Social Innovation Oxford 08

Friday, March 28, 2008

Introduction

Social Innovation Investment Group decided to send Sukhi Turner, (former Mayor of Dunedin City and Advisory Trustee to the Group), Emeline Afeaki-Mafile'o (New Zealand Social Entrepreneur Fellow) and Philip Patson (New Zealand Social Entrepreneur Fellow) to attend the Skoll World Forum 2008.

The theme of the conference was Culture, Context and Social Change. The questions that needed addressing were:

What are the cultural and contextual barriers that social entrepreneurs need to overcome to create sustainable change in the area where they work?
To what extent does culture accelerate or inhibit change, innovation and scale?
How can social entrepreneurs best evaluate the contexts in which they operate?
At the most practical levels., what mindsets and tools are needed for social entrepreneurs to work successfully across different cultures and contexts?

This was to be an opportunity for networking, testing new ideas and a chance to connect to a broader community of social entrepreneurs from all over the globe

Sukhi Turner, Emeline Afeaki Mafile'o and Philip Patston before leaving for Oxford

Opening Plenary

Skoll World Forum Opening - 1hour 57min (Real Player required)

Masterclasses - 1st day of Skoll World Forum

The best way to start a conference is to ease into it. The Skoll World Forum 2008 began with some pre-forum events.

Our first opportunity as delegates was to interact with the next generation of social entrepreneurs. These were mostly students who were doing their Master of Business Administration at the Said Business School, some were attending the conference from places like Berkeley and Harvard.

Our role was to be mentors and share our experience of being social entrepreneurs with the students. What they were looking for was practical advice and sharing of our insights.

All the students we interacted with were earnest and very interested in hearing our story and wanting to learn about the strategies that worked for us. The organisers were keen to get as many students to interact with the delegates as possible.

It was interesting to meet students that were from all over the globe. Most of them were very enthusiastic and committed to their studies and most showed a ambitious commitment to making a difference in the world.

The format that was used at the Masterclass seminar, was the fast and furious speed dating technique which suited the time constraints of the forum.

For me it was a good opportunity to learn about the aspirations of the students. It was interesting to find out that most of them were from the commercial world and were looking for a career change because they wanted to be involved in something more meaningful. They were looking to make a real difference in the world in the not for profit sector.

The Social Innovation & Investment Group may like to consider inviting students from Auckland University who are studying social entrepreneurship or any other young person who may like to be mentored by our first XV social entrepreneurs at our next retreat.

Master class

Philip Patston - 200GR8

Philip Patston's blog posts about his experiences at the Skoll World Forum 2008...

Here's an innovative idea...NOT
Changing the past
Depressed, hopeless, purposeless...but it's ok, I've been here before
The objective light of day

Pre-Forum Session:University Network for Social Entrpreneurship

At this session the attendees were asked to put forward area for research and discussion. I chose the topic on Governance and Accountability led by Dr. Alex Nicholls, conference co-convener and lecturer at the Skoll Centre for Social entrepreneurship.

The discussion revolved around accountability's of the governing bodies that were responsible for social entrepreneurship.

Who are they accountable to? Who are their stakeholders?

- donors
-beneficiaries
-the law
-customers
-community
-society

We discussed the "metrics" of this. What is best practice? The subjective (social) and the objective (economic) criteria for our judgements. Someone mentioned the Ibrahim Index, which I believe are external standards. Other discussion points were reputation of the governance and its legitimacy. It is interesting that Michael Edwards, the author of Just another Emperor? The Myths and Realities of Philanthrocapitalism says that we need to give beneficiaries a voice in decision making rather than the demands made by venture philanthropy that gives all power for the donors.
I look forward to some discussion and debate on the following web site.

Resources

- www.universitynetwork.org/ is a web-based portal for academics and practitioners. It gives access to a growing body of scholarly work and case studies in the field of Social Entrepreneurship. It hosts debates and posts conference details and news for students.

- Just Another Emperor? The Myths and Realities of Philanthrocapitalism (published by Demos: A Network for Ideas & Action 2008)

Consultancy Clinic 1

Consultancy Clinics were added to the Forum this year. They were advertised as "vigorous and fast moving Consultancy Clinics where select delegates "pitch" new ideas, business plans for sticky challenges to an esteemed panel of experts, innovators and thought leaders who will listen ask questions and provide valuable advice." Each delegate had a total of 20 minutes in front of these master panels - 5 minutes to pitch and 15 minutes for questioning and input. It was an opportunity for shared learning and 'out loud' thinking as panellist, many of whom were speakers at the forum.

My pitch was "assessing the fit between social entrepreneurs and financial supporters" and the panel of expert thought leaders were:

David Bornstein: Specialises in writing about social innovation. We have all come across his book How to Change the World:Social Entrepreneurs and the Power of New Ideas at SIIG and NZSEF. His first book, The Price of a Dream: The Story of the Grameen Bank, traces the history of the the Nobel Peace Prize winning Grameen Bank during its first 20 years and describes the global emergence of micro-finance. He has received awards for his writing from various universities in the USA.

Mark Campanale: Has over 19 years experience in sustainable financial markets; his area of knowledge is the finance of clean tech companies; sustainable asset management and social capital markets; and the role of capital markets in ecosystems management, principally forests. He is a founder director of the UK Social Investment Forum.

Roger L. Martin: Served as Dean of Rotman School of Management since 1998. His research work is in integrative thinking, business design. corporate social responsibility and country competitiveness. He had written several Harvard Business Review articles and published 2 books: The Opposable Mind: How Successful Leader win through IntergrativeThinking and The Responsibility Virus: How Control Freaks, Shrinking Violets - And the Rest of Us - Can Harness the Power of the True Partnership. He was named a Business Week 'B-School all Star' for being one of the 10 most influential business professors in the world.

Sophi Tranchell: Is the managing Director of Divine Chocolate Ltd, the pioneering Fairtrade company co-owned by farmers. Over the last 8 years she has built the company and brand from an idea to a dynamic business, turning over 10 million UK pounds and a profit of 500k UK pound profits. She has led the company's mission to improve the lives of small holder cocoa farmers in West Africa through a fairer trading relationship. she has won many awards and is also the chair of the steering committee to make London a Fairtrade City.

I started my pitch with a short summary of SIIG and NZSEF. I said that our entrepreneurs represented a diverse group representing youth, housing, gambling addiction, social and prisoners welfare issues. I said that we were a learning community that had only been going for over a year and one of our challenges was looking for resources for deepening and widening the work of our social entrepreneurs. One of the panel members suggested that perhaps our group was too diverse.

Mark Campanale suggested that we find out what a European Bank called Triodos had to offer and also a organisation called Prometheus who is based in New Zealand. The contact there is Glen Saunders. Bendigo Bank in Australia was also doing some interesting things.

The other pitches were about a 30M Venture fund to support financial services to lower income consumers in the US, micro financing poor people and helping them transition to self employment, developing a venture fund for micro financing organisations and incubating early stage social entrepreneurs in India.

When one of the panel suggested that the the poor should pay the going interest rate for any loans, a lively debate ensued. Sophi Tranchell was in doubt that this was an exploitation of vulnerable people in society!

Resources

- Social Edge blog Consultancy Clinic - Invaluable Expert Advice for social entrepreneurial challenges

- The Price of a Dream: The Story of the Grameen Bank by David Bornstein (book published by Oxford University Press 2005)

- How to Change the World: Social Entrepreneurs and the Power of New Ideas by David Bornstein (book published by Oxford University Press 2007)

-The Opposable Mind: How Successful Leaders Win Through Integrative Thinking by Robin Martin (book published by Harvard Business School Press 2007)

-The Responsibility Virus: How Control Freaks, Shrinking Violets-And the Rest of Us-Can Harness the Power of True Partnership by Robin Martin (book published by Harvard Business School Press 2007)

Legal Issues and Challenges facing Social Entrepreneurs

This seminar was part of the the Skoll World Forum's Orange Programme which offered a series of informal satellite meetings hosted by delegates. It gave an opportunity for delegates to engage with emerging ideas, approaches and innovations directly from the social entrepreneurship community.

David Roll, whom Vivian met last year, (and who has already given organised pro bono advice for one of our own social entrepreneurs John Stansfield) led the session. He is the founder of Lex Mundi Pro Bono Foundation. It's parent body Lex Mundi which has been operating for 20 years. It is a business network of 160 top tier independent commercial law firms with 500 offices world wide and employ over 16,000 lawyers.

The Foundation was set up in 2006 and is run by David Roll. I asked him what motivated him to give up his day job to do this work. His uncomplicated reply was that he wanted to "do something worthwhile"! The Lex Mundi Foundation has purposefully built relationships with organisations like Ashoka and Schwab. Skoll Foundation has just become their latest collaborator http://www.lexmundiprobono.org/

To date they have engineered 260 matches between social entrepreneurs and legal advisers. The Foundation's aim is to become one of the world's premier pro bono legal services organisations.

At the moment they are focusing on social entrepreneurship, but would like to broaden their horizons. Their future plans are :

Establishment of the rule of law in developing countries
legal reform
judicial reform
legal eduction and training for lawyers in developing countries
anti-corruption initiatives

I particularly like the last one. It would be a great help in India!

David was keen to get more applications to the Lex Mundi Pro Bono Foundation.

http://www.lexmundiprobono.org/

Mirror, Mirror on the wall, what's the impact of this all?

Measuring impact/assessment/evaluation were popular points of discussion at most of the sessions that I attended. This session discussed tensions surrounding the measurement of social impact with organizations both at the forefront of developing evaluation theory and those people on-the-ground implementing social programs. This interactive panel discussion explored various approaches to assessing impact and leveraging these efforts to attract resources and drive organisational learning. The panellists were:

Jeroo Billimoria, Executive Director, Aflatoun, Child savings International She has been an Ashoka fellow and founded the highly successful Childline in Mumbai, which now operates in 74 large cities in India. She is on to her third social venture which provides children with financial education, while teaching them about their responsibilities and rights as citizens.
David Bonbright, Chief Executive, Keystone Accountability. He has extensive experience in international development as a grant maker for institutions like the Ford Foundation and the Aga Khan Foundation and as an innovator in civil society strengthening. He is a regular contributor to the Alliance Magazine.
Joe Madiath, Executive Director, Gram Vikas. In 1971 he led 400 volunteers to manage a number of relief camps for refugees from Bangladesh. Later that year 40 volunteers, along with Joe moved to Orissa which had bee ravaged by a cyclone. they decided to stay on in the area to work as development activists. In 1979 Gram Vikas was established. Gram Vikas works with 36.000 indigenous and poor families living in 560 rural habitations.
Brian Trestald, Chief Investment Officer, Acumen Fund - a social investment fund with $27 million in approved investments in businesses that provide health, water, housing and energy good and services to the poor. the fund that is know for its record in tracking financial and social metrics.
Faye Twerskey, Director, Impact Planning and Improvement at the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. This is an internal department that serves as a consultancy on strategy, measurement and learning to all 3 of the foundations programme areas - Global Health, Global Development and US Programme.
Roger L. Martin, Dean, Rotman School of Management, University of Toronto acted as facilitator.

Each panellist gave a their approach and experience of assessing impact and their experience of measuring it.

Joe Madiath gave some dire statistics of the inequity for the girl child in rural India, the state of the sanitary infrastructure . He said if these statistics change, there was evidence of impact.
Jerro Billamoria spoke about he investment in children and the complexity of measurement and who needs to be involved in measuring. She was interested in how one gets "systems change".
Brian Trestald said the Acumen Fund measured evidence and said the "social capital market does exist and the market is a good listening device. David Benbright spoke about the complexity of measuring some impact.
Faye Twersky from the Gates Foundation advocated that evaluation should be aligned with the organization’s overall strategy – for example, measuring customer demand in market-based models or measuring improved access to water for development projects. And no matter what model you follow, if it’s not going to be helpful for your programming and learning then there’s no need to be spending time and energy gathering the data.

Much of this conversation always comes back to defining one's vision of success. In a standard business model, looking at sales and revenues and net profit make measuring success is an easy target. However, in the complex world of social entrepreneurship, the metrics become harder to define. This session unfortunately did not offer any concrete solutions , but it continued to raise the critical issue of using evaluation as a learning tool to improve the performance of the enterprise.

Mirror, Mirror on the wall, what's the impact of this all?- 1 hour 52 min (Real Player required)

Resources

- Social Edge blog Mirror Mirror on the Wall, What's the IMPACT of this all?

Marketing that Matters

This session was run by Prof. Douglas Holt, who is the L'Oreal Professor of Marketing at Oxford University. He specialises in the application of social and cultural theory to core branding issues. His most recent book, How Brands become Icons: The Principle of Cultural Branding develops a new cultural approach to cultural branding. At Oxford, he has launched an innovative interdisciplinary marketing area called "marketing, culture and society" which engages the civil and public sector in addition to business. The department is focused on applying socio-cultural marketing ideas to development and environmental issues.

Prof. Holt used the Global Foot Print Network website to illustrate his point. His definition of Brand was " What is out there in the world". In the area of branding for a social mission we need to focus on citizen behaviour. He talked about successful social entrepreneurs like Gandhi, Mandela, Martin Luther King who "delivered myths that mattered at the time"! He talked about the cultural branding framework and used examples from his research of brands in the history of the US.

Much of the lecture was esoteric and in the realm of business enterprise.

Marketing that Matters - 1hour 56min (Real Player required)

Lunch time film session - Oceans

Oscar-winning producer Jake Eberts spoke about the making of the forthcoming film Oceans and we were privileged to see a number of shorts of the film. Oceans cost US$75 million to make and was supported by Skoll's Participant Productions. It has some beautiful underwater photography of marine life, fish behaviour and habitats. Some tantalising shots of underwater cameramen swimming with various species of sharks, which included the big white. Also amazing shots of large species of whales, including the Humpback, that were shot at very close quarters.

The film explores the effects of overfishing and the killing of many species of fish, including 2 million sharks that are killed in long line fishing nets. Eberts discussed how film can be used to highten awareness and influence citizen participation towards finding solutions for environmental and social problems.

Thursday, March 27, 2008

Closing Plenary

We waited patiently outside the Nelson Mandela Lecture theatre for the last gathering of the Skoll World Forum 2008. The theatre was full to the full to the gunnel's and I would not be surprised if nearly all 750 delegate attended!

Paul Collier, Professor of Economics and Director of the Centre of Economics at Oxford University, served as Director of Development Research Group at the World Bank, senior advisor to former PM Blair's Commission on Africa was the first speaker. His past and current research has centred on addressing developmental changes facing low income countries, including research on the economics of conflict, governance and macro economics with a strong focus on the effects of aid, exchange rates and trade policies.

Prof. Collier spoke about this recently published book, The Bottom Billion which aims at providing concrete solutions to answering the plight of the world's poorest citizens. He asked how we could provide jobs and basic social services to the bottom billion. How can social entrepreneurs help. He believes this is a market opportunity for them (the bottom billion), not as consumers but as producers.
How do we make them more productive producers? His solutions were micro finance, business expertise, formation of clusters. Apparently 65% of buttons in the world are made in one country clusters. He said the provision of social services by governments had failed. There was hard evidence that community models don't work. There needs to be sustained public finance through private means.