Ashoka - Innovators of the Public
Ashoka (branded Ashoka: Innovators of the Public) is an international organization that promotes social entrepreneurship by affiliating individual social entrepreneurs into the Ashoka organization. Their stated mission is "to shape a global, entrepreneurial, competitive citizen sector: one that allows social entrepreneurs to thrive and enables the world's citizens to think and act as changemakers". (Wikipedia)
From interview with Ashoka Scandinavia
Asa Burman, Co-Director, Ashoka Scandinavia and Rebecca Altman, Venture and Fellowship Manager, Ashoka Scandinavia
Ashoka, started in India, by Bill Drayton, to become network and support social entrepreneurs – entrepreneurs applying entrepreneurial principles to social problems. Not only to identify these entrepreneurs but actually connect them to the resources & individual people and communities that they needed in order to spread their work.
Key qualities of Ashoka fellows:
1. New ideas: innovation, system changing new ideas
2. Creativity: vision to bigger and better idea
3. Entrepreneurial skill
4. Persistence
5. Social impact
6. Ethical fiber
7. Changing society – the ultimate goal
From interview with Ashoka Scandinavia
Asa Burman, Co-Director, Ashoka Scandinavia and Rebecca Altman, Venture and Fellowship Manager, Ashoka Scandinavia
Ashoka, started in India, by Bill Drayton, to become network and support social entrepreneurs – entrepreneurs applying entrepreneurial principles to social problems. Not only to identify these entrepreneurs but actually connect them to the resources & individual people and communities that they needed in order to spread their work.
Key qualities of Ashoka fellows:
1. New ideas: innovation, system changing new ideas
2. Creativity: vision to bigger and better idea
3. Entrepreneurial skill
4. Persistence
5. Social impact
6. Ethical fiber
7. Changing society – the ultimate goal
About 83% fellows bring change in the system of country. And ideas of about 90% fellows have been replicated by others.
Ashoka focuses on system change. There are two categories of system change.
Ashoka focuses on system change. There are two categories of system change.
Pattern change: When you revolutionize or change system. For example, Jeero Billimoria got Childline India to be the national protection service for children in India.
Framework change: That’s when you change how people understand themselves, how they think about themselves, how other people regard them. Basically, our understanding of world shifts a little bit. For example, the field of social entrepreneurship has changed our way of understanding how we can do business in different way.
This blog post is based on my learnings from the course on ‘social entrepreneurship’ offered by Copenhagen Business School through Coursera (2014).
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