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Every Enterprise – A Social Enterprise (Part 2)

2. From Sequential to Simultaneous Impact – Govt as Enterprise

Today – most governments are struggling at one level or another. There is so much to fix and solve and so little resources. We must re-base our expectations from governments and encourage them, local and federal, to think differently about creating transformative impact? Governments sometimes can get caught up in ‘isms and can often be hamstrung by their own history. I say this because we have relied for far too long largely on interventionist approaches, be they state led or sponsored via policy directives. Those may be necessary but certainly not sufficient. For instance during the pandemic, the UK put in place a furlough scheme to help millions receive a wage despite lack of work, but as it came to an end late in 2021 it has set many people back with challenging times. Or the “Eat out to help out” scheme which encouraged people participation in helping a struggling food and hospitality industry. These were certainly useful at great cost to the tax-payer, but really didn’t provide for long-term, systemic and sustainable solutions.

The question we must encourage is around how governments and private enterprises can partner via systemic interventions which create unprecedented impact. Governments historically have been executing sequentially – earn, tax, disburse, incentivize/redistribute. Can our governments embrace, encourage, and catalyze simultaneity? We need a mental model shift.  A shift away from one where governments are saddled with all the responsibility for creating better lives and livelihoods whilst private enterprise provide fuel via tax dollars – towards one where both entities simultaneously solve for bigger impact. Here are some thoughts:

For both entities, the trick is not seeing these as sequentially compliant Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) initiatives but instead governments encouraging and incentivizing such responsibility to be integrated into business. Our governance structures must help create a shift from compliant CSR (as a set of activities) to Socially Responsible Corporates. Acting responsibly is good but being responsible in every action is great!

3. From Impact to Collaborative Transformation – Social Sector as Social Enterprise

And finally, our social sector must collaborate more. We must think of Social Enterprise as not just being financially accretive but as an enterprise free from any other code other than one that creates transformation. Meeting impact metrics is good but eliminating the problem from its core and in the process, creating transformative business models is stuff of greatness.

In this quest, I would encourage Social Entrepreneurs to think of the following key principles:

When combined, the above three principles make up the tri-sector approach to transformation. If governments do what they can do best which is unleash governance that liberates, if private enterprise generate profits that are seeded in purpose and if the social enterprise can collaborate with both, we will see a world that we can truly gift the next generation. There is still much to celebrate in the Ricardian principles of competitive advantage!

And if we do this well, we can perhaps even earn the respect of the great poet Rabindra Nath Tagore having played our part towards creating a magical world.

 Where the mind is without fear,

and the head is held high…

…into that heaven of freedom

my father

let (all of us) awake

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