United Prosperity’s Powerful Upgrade to the Microfinance Model
Posted by Amelia Timbers March 19th, 2010 
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Microfinance is feel-good. It’s win-win-win for investors without demanding return requirements. It’s low risk. It helps the poor and empowers an escape from subsistence living. Microfinance is finance we can live with, far from Wall Street’s psychotic derivatives and Madoff-styled sociopaths. Microfinance is lending and investing that’s so ideal that it’s almost cutesy. However, it’s also small-scale, and its small scale reduces its potential to change the world quickly. United Prosperity is a new organization that includes all of the charm of a typical microfinance outfit, but also incorporates more serious, higher impact financial strategy. Ladies and gentlemen: the power of the guarantor.
What if Doing Well Means Getting Sued?
Posted by Leon Kaye March 16th, 2010 View Comments
Dr. Peter Cappelli of Pennsylvania University’s Wharton School recently finished a study that suggests Indian firms succeed because they often have a strong social mission. Doing well financially is possible, Cappelli and his team of researchers assert, because they are “doing good.” Indeed, a cursory look at large Indian corporations offers commendable mission statements: Tata Group’s value and purpose include a goal to “improve the quality of life of the communities” in which it serves. Reliance Industries Inc. equates growth with care for good health, safety, the environment, and people. Many Indian conglomerates list an impressive range of projects that improve the lives of Indians and citizens abroad. Cappelli concludes, therefore, that American business leaders should serve all of a company’s stakeholders, not just its shareholders.
Unfortunately, US law is in the way of any company striving to do good.
10 Ways Crowdsourcing Can Save or Fail Your Business
Posted by Jen Boynton March 15th, 2010 View Comments
Crowdsourcing is kind of the best of the internet. Strangers self-organize to complete a task or solve a problem, and the solution often comes faster and cheaper than anything one desk jockey in a cubicle could come up with on his own. An amazing example of crowdsourcing in action is the Haiti Crowdsourcing project which connected real time texts and phone calls from Haitians in need after the earthquake with a graphical overlay map of their precise location, so emergency personnel could respond.
Of course, when you set the crowd free, dangerous things can happen, too, like in the case of the popularity contest that left Kraft re-naming Australia’s beloved Vegemite “isnack 2.0″ and then quickly changing it back after the public outcry about the stupid name.
Entrepreneurs and brand managers alike are left wondering how to utilize these tools to benefit their businesses without opening themselves up to disaster. Folks who are passionate about social change are also concerned about using these tools effectively without coercing the individuals in the crowd to do work for free that might otherwise be done by a professional. These are some of the themes that emerged from the SXSW panel Crowd Sourcing Innovative Social Change. The panel was crowdsourced, of course, with the moderator walking the crowd and taking questions and answers alike from both the panelists and the audience members. Here are the best and worst uses of crowdsourcing, straight from the hive mind:
How Carbon Markets Can Deliver Local, Sustainable Development Throughout the World
Posted by 3p Guest Author March 9th, 2010 View Comments
Images courtesy of Kincentricity Social Carbon
By Boyd Cohen, co-founder, Kincentricity Social Carbon
Carbon trading is a $100+ billion global industry driven largely by the regulated markets in Europe, where most of the offset trading is done on the European Union Trading System (EUTS). The primary tool resulting from the Kyoto Accord for generating offsets for the EUTS is the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM). CDM is an instrument originally designed to enable countries and companies from the developed world to develop lower-cost, high quality carbon offset projects in developing countries.
While it has arguably succeeded with that goal, it has fallen well short of achieving one of its secondary goals, which is to enable local, sustainable development in the developing world.
Yes, massive new hydroelectric power plants in China create renewable energy sources for their population, but they also have detrimental impacts on local ecosystems and often cause the displacement of thousands of local villagers. Methane capture from an oil refinery in Argentina also can generate sizable amount of offsets for a profit but can easily lack local impact.
eBay Aquisition: Has World of Good Sold Out?
Posted by RP Siegel March 8th, 2010 View Comments
World of Good Inc., a company that has made a business of connecting artisans in developing countries with mainstream consumer markets, announced last week that eBay has fully acquired its brand and related assets. The company also announced that GreaterGood, a division of Charity USA has acquired its wholesale division and line of designer Fair Trade products. Existing relationships with retailers and artisan partners will be maintained. The terms of the transactions were not disclosed, but given eBay’s track record of significant acquisitions, we know that this is a company that believes in the adage, “you have to spend money to make money.”
We spoke with World of Good CEO Priya Haji, to understand the logic behind the sale and to ask her, “Has World of Good sold out?”
Triple Pundit: So what was the question you were trying to answer that ultimately led you to become a part of eBay?
Priya Haji: We started World of Good almost six years ago with the goal of opening much larger mainstream markets for small producers doing fair trade and sustainable products.
Hello Rewind Project Gives New Life to Old T-Shirts and Sex Trafficking Survivors
Posted by Jace Shoemaker-Galloway March 5th, 2010 View Comments
Let’s face it. Chances are pretty good you have an old t-shirt in your dresser that has seen better days, but for whatever reason, you just can’t seem to let it go. Whether it has sentimental value or is a one-of-a-kind vintage tee, if you can’t part with that shirt, a new company, that is combining recycling with a mission, can put it to use.
While staring at a pile of old t-shirts in her Manhattan apartment and with no room to spare, Jess Lin wanted to make “something usable” out of all those shirts. After developing a concept, Lin founded the Hello Rewind Project. Hello Rewind upcycles old t-shirts into a one-of-a-kind usable product while providing help and assistance to sex trafficking survivors in New York City.
Many people may be surprised to learn that sex trafficking occurs in the United States. In fact, this form of modern-day slavery has been reported in all 50 states. In 2004, the United States Department of Justice estimated that up to 17,500 foreign nationals are trafficked into the United States annually. While most of the victims are women, men and children are also victims.
Socially Responsible Financing For-Profit: An Emerging Opportunity
Posted by Bill DiBenedetto March 4th, 2010 View Comments
This is what the triple bottom line should be all about but maybe a Harvard Business Review article will put a firmer imprimatur on an emerging business opportunity for CEOs in the for-profit finance sector: Linking entrepreneurs and their companies with the necessary resources needed to create lasting social change.
Writing in HBR’s blog this week, Bill Drayton, the founder, chairman and CEO of Ashoka: Innovators for the Public Since 1980, says that since the late 1980s the financial industry has not kept up with the rapid change and growth occurring in the “citizen sector.” As a result, the “change makers of the citizen sector lack the financing options they need to make their projects successful and scalable.”
Without new sources of private capital “the citizen sector has to continue to rely on funding by governments and foundations,” Drayton continues. And “that’s far from ideal.”
How International Business Outsourcing Helps Rural Development in India
Posted by 3p Guest Author March 3rd, 2010 View Comments
By: Rishabh Kaul
A decade ago, the business world started outsourcing its back end work to the Indian megacities. But for a nation with 70% of its population living in rural settings, a new breed of Business Process Outsourcing companies (BPOs) are emerging which hope to tap into this talent pool. They are taking employment cost differentials to a whole new level. With much lower land rates, compared to their urban counterparts, rural BPOs are able to sustain themselves for as low as $1.50 to $2.00 USD, per hour.
Manoj Vasudevan left a high paying IBM job to start-up a rural BPO called SourcePilani in the university village of Pilani two years ago. Today, Source Pilani offers services such as medical transcription, social media marketing and SEO. Vasudevan feels that for a melting pot such as India (29 languages are spoken by more than a million native speakers), the true potential of rural BPOs can be achieved through voice-based services and not just low end jobs such as data entry.
How Has Microfinance Changed Since 2005?
Posted by Paul S February 26th, 2010 View Comments
Microfinance, something now fairly common and even mainstream in 2010, was a novel concept when we first wrote about Kiva in 2005. At that time, you could only lend to people in Uganda. Now you can lend to people around the world, and in a clear sign microfinance has moved beyond being only about helping those in developing countries, it now includes North America.
Entrepreneurs needing funding is a universal thing, it seems.
The model has shifted since then, in useful ways:
The Cleantech Open – A Bridge over the Valley of Death?
Posted by 3p Guest Author February 26th, 2010 View Comments
Ed Note: This is the second in a handful of guest posts we felt worth publishing on behalf of Chevron. Although we have mixed feelings about many aspects of the oil industry, Chevron’s sponsorship of today’s cleantech open speaks to their willingness to enter into a productive dialog with entrepreneurs building a new energy economy.
By Jim Davis, President, Chevron Energy Solution
The “Valley of Death” is a well known concept in the business startup and technology community. It’s the place where good ideas go to die. If small businesses are the lifeblood of economic growth and job creation, entrepreneurs and startup companies are the marrow. While the entrepreneurial path has never been easy, it has become even tougher in today’s economic climate.
Let me give you an example of the challenges for clean technology entrepreneurs that I see every day. In a business such as ours, which is “technology agnostic” in the sense that we aren’t tied to any one manufacturer or product, innovation and access to new technology are critical success factors.
Detroit’s Schools Offer New Class: Working at Wal-Mart
Posted by Audrey Khuner February 18th, 2010 View Comments
“When I grow up, I want to work at Wal-Mart.” A phrase I would expect to be uncommon coming from high school students. However, in a city with a 50% unemployment rate and public schools struggling to stay open, the education system has joined with Wal-Mart to help our country’s future generations learn to, well, work at Wal-Mart.
Four inner-city Detroit high schools have teamed up with the world’s largest retailer to offer classes in “job-readiness training.” This program, launched last week, is during school hours and gives students high school credits toward graduation in addition to entry-level afterschool jobs. Sean Vann, principal at Frederick Douglass Academy for Young Men, explained that 30 students at his school will get jobs at Wal-Mart.
New Business Model Transforms E-scrap for Good
Posted by RP Siegel February 17th, 2010 View Comments
Imagine a world where nothing is wasted, where there are no landfills and where all citizens pitch in to help—a world where discarded items are picked up at curbside, turned into gold, which is then distributed to those most in need. Sounds like a fairy tale or a utopian dream, doesn’t it?
Well, the folks at Imagine It 
in Rochester, NY have put all the pieces together to make this happen with their Fundraising Through Recycling program. The idea started back in 2002 when founder Carlie Albano decided to raise money for a local charity and was looking for something different; she hit upon the idea of collecting ink cartridges and then selling them to recyclers, passing the proceeds along to her intended recipient. Setting up shop in her garage with her grandfather working along beside her; she conceived the idea that has grown to become Imagine It.
It seems that she stumbled upon a really big idea.
Did you know that every second:
• 8 printer cartridges are thrown away.
• 2.5 ounces of oil are used to produce each inkjet cartridge
• 3.5 quarts of oil to make each laser cartridge.
In a couple of months, cartridge remanufacturing will, according to Imagine It, save more oil than was spilled by the Exxon Valdez.
Takeaways From Toyota: Choosing to Break Growth
Posted by Amelia Timbers February 12th, 2010 View Comments
Toyota shares a compromising, cliche business story with many other firms: explosive growth at the expense of consumer protection. What can we do to break this pattern in the future? The solution is about remembering that CSR minimally means producing products that benefit consumers, a principle typically lost in deploying aggressive growth strategy.
Hasty expansion means hasty management, decision-making and production
Figuring out what went wrong with Toyota isn’t complicated or new. Toyota was founded in 1934. In 2002, it gave itself eight years to double the size of a company that it had taken sixty years to grow to its 2002 size. Taking advantage of sedan and coupe niches abandoned by the U.S. automakers’ SUV oriented brands, Toyota swooped in, scooped up marketshare and was a first mover on “green” via its Prius, both in US and international markets. The news is now replete with explanations of how Toyota’s quality standards were disregarded in favor of market penetration. Do we need specifics? The best multitaskers among us admit that doing too much too quickly always, like a law of nature, comes at the expense of quality. If rapid growth isn’t leveled by a Malthusian limits/ self-cannibalization, it is limited by quality problems, sometimes in the form of product liability disasters.
How can we grow with sanity?
1. Like Slow Food, we need a Slow Growth movement
The first step to prevent over-expansion is to stop worshiping it.
Hitachi’s Young Entrepreneur Award Targets Poor in America
Posted by RP Siegel February 12th, 2010 View Comments
The Hitachi Foundation recently announced that it is accepting applications for the Yoshiyama Award, which seeks young entrepreneurs, between the ages of 18 and 29 that are “focusing on for-profit businesses that are intentional about making a difference in American society in addressing poverty.”
Applicants must be “operating viable businesses that create jobs, supply goods or services, or use internal management practices that offer low-wealth individuals in America a leg up.”
“We are a foundation focused on America,” says Foundation CEO Barbara Dyer. “While there are critical challenges around the globe, we have our share right in our own back yard. The fast-growing field of social entrepreneurship has shown us the power of innovation in addressing global poverty and environmental degradation. We believe that there are compelling problems here and hope to shine a spotlight on the young entrepreneurs that are combining social innovation and sound business practices to address them.”
What’s New
Where We’re Going
NY: Mar. 24
FT Investing in a Sustainable Future - Learn how investors are using new techniques to generate returns on responsible investments and hear about the latest trends in CSR activities.
SF: Apr. 14-16
Navigating the American Carbon World - Looking at the status of climate policy in 2010 and how climate initiatives will move forward with or without new policy.
Chicago Apr. 28-29
LCA Sustainable Supply Chain USA How To Measure, Prioritize And Reduce Social And Environmental Impacts In The Most Effective Manner
April 28-30
SF: Social Enterprise Summit/World Forum
SF: May 20-21
Microfinance USA 2010 - The place where microfinance practitioners, investors, and enthusiasts meet.
Monterey: Jun. 7-10
Sustainable Brands 2010 - Explore The Power of "And" at this year's highly anticipated SB10 conference - a 3p favorite since it's inception. Join more than 700 business and brand strategists, designers and sustainability executives for three days of extraordinary conversation.
July 29-30
GRI Certified Sustainability Reporting Course - Get the tools needed to fully assess the sustainability of business activities and to reduce the negative impacts of day-to-day operations.
LA: Sept. 1-2
Women in Green Forum - Recognizing the achievements of women across the vast range of environmental industry sectors.
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University of Kansas Green Jobs Tweets
- http://twitpic.com/19ku6b - Add the included solar panel, and this little thing is going to light up Africa #greenjobsku
- Just watched Warner Phillips throw new lightbulb on ground. It bounced! #greenjobsku
- Philips says sometimes you can't go to companies to make what you want. You just have to go out and do it yourself. Right on. #greenjobsku
- Another company balancing the three P's - people, planet, and profit - Lemnis. #greenjobsku
- This solar-powered LED is being used in communities in Africa. #greenjobsku http://twitpic.com/19kt72
- The Abbott Fund, Boston University School of Medicine and Leading Health Institutions in Vietnam Inaugurate the Abbott Fund Institute of Nutrition Science at Bach Mai Hospital
- PepsiCo Marks World Water Day 2010 with Global Water Goals
- CBRE Teams with The Green Standard
- Mannington's 25% Postconsumer Recycled VCT Honored with Environmental Stewardship Award
- charity: water to Launch UNSHAKEN on World Water Day, March 22
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