Social Entrepreneurship

This book provides a guided deep dive into the early stages of venture development of social entrepreneurship. It introduces concepts that provide important insights necessary for social venture success. It introduces a set of entrepreneurial tools designed for the unique set of challenges faced in selecting and designing social entrepreneurial ventures.

With this book as a guide the reader can develop a feasible venture concept and communicate it effectively. A passion to address social or environmental issues is the motivation for a growing number of entrepreneurs. Yet, effective approaches addressing these societal issues can be difficult to discern. Approaches cannot be well formulated using the traditional market placed based framework of traditional entrepreneurship. For example, traditional market and target market analyses miss important aspects of potential customer behavior. Cultural traditions, family structures and community norms significantly influence human behavior. Without the knowledge about a specific community the missing perspective is too often discovered too late in the process. Undiscovered competitors, cultural practices that block adoption and home-made alternatives can result in the demise of a start-up.

This book introduces concepts that frame new ways to approach information gathering and analysis for social entrepreneurial ideas. The book provides the reader guidance on:

• How to move from heart tugging issues to social entrepreneurial opportunities with high potential
• How to understand and assess the societal and policy environment in which the opportunity would be implemented
• How to analyze and select the best approaches for that circumstance
• How to frame a results focused approach
• And how to communicate the product or new approach to gain investors, grants and community engagement