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What It Means To Be A Social Entrepreneur

By James Watson


Starting a social venture is one of the most fulfilling undertakings. These start-ups, however, have been known to face many challenges as they get off the ground. As is the case with many other start-ups, a great majority of them fail to make it past their first birthday. We will look at some of the main challenge of a social entrepreneur in this article.

The presence of such people in society is of essence, because they act as the agents of change in many spheres of life. They get to identify and seize the opportunities that other people do not see or are afraid to explore, they improve systems and even invent new approaches of doing things. The end point of all this is creation of solutions to change society in better ways.

Many people who decide to get into entrepreneurship often venture into new areas with the intention of making profits. However, those who chose the path of social enterprises are socially responsible, and are obliged to contribute to the well-being of the society in which they operate. They usually make it a primary goal to ensure they impact the society positively and the profit making part is always secondary.

Other major characteristics are that the individuals involved are usually passionate and determined about what they do. They possess a high sense of motivation, intrinsic or extrinsic, and are visionaries who have the aim of bringing change. In essence, the this kind of entrepreneur can be termed as a persons recruiter, who presents their ideas or solutions, in a manner that the people, who could be a part of the problem, get to see the need for a change and join the entrepreneur in attempts to achieve it.

The entrepreneur aims to deliver more than just commercial value, but also social value. This is what in most cases is responsible for the passion of their passion. However, these social values cannot be easily measured and hence make it difficult to communicate to donors, investors and the community at large.

Entrepreneurs in this category are always looking for opportunities to advance their mission, whether social or environmental. Through this, they are able to better the lives of their target beneficiaries. It is not unusual for the investors to collaborate with governments and nongovernmental organizations who share their vision of improving service delivery.

Despite the fact that this form of entrepreneurship is meant to address social needs, the entrepreneur should not ignore the factor of funding or profits. They should put in mind that they need a clear vision, a plan and enough funding, to see to it that the kind of vision they have can be seen through.

The entrepreneurs also have the role of promoting the development of entrepreneurial skills among the societal members. It can therefore be seen that they have roles of very significant influence to the economy and also the society well-being. It is always of vital importance, as seen above that efforts made by the entrepreneurs be supported to see to their success.




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