Grassroots organizations like Young Entrepreneur Net http://ycen.fliggo.com/ and 4 Entrepreneur Net are raising the bar on supporting entrepreneurship and exposing youth to positve, confidence-building experiences that will show them a path to realizing their dreams. By creating more experiential opportunties and providing the business education and information so lacking in the public school curriculum, 4Entrpreneurs demonstrates the power of ethnonomics and best practices in giving back to the community and educating in a practical, powerful and pro-active way.
There's great info for all entrepreneurs here, including a video channel
Drum Major Institute is creating a "farm team" of young leaders who'' learn to bring their passion for change and social causes into practicality: seeding and feeding think tanks, government, social and political campaigns and more.
The Summer institute happens in New York City in mid-August. Attendees then have the opportunity to be placed in internships.
NYWSE supports and promotes women social entrepreneurs through workshops, networking opportunities, and a book club forum. The group includes seasoned social entreprenurs and those wishing to add social entrepreneurship to their work and life agenda.
On Friday, November 7,2008, I will speak in very distinguished company at NYWSE's breakfast roundtable, which includes women CSR and communications directors from Citigroup, GE and more.The Roundtable is entitled:
I welcome blog comments on your experiences as a corporate/business change agent; and how you see the recent Wall Street shakedown affecting your efforts.
Financial Times columnist Adam Jones asks if CSR will wither and die in light of the current crisis on Wall Street. Read his blog column here.
It's the perfect "legit" excuse to take a pencil through CSR initiatives in the budget and label them as 'unnecessary spending" in this time of uncertaintly and belt-tightening.
And what of diversity? Does that take a backseat as well? According to Jones, Howard Davies, director of London School of Economics, went so far as to say that the financial crisis will even affect governments' actions to promote equality in the workplace.
Some say the public's demand for accountabilty may actually help, pushing CSR into the forefront. What are your thoughts?
Always Onrecently posted the Top 100 private Cleantech companies, which will be feted at next week's Going Green conference in Cavallo Point, San Francisco, CA.
Here's a list of the winners:
For a link to the complete announcement click here.
On Tuesday, July 14, 2008, I attended the Green Communications Conferencein New York City, presented by BDI, and sponsored by PR Newswire, Linked In and several others. Thanks, BDI for the opportunity to represent FastCompany.com at the conference.
Two key marketing trends cited in the introduction were:
1. Due to the proliferation of social media (and viral marketing) brand loyalty is no longer necessarily the result of a consumer's first hand experience with the brand itself. Brand loyalty is now experienced through peer-to-peer sharing.
While there is some validity to that, I think it is more a generational shift, as the habits of the Brand Sirens group have been much studied.Their associations with brands tend to be tribal, viral and fickle. The Brand Sirens' way of behaving with and towards brands is causing a major shift in how brand marketers communicate and present their product or service.
2. The "Green Movement" is now married to business.
Is it really married to business, or is it that business was "poked" so relentlessly by the citizen consumer and consumer advocates and shamed so often and so publically by environmental groups that it is finally coming to terms with the inevitable? Or does it mean something far more uncomfortable? E.G.: If big brother corporate cleaves the "green movement" to its bosom, does it also castrate it? When does an inconvenient truth become a convenient convention? Can hard-core greenies like Greenpeace really cooperate with Coca Cola? Lisa Manley, Director of Environmental Communications for Coca Cola, claims they do collaborate - at least to some degree. I'll have more on her presentation in my next post.
I will post the above question on the social responsibilty discussion forum as well.
