Social Finance

I was recently at a Calgary+Acumen Fund event where CAWST presented on social impact investing and measuring performance of an organization.  It was a great conversation, in large part, because here was a charity that was advocating for stronger evaluation metrics before donors make charitable contributions.

When an individual evaluates a company before s/he invests there are several things that are evaluated:

• Leadership
• Financial stability
• Product
• Opportunity for financial gain
• Future plans and growth opportunities (new markets)
• Competitive landscape
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I am presenting at the Social Innovation Ideas Festival hosted by United Way of Calgary.  The keynote speaker is Richard Florida, author of the Creative Class.  Read more »

This is a link to my first Calgary Herald blog post in the Business Section.

For some, what I am about to say will send shivers for foreboding down their spines; for others exclamations of Hallelujah.  Now, I’m not talking about RIM crawling out of its impending doom, nor am I heralding back to the discovery of Penicillin.  I’m talking about a significant social shift that will have ripple effects across the financial services sector and will be re-shaping the way that Canadians interact with organizational systems.  I am talking about how we have industrialized our philanthropic sector.

What makes up an industry?

1. Standardized practices and formalized structures
2. Peer-reviewed publications and academia
3. Policies and regulations
4. Professional Associations
5. Data

To read the rest of this post click here.

This past weekend I was part of a facilitation team taking a group of individuals and organizations through a course on starting a social enterprise.  The workshop was hosted by Canada Bridges and there were about 25 individuals ranging in age, ethnicity, and most especially in the ideas that they felt they could get to market that would make meaningful social change. Read more »

In the fall, I posted a brief for the House of Commons Finance Committee on social enterprise and social finance policy development.  The final version, along with others that were submitted can be found here.

The Finance Committee is expanding their work and is now looking at charitable tax incentives.  The crowdsourcing of the last brief proved to be quite successful so I would like to try it again.

Attached is a draft of the submission for the Finance Committee. I will be sending in the final version on January 14th. Please share your thoughts and comments on this blog post. If you would like your name added to the reference list of this paper please let me know so that I can ensure that appropirate credit is made.

My career has been shaped in the charitable sector. It spans two countries, several sub-sectors and a lot of fundraising time. When I decided to launch my own company it was at the begining of the formal social enterprise discussion in the States. I realized early on that what the charities value as their business and revenue models is not what the traditional markets value.  This seems obvious, when charities talk about their business, they talk about the lives that they have saved and how they do it on so few dollars.  When companies talk about their business, they talk about profit and commodities and consumers.  So it was with great interest that I read this past week's issue of the Globe & Mail on renaming the sector from non-profit to Social Profit.

The latest revision of the briefing to the Finance Committee of the House of Commons is below.  I have included references to the Manitoba Corporate Tax Credit for Social Enterprises and the British Columbia's advisory committee on Social Entrepreneurship.

Thank you to those who have shared their thoughts, research and ideas on what should be included in this brief to the House of Commons Finance Committee.  Attached is a draft version of the document. I have not completed the bibliography and it needs to be tightened up but your feedback is most welcome, especially on the recommendations that are being presented to the committee (page 5).

If you have written a brief for a House Committee before, please share how you think this document should be laid out.

Thank you for your contributions!

Yup, you read that correctly, I am exploring an ideation space. I'm calling this space My Tickle Trunk.  Thank you Canadian children's show icon - Mr. Dressup! Read more »

I recently tweeted some research that we had done by UnCommon Innovation on the state the financial services sector.  The focus on the study was on how advisors are talking with their clients about charitable giving.  What came out loud and clear is that advisors are looking for tools and resources to have deeper, more meaningful conversations with their clients about philanthropy.  These tools and resources can come from a number of places, the most knowledgeable place would be the charitable sector itself.