Displaying Archive for the ‘business social responsibility’ Category

An empty stomach is not a good political adviser.

Connie K. Duckworth / January 12th, 2011 / posted in afghan people, business social responsibility, economic sustainability, opportunity, social change, social investment / 1 comment

An empty stomach is not a good political adviser.

– Albert Einstein

Everyone I know personally or professionally shares a singular perspective—how glad we are to see 2010 in the rear view mirror. The past two years, in fact, have been exhausting on every front—economically, politically, globally—and our collective fatigue level is high. It’s hard to run life unceasingly at DEFCON 2. At the same time, there’s an innate optimism that comes with flipping to the blank slate of a new calendar year. It refreshes our spirits, revives our energy, stiffens our resolve and restores our hope for positive change.

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Frugal Thinking

Connie K. Duckworth / August 23rd, 2010 / posted in business social responsibility, economic sustainability, opportunity / 1 comment

I recently read an interesting report by Booz & Company called ” The Importance of Frugal Engineering.” It cites the development process of the Tata Nano car as a case study to illustrate the imperative of this approach in designing products for the developing world. To me, the idea of “frugal” can and should be extended to the larger platform of international development. This is the vision of sustainable community development that is very different from the standard approach taken today.

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Distribution: The (Social) Entrepreneur’s Dilemma

Connie K. Duckworth / May 27th, 2010 / posted in business social responsibility, economic sustainability, social business enterprise, social change, social entrepreneur, social investment, sustainable economic development / no comments

If “earned income” is the roadmap to sustainability for non-profits, then, for innumerable international NGOs, identifying robust distribution channels for the goods they produce is the interstate highway to success. These are the direct routes that connect emerging market seller with developed market buyer. Developing these connections is the hardest part of the entrepreneurial journey.

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Access Envy: They Get to Go Where I Can’t

Connie K. Duckworth / March 26th, 2010 / posted in afghan people, business social responsibility, people, social investment / 1 comment

I like to read books about Afghanistan. The ones I’ve enjoyed most are the first-hand, contemporary accounts of this extraordinary land, rich in descriptive detail of stark beauty and complex tribal ethnicity.

My personal favorite is Rory Stewart’s The Places In Between, the astonishing account of his walking across Afghanistan, from Herat, near the Iranian border, to Kabul in the winter of 2002, just after the fall of the Taliban. I recommend listening to it on audio book, to hear Rory’s own reading of his account. Among his many achievements, Rory is the Founder of Turquoise Mountain Foundation (www.turquoisemountain.org), credited with renovating the only remaining British fort in Kabul and establishing the Institute for Afghan Arts and Architecture which teaches talented Afghans ancient techniques in woodworking, calligraphy, ceramics and gem-cutting. A couple of years ago, TMF and ARZU STUDIO HOPE partnered on a joint catalog, with Rory’s art and our rugs shot on site at the Serena Hotel in Kabul.

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It’s about them, not us

Connie K. Duckworth / March 22nd, 2010 / posted in afghan people, afghanistan people, business social responsibility, investment, people, social change, sustainability strategy, sustainable community, sustainable economic development / 5 comments

Actually, how we view village priorities is somewhat immaterial; what matters is how the Afghans view them. From week one, we’ve learned to assume nothing upfront and not to prejudge outcomes. At the end of the day, we’re facilitators; it’s the Afghans who must decide whether to internalize change and integrate it into their daily lives.

We made an early and conscious decision to hire an all-local staff, drawn from the ethnicities and communities in which we work. Before rolling out any new program, we start by asking a lot of questions and then listening to the answers. We drink lots of cups of tea. We research the programs other NGOs develop and analyze their successes and failures. Every action we undertake starts as a pilot—by test-driving each initiative prior to a full rollout, we can gather more local input, see what actually works and tweak what doesn’t. This way, we increase the odds of success before we expend the resources.

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The poor get a 25% raise to $1.25 per day—all billion + of them.

Connie K. Duckworth / March 15th, 2010 / posted in business social responsibility, investment, social business enterprise, social corporate responsibility, social innovation / 2 comments

When people think about who delivers humanitarian aid, most of us think charities. However, as we’ve seen in Haiti, the military is typically the first responder in times of extreme crisis. It’s got the ships, the helicopters, the heavy equipment and, for all practical purposes, the unlimited budget and large headcount to deploy quickly. In addition, corporations don’t often get the credit they deserve for their significant charitable contributions of both money and goods. Every major corporation in America is responsible for major funding to the entire non-profit sector. In the Haiti relief effort, for example, scores of companies as diverse as Caterpillar, Royal Caribbean, Kimberly-Clark, and Citigroup have stepped up in the Haiti relief effort. And, of course the large NGOs are there trying to provide basic emergency disaster relief—food, shelter, clean water, medical care.

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International development is a big business — as in billions of dollars big

Connie K. Duckworth / March 12th, 2010 / posted in business social responsibility, economic sustainability, investment, opportunity, social business enterprise / 1 comment

Having worked on Wall Street for my entire career, I sure never knew where the “real money” was hiding. Most of the money for humanitarian assistance comes from the governments of developed countries. Actually, I’d guess that hundreds of billions get aimed each year at improving the lives of the citizens in developing countries around the world, by a whole cast of development organizations. Here are a just a couple of examples.

The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) is our federal government agency responsible for allocating and distributing American foreign aid. Its stated objective is to “extend a helping hand to those people overseas struggling to make a better life, recover from a disaster or striving to live in a free and democratic country…” In 2009, Congress appropriated about $26 billion for USAID’s handshake. Assisting in the execution of this mission are the for-profit “Beltway bandits”, the private consulting companies circling Washington, DC along Interstate 495.

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If we’re stirring up change, then the internet is our spoon

Connie K. Duckworth / March 4th, 2010 / posted in afghan people, afghan women, afghanistan families, afghanistan women, business social responsibility, economic sustainability, people, social business enterprise, social innovation / 1 comment

While one person is writing STIR, it’s about the actions of many—hundreds of volunteers across the developed world working together with thousands of Afghans. Please note the added emphasis on the word “actions.” If we’ve learned anything in building ARZU, it’s that forward movement is an essential ingredient for change. It’s about taking a chance, making the first pass, taking one step forward, even when it means you fall two steps back. What’s critical is to begin.

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From Wall Street to No Street

Connie K. Duckworth / February 26th, 2010 / posted in afghan women, afghanistan women, business social responsibility, social business enterprise, social entrepreneur, social responsibility, sustainable economic development, sustainable innovation, triple bottom line / 2 comments

Opportunities often present themselves when we’re not expecting them, yet they change our lives. That’s what happened to me right after 9/11. I was a Goldman Sachs partner, at a meeting in New York, when the Twin Towers went down. Now I’m a social entrepreneur, trafficking in rugs rather than bonds, focused on a triple bottom line—people, planet and profit. Today, instead of applying my Wharton MBA toolkit to strategy, investing, and the fundamentals of market change, I apply it to sustainability, strategy, socially responsible investing and fundamental social change.

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