By Carolyn Gray Anderson
Today Net Impact launched Social Innovation Week with the first of a series of guest panels addressing social and corporate responsibility in 21st-century business enterprises. Anderson Social Innovation Week provides an opportunity to learn from high-profile professionals who advance the discussion around social entrepreneurship, social impact in media and entertainment, corporate social impact and one-for-one models.
The panel “Social Entrepreneurship: Strategies for an Accelerated Path” was organized by Net Impact’s Gena Goh (’16), co-sponsored by the Anderson Entrepreneur Association and moderated by Bhavna Sivanand (’14), a Johnson & Johnson fellow in health care management. Leaders from LA Cleantech Incubator, Hub LA, Cheeky and Formative engaged in an informative discussion about incubators, accelerators and startups. With some unexpectedly divergent stories to tell in addition to the overlap in their respective experiences, the panelists assumed admirable humility while talking about their success.
Craig Jones (’14) was still in the MBA program at Anderson when he began building Formative, a platform that allows teachers to see all their students’ work in real time, track growth to learning standards and intervene at moments that matter most. With four years of classroom teaching experience, Jones came to business school already knowing the problems he wanted to solve. He entered a growing and increasingly competitive sector when he launched Formative, but he’s been willing to take risks in order to give his venture a chance. Startup UCLA funded his first $5,000 and things snowballed from there — with a Wolfen Fellowship, subsequent funding from the Wolfen family, who are passionate about giving and learning, and great interest from Anderson alumni following his and Kevin McFarland’s (’14) success in the Knapp Venture Competition for SmartestK12, a software-technology company designed for the classroom. Additional funding has come from a range of no-equity investors, though Jones advises entrepreneurs to review what accelerators have accomplished to make sure the eventual deal is a good match. “Seek out funders who share your passion,” he says. And be prepared to “commit yourself for six years” or you’re unlikely to see it through. “A startup is about survival — and grit more than anything.”
Ani Okkasian is director of programs for Hub Los Angeles, a co-working community for socially conscious entrepreneurs and professionals. Focused primarily on civic improvement, she is also a professor of Transdisciplinary Research at Woodbury University. With its 250 members, Hub LA is one of 65 such centers around the world specifically helping to connect people in support of social impact. Some people gravitate there without a business plan but with the sense that ideation can germinate there.
Ian Gardner (’99) is the chief strategy and investment officer of nonprofit LA Cleantech Incubator, created to accelerate the development of clean tech startups by offering flexible office space, CEO coaching and mentoring, and access to a growing network of experts and capital. The mandate is a combination of clean technology and job creation. LA Cleantech employs formerly incarcerated workers through its recycling company and operates “spoke” incubators regionally as well as farther away, like in Seattle and New York. LA Cleantech has helped some 30 companies through the process of starting up and collectively they have raised $54 million. “It’s like a mini MBA for a startup,” Gardner says. “You take them through the process of envisioning a business, from concept to commercialization.”
Gardner has a background in finance and as an entrepreneur and management consultant in the clean tech sector. He sees huge opportunity for clean tech right now, with “mountains of cash on the sidelines” waiting to be put toward solving big problems — which he says Millennials are more interested in doing than turning massive profits.
Okkasian cautions against running on the sheer momentum of your zeal about a startup. The “TED effect” is that people are polishing their narratives around their ideas but failing to conduct proper research. Do a competitive analysis, she advises. In her role at Hub LA, Okkasian makes it a point to watch for redundancies and duplication of effort and instead encourage like-minded professionals to develop enterprises together. “How do we leverage each other?” she asks. She also feels strongly that in a glutted landscape of possibly hundreds of Meetup groups for social innovation, entrepreneurs might do better to attend a city council meeting and tap an undiscovered source of public funding for startups that help the city. Mayor Eric Garcetti’s administration is particularly inclined to invest in that direction, she says.
Meanwhile, Binns counters that asking too many questions could mean you never get an idea off the ground. “I’m getting a second version of business school,” she says when describing the rapid pace of Cheeky’s development and the snap decisions the founders are sometimes faced with making.
All the panelists concur that not everyone is destined to be an entrepreneur. “It’s trendy to be an impact professional,” Okkasian observes. Gardner adds, “The biggest problem we see is that companies don’t take the time to understand their market.” They collectively advise cultivating your PR and holding off on marketing until your relationships are cinched and you know better the context for what you’re pursuing.
As incoming Anderson Net Impact president Amy Barth explained, the week’s panels are designed to appeal to MBAs following a traditional corporate trajectory as well as those embarking on social enterprises, nonprofits and one-for-one businesses. Outgoing President Sandy Tesch Wilkins echoed that welcome and hopes everyone will attend the Social Innovation Week events.
Social Innovation Week panels continue throughout the week with guest speakers representing various industries, including entertainment and finance. There will also be a special global impact Fireside event, as well as a social enterprise marketplace at Anderson Afternoons.
Access the Social Innovation Week schedule
The UCLA Anderson chapter of Net Impact (NI) is a group of students who want to put their business skills to use in positive ways, whether by incorporating environmental management practices into a large corporation, bringing microfinance to developing countries, working for a small nonprofit or launching into the world of social entrepreneurship. The mission of the national Net Impact organization is to build a network of leaders committed to using the power of business to make a positive net social, environmental and economic impact. Anderson NI offers a speakers series, internship opportunities, conferences and social events. To meet the needs of our diverse membership, NI often partners with industry-specific clubs and other UCLA graduate schools, including public policy, urban planning and public health.
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