this idea into education? MIT Open Courseware (http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/web/home/home/index.htm) is a great example. Free course material offered to anyone in the world who can access a computer. Someone in an internet cafe in Nigeria can be learning from the very same materials as a student studying at MIT in the US. So, what's the next step?
What we do with all this information.
With this freedom, of course, comes responsibility. It sounds elementary, but we have a responsibility as global citizens to contribute, to participate, and to change things. That's what will continue to push these movements and truly flatten the world.
After all, "Ideas are the currency of the future", says Kevin Roberts at Saatchi & Saatchi.
http://www.thestar.com/Business/article/254701
"The Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR), the federal government's health research granting agency, unveiled a new open access policy for the research that it funds.
The new policy – the first of its kind for Ottawa's three major research granting institutions that dole out hundreds of millions of dollars each year – will revolutionize access to health research by mandating that thousands of articles published each year be made freely available online to a global audience.
This marks an important step in the "open access" movement in Canada, which had been falling behind peer institutions in the United States, Europe and Australia."
Could we somehow fit this idea into education? MIT Open Courseware (http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/web/home/home/index.htm) is a great example. Free course material offered to anyone in the world who can access a computer. Someone in an internet cafe in Nigeria can be learning from the very same materials as a student studying at MIT in the US. So, what's the next step?
What we do with all this information.
With this freedom, of course, comes responsibility. It sounds elementary, but we have a responsibility as global citizens to contribute, to participate, and to change things. That's what will continue to push these movements and truly flatten the world.
After all, "Ideas are the currency of the future", says Kevin Roberts at Saatchi & Saatchi.
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