While it is admirable to build a successful business of any kind, some
entrepreneurs do more than just make a profit with the fruits of their labor.
Some actually help others, bringing resources, opportunities, training, and
other assets to those who need them most. These social entrepreneurs use their
know-how and business savvy to make the world a better place, combining a
traditional business model with a pressing social mission in ways that have been
helping to make big changes in places around the world for decades. Here, we
highlight just a few of the standout social entrepreneurs who’re showing that
successful businesses don’t have to just watch the bottom line and can truly be
socially and environmentally conscious.
Bill Drayton
Bill Drayton isn’t just a great example of a social entrepreneur, he actually
helped to define and promote the term itself. Drayton is the founder and current
chair of Ashoka: Innovators for the Public, an organization that is dedicated to
finding and helping social entrepreneurs around the world. Drayton spreads out
his social entrepreneurship expertise in other organizations as well, working as
a chairman at Community Greens, Youth Venture, and Get America Working! in
addition to his duties at Ashoka. As of 2010, Ashoka Foundation has sponsored
2,145 fellows in 73 countries, some of which have gone on to develop leading
social businesses that have made a huge impact on communities around the
world.
Muhammad Yunus
Bring up social entrepreneurs and one of the first names you’re likely to
encounter is that of Muhammad Yunus. Yunus has quite literally written the book
on social entrepreneurship, sharing his expertise in microfinance and social
capitalism through a number of books. Yunus is the founder of the Grameen Bank,
an institution that provides microcredit loans to those in need to help them
develop financial self-sufficiency. Founded in 1983, the bank has brought in a
net income of more than $10 million, and his work with the organization landed
Yunus a Nobel Prize in 2006.
Blake Mycoskie
TOMS founder Mycoskie makes this list because, unlike many of these other
ventures, almost everyone with an awareness of pop culture has heard of this
social brand. Its popularity has spread like wildfire, which is a good thing
both for Mycoskie and for the people that TOMS aims to help. Mycoskie founded
TOMS in 2006 after a visit to Argentina where he learned that many children get
sick or injured because they do not have shoes to wear. To combat this, he
created TOMS, a business that donates one pair of shoes to needy people for
every pair that’s bought. So far, the company has donated more than a million
pairs of shoes. In 2011, the company launched another initiative which aims to
give away a pair of glasses or sight-saving surgery for every pair of sunglasses
or glasses sold.
Scott Harrison
Lack of clean and accessible drinking water is sadly something that millions
of people (some estimates put it at more than a billion) worldwide face every
day. After a moment of clarity in Liberia, club promoter Scott Harrison decided
to make it his mission to change that, heading up the non-profit organization
charity: water. Since it began, the charity has delivered clean drinking water
to more than a million people in 17 different countries around the world.
Harrison is perhaps one of the most successful social entrepreneurs of all time,
with his organization growing more than 100% in the first quarter of 2011,
despite a major economic crisis that paralyzed many similar ventures. Harrison
says he regards charity: water as a for-profit startup that has no profits,
saying, “We give away 100% of our profits. Our shareholders are people in 17
countries around the world waiting for a rig to drive into a village and provide
clean water to a few hundred people living there. We use the word business so
much more than nonprofit, even though that’s what we are.” The model seems to be
working for him, and Harrison has quickly created a new model for social
entrepreneurs to emulate.
Jeffery Hollender
Jeffery Hollender founded cleaning, paper, and personal
care products company Seventh Generation. The company focuses on producing
products that have a reduced environmental impact, avoiding the harsh chemicals
that are part of many of today’s leading cleaning and personal care products. In
addition, the company donates 10% of pre-tax profits to funding nonprofits and
businesses focused on the community, the environment, and responsible practices.
Despite adhering to practices that many businesses claim limit profits,
Hollender and his associates have built Seventh Generation into a major
corporate force, bringing in over $150 million in revenue in 2010. Hollender was
pushed out of his role at Seventh Generation in 2010, but that doesn’t mean he’s
slowed down in social entrepreneurship. He helps with the American Sustainable
Business Council, writes books on responsible business practices, and is a
member of the Social Venture Network and founder of the Community Capital
Bank.
Xavier Helgesen, Chris Fuchs, and Jeff Kurtzman
B corporation Better World Books is an amazing example of a truly successful
social entrepreneurship venture. Founded in 2002 by Notre Dame grads Xavier
Helgesen, Chris “Kreece” Fuchs, and Jeff Kurtzman, Better World’s mission is to
maximize the value of every book out there and to help promote literacy around
the world. The company works by reusing or recycling books through sales on
their website and donations to schools, and so far has used 84 million volumes
to raise $12.1 million for literacy funding. The company attributes its success
to using a “triple bottom line” model, caring not only about profits but also
about the social and environmental impact of everything they do.
Akhtar Hameed Khan
One of the pioneers of the now thriving microfinance world was Akhtar Hameed
Khan, the dedication to which and his activism in developing rural communities
in Pakistan earned him a nomination for the Nobel Prize. Two of Khan’s most
major projects during his life were the Comilla Cooperative Project and the
Orangi Pilot Project. The Comilla Cooperative aimed to build local
infrastructure in rural communities while also helping businesses grow through
microfinance initiatives. It would ultimately be unsuccessful, but would be a
major learning experience for Khan as he would move on to other projects,
including Orangi. In contrast to Comilla, the Orangi Pilot Project would be
quite successful, helping a squatter community solve their own problems with
sanitation, health, and housing, while offering microfinance, education, and
family planning. Some aspects of Khan’s plan are still in use today in areas all
over Karachi.
Ibrahim Abouleish
Early in his career, Ibrahim Abouleish was working in leading pharmaceutical
firms in Europe, developing new treatments for osteoporosis and
arteriosclerosis, but a trip to Egypt in the mid-’70s would change that. He
would leave Europe and move back to Egypt, founding the development initiative
SEKEM (Ancient Egyptian for “vitality from the sun”). Abouleish hoped that by
using biodynamic farms, schools and vocational training centers, a medical
center, and trading company that he could not only help repair the environment
but also the lives of the Egyptian farmers in those areas. SEKEM grows plants
that are developed into herbal teas, fresh produce, and even organic cotton,
which helps to sustain the other facilities it hosts. Abouleish has also played
a key role in developing new chemical-free methods to process cotton and
developing Egypt’s first private pharmaceuticals company. His business has been
so successful that experts and ideas from it are being exported to South Africa,
India, Palestine, Senegal, and Turkey.
Willie Smits
Microbiologist Willie Smits never really expected to become a social
entrepreneur, but when he found an abandoned baby orangutan in 1989 while
working in Indonesia, his career would quickly alter direction. Smits’ work with
orangutans would blossom into the Borneo Orangutan Survival Foundation, which
not only works to help orphaned or imperiled apes, but also helps locals learn
sustainable farming methods and the benefits of reforestation. Smits also takes
part in the Masarang Foundation, an amazingly innovative social entrepreneurship
enterprise that uses thermal energy to turn sugar palm juice into sugar and
ethanol, providing jobs and power to the community while preserving the local
forests. In recognition for his work, Smits has received knighthood in his
native Netherlands as well as an Ashoka Fellowship and a variety of other
conservation-based awards.
Sanjit “Bunker” Roy
Indian social activist and entrepreneur Sanjit “Bunker” Roy has helped
thousands of people in Asia and Africa learn vital technical skills and bring
solar power to their sometimes remote villages. Roy founded the Barefoot
College, an organization which specializes in teaching illiterate women from
poor villages how to become doctors, engineers, and architects. What’s more
impressive is that each of the college’s campuses are solar powered and often
built and designed by former students. In founding the college, Roy’s goal
wasn’t to make a profit for himself, but to help improve the economic production
and quality of life of women throughout his native India (though some aspects of
the project have spread to Africa as well). With women leading and running most
of the Barefoot College’s operations, it’s clear that he’s been pretty
successful in achieving that goal.
Related Posts
Bschool.com’s “10 Great Companies Who Were Green Before It Was Cool”
Puma Wins the Guardians’ Sustainable Business Award
Corporate Green Ranking: Top Spots and Most Improved
The World’s Greenest Companies (2011)
America’s Greenest Companies (2011)
Newsweek’s 10 Greenest Companies (2010)
America’s Most Sustainable Businesses (2009)
Greener Japanese Companies
Surveys of America’s Greenest Brands Suggest that Redemption is Possible
Best Foreign Corporations with Operations in Canada
Canada’s Best and Worst Green Cities
Canada’s Green Provincial Report Card
Canada’s Clean 50 from Delta Management Group
Canada’s Green Provincial Report Card
Best CSR Business Rankings from Miratel Blog
Top Canadian Corporate Citizens (2012)
Canada’s Greenest Companies (2011)
Canada’s Most Sustainable Businesses (2009)
What Businesses are Doing to Combat Climate Change
