What is Social Entrepreneurship ?
Social entrepreneurship manifests solutions to social, cultural and environmental problems. Some people even apply this concept to many other organizations with different aims, sizes and beliefs. Social entrepreneurs measure business on the basis of generating a positive ‘return to the society’ over profit, revenues and increase in stock prices – the typical measure of growth by entrepreneurs.
Social entrepreneurs often engage in working for the upliftment of the poor, alleviation in health care and overall societal development. At times they are engaged in profit making enterprises to support social or cultural goals of the organization. For instance, an organization which is engaged in working for the rehabilitation of acid attack victims may be engaged in operating a food outlet chain, aimed at raising money to provide rehabilitation to the survivors.
As far as now, there have been no consensus over the definition of social entrepreneurship as there are several sectors involved in its ambit including profit business, voluntary organization, non-profit charities, etc. In addition to this, some people often refer philanthropists, social activists and other social related professionals as social entrepreneurs.
Some even suggest that it becomes necessary to list out the voluntary sector and charity-oriented activities from social entrepreneurship. Some have suggested that the term should be used to denote those founders of organizations that primarily focus on earned income over donations and grants for the social cause. The general consensus over the term is that it is the product of the modern society and is the fusion of profit-making enterprises and social welfare organization.
It is generally seen as a positive term because social entrepreneurship largely depends upon the social impact which the traditional corporate world has failed to do up to an extent. Social entrepreneurs look for solutions to social problems immediately, keeping the broader context of the issue in mind. This leads to new innovations so that they could resolve the issues effectively while using only minimum resources.
Although, social entrepreneurship is expected to address the social issues through new and creative ideas. There come many challenges with it. Entrepreneurs do analyse current market situations to make their business successful, on the other hand social entrepreneurs in addition have to tackle many unforeseen situations such as overpopulation, unsustainable energy sources, food shortages, etc. Preparing a successful social business plan can be nearly impossible.
Having said that, at large we can conclude that there are many such social entrepreneurs who have successfully created such business models which are directly affecting thousands of underprivileged lives on daily basis. With the growth of technology and internet, the number of social entrepreneurs is increasing as they are able to connect to more people directly than ever before. Some of the social entrepreneurs who have successfully stepped over the international borders and are serving the society around the globe.
