Recent Articles
Using Consumer Insights to Thin America and Fatten the Bottom Line
This post is part of a series on sustainability in the health and wellness industry, curated by Becky Eisen, Dana Ledyard, Izabel Loinaz. Follow along with the series here.
By Stephen Huie
Just because the growth rate of American obesity has slowed down to reach 34% of the adult population from 30% ten years ago, there isn’t any reason to begin letting loose again. Obesity may be plateauing for adults, but the number of obese children tripled to 17% over the same time period (CDC – 2010).
Food producers have been watching these “mega” trends in obesity and their counterpoint, health and wellness, for many years now. Food companies recognize that their customers’ bodies are changing and that buyers are responding by modifying what they choose to buy and eat.
But, how do you design and market healthier food products to a mass audience, especially when you’ve been producing products high in sugars, sodium, and fats for so long?
Taking the Entrepreneurial Plunge: Stories from the Social Venture Field
By Sara Herald
One of the sessions at the Social Enterprise Symposium held at the University of Maryland last Thursday featured tales and advice from four social entrepreneurs: Janessa Goldbeck from STANDnow, Steve Ma from Live Green Inc., Josh Nesbit from Medic Mobile, and Robyn Nietert from the Women’s Microfinance Initiative. What do these individuals working on the front lines to solve a variety of social problems have to say about the future of social entrepreneurship? That the world needs fewer generalists and more specialists who can tackle specific ills. What does that mean for the group of eager college and graduate students in attendance? Pick an area of interest to study and then focus on how the skills learned can address social problems.
That theme echoed throughout the Net Impact National Conference back in October, and it was really interesting to hear it repeated by people who have started successful businesses, both non- and for-profit. Echoing Green fellow Nesbit was pre-med at Stanford and became fascinated with mobile health and its implications in rural Africa while studying in Malawi. What kind of people is he looking to hire for Medic Mobile? Those with technical skills in software development and healthcare. It’s important to be passionate about the organization’s mission and a proven commitment to rural healthcare, but bottom line is that passion alone isn’t going to get you a job.
Find a Career that Gives You Passion in Six Easy Steps
By Zachary Olson
Everyone’s been lured into those seminars that are supposed to teach you THE SECRET to something, like finding happiness and blah blah blah, but then you end up just wanting to leave as soon as possible because they’re telling you things that seem like just common sense. But then sometimes, if you’re lucky, the speaker asks you to actually do one of their exercises, and your ego completely deflates as you realize you’re not actually doing these simple things. I had one of those moments in Dr. Mrim Boutla’s session about choosing a socially conscious career at the 2011 Social Enterprise Symposium. This is basically how the session started:
“Align your career with your passions!” Really? I should choose a job that I like doing? What a mind-blowing concept. 47 minutes left until I can leave and get some free food.
“Write down your top 6 passions.” I like my job, thanks. …If I were to do it, though (which I’m not), I guess I’d list things like web design and development and something to do with economic development or education and something about being outside and travel… None of which I get from my new internship (queue animation of ego shriveling up into a prune).
What Makes A (Social) Entrepreneur?
By Mike Levitsky
Simply seeing the panel “Social Entrepreneurs: Stories from the Field” at the UMDs Social Enterprise Symposium recently, has shown me that entrepreneurs come in all shapes and forms. A diverse panel allowed for different perspectives and experiences, each with unique contributions to what social entrepreneurship really means in our society. But, whether fighting against genocide in Africa, making green living the norm, helping women find financial help when no one else would, or bringing a new technology to become the standard in healthcare, these entrepreneurs have presented several traits and tidbits they feel are necessary for “entrepreneurial” success:
- Audacity is great. Don’t be afraid to go big early.
- Always go where you will have the most impact
- Passion makes up where skills lack
- A great TEAM is essential to success
- Be idealistic!
- “I got a great idea….now tell me what’s wrong with it”
- You don’t need anyone’s permission to do what you want to do
- Failing is good
- Entrepreneurship should be learned late in life! only after technical skills are learned should entrepreneurship be studied, so that these skills can be applied in new ways.
So…
It seems this “social entrepreneur” needs to be risky, goal oriented, passionate, idealistic, and rebellious. They need to have the ability to surround themselves with a good team of critics that won’t hold back, and to be able to accept failure time and time again.
Maybe it’s just me, but I feel like I’ve heard this before….in any business class that has tried to define entrepreneurship. So what is it that makes these people SOCIAL entrepreneurs?
Nothing, except changing times and trends.
The social conscious-ness of society of changing. We have more than we’ve ever had before. Resources, responsibilities, relationships. For one reason or another, we care more about how our actions impact the earth, others, and ourselves. The trend is impossible to ignore. More companies are claiming to be “socially responsible” through CSR programs to try to strap you to their bandwagon. We can even try to connect this trend to the growing needs of Gen Y’s in the corporate workplace. Simply put, times are changing.
Our generation can make a difference (realism has been replaced by idealism.) In a society experiencing innovation at rates never seen before, with technology making tasks and actions more efficient, while resources become more readily available, the new class of entrepreneurs has shifted its focus towards widespread impact. This, combined with the increased interconnectedness of people around the world due to the growing popularity of social media has allowed for MOST entrepreneurial ventures to be “social.”
No longer is the goal to create some new invention or gadget for its use or functionality. The new goal is to create something that will change markets, change the availability of resources, change how people live.
So join me in making the world a greener place. Save some paper, and lets simply call it “entrepreneurship,” whether it’s social…or it’s social.
Calling All Female Would-Be Entrepreneurs
By Sara Herald
Although rates of entrepreneurship among women in the United States have been growing steadily, 60% of new businesses are still founded by men. However, if Natalia Oberti Noguera, Julie Lenzer Kirk, and Amy Millman have their way, that percentage will decrease significantly in the coming years. These three women, all entrepreneurs themselves, have made careers of helping other women start and grow businesses.
Oberti Noguera founded the Pipeline Fund, “a social venture fund that invests in women-led for-profit social ventures and trains women to become angel investors.” She’s passionate about gender equality in the business world, and she wants all aspiring female entrepreneurs to know that “it’s okay to fail, because each failure is just a step closer to success.”
Bank of America Knows Money Isn’t the Only Green That Matters
The Bank of America Tower
By Taylor Muckerman
This past week, I ventured to New York City with some fellow finance MBA’s from the Smith School to visit with some alumni at their respective jobs. The final day of our trek included a visit to the new Bank of America Tower on the Avenue of the Americas. Our visit here turned out to be more than just a Q & A with an alumn. After our lunch and informational interview session with a Managing Director of the Global Wealth Management division, we were treated to a virtual tour of this grand facility designed by Cook+Fox.
The new building, which opened in 2008, has received LEED Platinum certification. The Leadership in Energy & Environmental Design (LEED) rating system aims to identify the best practices, materials, and systems for environmentally friendly buildings. This rating is well warranted due to the vast array of eco-friendly features this skyscraper houses:
Net Impact Conference 2010: Reconciling Ideals with Reality
Source: www.netimpact.org
This past week I attended the Net Impact Annual conference at the magnificent Ross School of Business at the University of Michigan. The conference mission is lofty: “to inspire, educate, and equip individuals to use the power of business to create a more socially and environmentally sustainable world,” but what makes the organization stand out is the practicality demonstrated while trying to achieve that mission.
The balance the organization strikes between ideals and reality is most evident in the food provided at the conference. Much of the food was organic, but not all. Some of the items were local, such as apples from nearby farms, but much of it was not. All the packaging in the box lunches was compostable, but coffee and tea were served in disposable cups. Conference organizers recognize that attendees care about where their food comes from and the waste the conference generates, but convenience is essential. Just as consumer product goods manufacturers have recognized that a growing sector of consumers care about the environmental effects of the products they purchase, but only after functionality is accounted for. Few people are going to buy dish detergent that doesn’t work, as “green” as it may be, because dirty dishes don’t appeal to anyone. In that same vein, few people are going to attend a conference without food, or God forbid, coffee.
The NFL’s Lip Service to Safety
An Eagles player turns himself into a missile
By David Croushore
This week, the NFL finally made a reasonable gesture with respect to player safety. However, the crackdown on brutal hits is only a good start in the fight for player safety that must continue.
As Greg Easterbrook of ESPN is quick to point out, the NFL must make efforts to promote the safety of its players, not simply for the players’ sake, but for the sake of the majority of football players, high school and college athletes who will never make a dime from athletics. These young players stand to lose much more in the event of an injury than they can ever gain. Head and neck injuries are particularly dangerous for young athletes, as concussions have been shown to cause more long term harm when sustained before the brain has fully developed.
Does America’s Public School System Need a Superman?
By: David Croushore
In high school, I graduated with a GPA of 5.8 on a 4.0 scale. That mark was good enough to be 23rd in my class. The reason for this bizarre, up-side-down score and rank was the result of a common practice in suburban public schools, tracking. Until last week, I saw nothing strange about the practice. Everyone I knew had experienced the same phenomenon, and we never questioned it. Then I saw Waiting for Superman, the new must-see documentary about education in America.
Everyone is aware that our education system is not perfect, but we often assume that the biggest problems are confined to the inner city, to the areas where a combination of low socio-economic status and years of neglect have led to failing schools and failing neighborhoods. Those problems do exist, but what we fail to recognize is the failure of the education system on the “other side of the tracks.”
The P&G Sustainability Vision: Reluctant Response or Strategic Shift?
P&G Headquarters - Cincinnati, Ohio
Last week, Procter & Gamble, the largest consumer product goods company in the world, announced an ambitious new environmental sustainability vision. The parent company of brands like Tide, Pampers, Bounty and countless others appears to have decided that its business stands to suffer significantly as more and more consumers choose “sustainable” products over traditional offerings.
The vision is ambitious: “using 100% renewable or recycled materials for all products and packaging,” “having zero consumer waste go to landfills,” and “emitting no fossil-based CO2 or toxic emissions” are just a few of the near Utopian statements it includes. In order to achieve those goals, the company has established a set of benchmarks that are much more realistic. For example, by 2020 the company aims to have renewable materials account for 25% of product/packaging materials, and for their plants to be powered by 30% renewable energy. While it’s great that a company whose products are used by more than 4 billion people every day has committed to reducing the environmental impact of its operations, it’s hard not to question the firm’s motives. If buyers as crucial as Walmart weren’t pressuring the company to reduce the environmental footprint of its products, and competitors such as Clorox Green Works, method, and Seventh Generation weren’t performing as well, would P&G even care about sustainability?
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