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Articles by Jim Bildner
Social Change Efforts Need More Than ‘Stop Energy’
In 2017, sociology professor Kenneth Andrews, in an op-ed in the New York Times, argued social movements that succeeded in creating lasting change needed to do three things well—create cultural awareness and draw attention to a problem (what I refer to as “stop energy”); disrupt things by socializing the change they seek to create and making it, as he says, “more costly to support the status quo;” and, of equal importance, organizing the implementation of the desired change.
Impact Investing for the Missing Middle in Agri-Finance (SSIR)
Imagine being in charge of a profitable vegetable cooperative in Benin. You know the cooperative can increase its income and improve its resilience if most of this year’s profit is set aside for investing in new hardware. You also know that your members are very poor. What would you do? Would you propose foregoing income now for the promise of a higher income later on? Would you be able to resist pressure to deliver immediate income to your cooperative’s members? The answer is almost certainly no.
Impact Investing Can’t Deliver by Chasing Market Returns
In 2012, more than a decade ago, in response to a growing wave of impact investing obsession, Kevin Starr warned that impact investing was doomed to fail: “Few solutions that meet the fundamental needs of the poor will get you your money back,” he observed, and “overcoming market failure requires subsidy.” These realities have not changed since Starr wrote “The Trouble With Impact Investing.” In fact, if anything, the cost of solving for inequity has only increased.
Instead of Disruption, Leverage What Already Exists (SSIR)
For as long as most of us can remember, social enterprises and social movements have sought to disrupt systems from the outside or to make fundamental policy changes from the top down. But while these tactics have often worked in the past, their increasing lack of efficacy in today’s world suggests the need to rethink their allure in favor of new strategies that leverage what already exists, in order to bypass the dysfunction that constrains change at almost every level.
How Nonprofits, Foundations, and Businesses Are Adapting to the Coronavirus Crisis
Nonprofits & NGOs Faced with unprecedented conditions caused by the coronavirus pandemic, organizations are rapidly adapting to serve the greatest number of people in need, now. The speed of change has been remarkable. By Jim Bildner Apr. 10, 2020 These are truly unimaginable times.
How Nonprofits, Foundations, and Businesses Are Adapting to the Coronavirus Crisis
Nonprofits & NGOs Faced with unprecedented conditions caused by the coronavirus pandemic, organizations are rapidly adapting to serve the greatest number of people in need, now. The speed of change has been remarkable. By Jim Bildner Apr. 10, 2020 (Photo by iStock/Francesco Scatena) These are truly unimaginable times.
To Change the System, Look Outside the System
Today, with upheaval in both politics and government, the ecosystem of most social sector systems has become more restrictive and risk averse. In this environment, many organizations are more concerned with safeguarding their existing channels for accessing resources and delivering services, rather than innovating and expanding. At the same time, pressures inside and outside the system are driving toward change.
The Urgency to Fund Early-stage Social Entrepreneurs
Society desperately needs new answers to its most challenging problems. Despite significant huge technological and scientific advances of recent decades, too few have found their way to the people and issues most in need. With the perspective of our venture capital legacy, we believe early-stage investments in social entrepreneurs are essential to creating profound and lasting change.
Why Social Ventures Need Systems Thinking
When Evan Marwell decided to start EducationSuperHighway (ESH), a nonprofit organization dedicated to bringing broadband internet access to every U.S. public school classroom, he approached the task with the mentality of a successful serial entrepreneur. That entrepreneurial mentality is stitched into the fabric of 21st-century America.
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