I spoke today with Kanika Gupta, founder of Nukoko, who is completing a masters degree at UVic on the challenges young people face starting social enterprises. The research will inform a guidebook she's creating for young people interested in getting into this line of business.
After our conversation she asked what advice I would give after the experiences with 21inc. This is always an uncomfortable question. We learn so much everyday, who are we to give advice? I asked if anything from our conversation struck her as unique and could be beneficial for others to learn from.
She spoke about how much thinking we have done and continue to do on the vision and structure of 21inc, and the positive change that resulted. That was interesting to hear and probably because we’ve got a bunch of over educated people in leadership positions.
But also because we never looked at our evaluations, our governance decisions, event brain-dumps and debriefs, advisory network, and the 18 months from 2006 to 2007 exploring what 21inc should do as anything except what needed to be done. Thinking and doing at the same time is not optional.
Have we always made the right decision as a result of that thinking? Definitely not. Do we always ask ourselves the right questions? No again. So what have we received from this thought work (aside from several headaches)? Intentionality in our actions, a larger network of friends, an understanding of our market, more targeted programming to achieve desired outcomes, and commitment to given directions. And an understanding from experience that improvement is never over.
I’m looking forward to reading the results and how they fit into the bigger picture.
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