What is a social enterprise?

There are a lot of definitions of what a social enterprise is and those definitions have evolved over the years and are continuing to evolve. 

But I like to break down what a modern social enterprise it A social enterprise is an enterprise/business/brand that prioritizes the positive transformative effects its actions have on the well being of a community and the world, over maximizing profit. You see most social enterprises are born out of the need to help a community that one is passionate about and then we tend to worry about money afterward.

Its business model is designed to benefit others. Social enterprises exist at the intersection of the private and volunteer sectors. They seek to balance activities that provide financial sustainability with activities for social impact, such as providing housing to low-income families or job training. By selling goods and services in the open market, social enterprises reinvest the money they make back into their business or the local community. This allows them to tackle social problems, improve people’s life chances, support communities and help the environment.

With this definition it is clear and most businesses can be to some degree be called social enterprises and most businesses have a social cause somewhere hidden in their mission or vision statement. But I like to think that to be considered a social enterprise your impact activities should be at least 50% of your profit activities. Finding the balance of these two is the real struggle most social entrepreneurs have to face. This doesn’t mean a social entrepreneur should shy away from making money, the key is balance. Would write an article about social enterprise business models. 

I hope this article made it clear what a social enterprise is. If you have any questions about this do reach out : henry@thinksenpai.com and please share this if you found some value from it.