News on The Edge
Welcome to the Social Edge update! After looking into the Fetishization of Scaling-up, Social Edge contributor Charles (Hipbone) Cameron wonders whether we are also making a fetish of our impact metrics. He agrees that numbers, such as cash flow, can be important and even the lifeblood of any enterprise, but “we engage the world as social entrepreneurs because we care, because we are passionate.” And contrary to what those who rely on quantitative analysis may think, the world does not easily reduce to quantities: “At a very fundamental level, we know there is more to human life than numbers can possibly capture.” Our host quotes J. Gregory Dees: “The value of social entrepreneurship is not reducible to economic or socio-economic terms,” and asks fundamental questions: Do funders require us to produce metrics that are unreasonable or irrelevant? And what impact, impossible to capture in numbers, are we most proud of? Join this important debate, and if you are ready for another provocative discussion, read why Kjerstin Erickson thinks social entrepreneurship is an oxymoron. She writes: “While I love the field of social entrepreneurship, I hate the term ‘Social Entrepreneur.’ This label is ego-flaming at best, and sector-defeating at worst.” She thinks we should make the leap from the ‘me, me, me’ that characterizes most entrepreneurs to the ‘we, we, we’ of social innovation. Join the debate today to prove that she is right when she reaffirms that “social change is a team sport.”
Join this Week's Live Discussions  The Fetishization of Metrics
If the value of social entrepreneurship is not reducible to simple quantitative terms, how do we define and capture the impact we are having? Join Charles (Hipbone) Cameron in the conversation.
Too Small to Fail: Debt Relief for Social Entrepreneurs
Peter Deitz wonders how we can we build debt relief into the social entrepreneurship ecosystem to ensure the growth and development of world-changing innovations, and the well-being of the social entrepreneurs behind them. Protecting Your Mission: The best legal structure
Besides standard non-profits and for-profit entities, what legal tools and structures are available to social entrepreneurs to protect their mission? Criterion Ventures’ Joy Anderson and Elizabeth McCance help you make the right decisions. Invest in Me, Take my Equity
Three social entrepreneurs (Kjerstin Erickson, Jon Gosier and Saul Garlick) are offering equity in their life’s earnings for an infusion of cash today. Should you invest in their future? Or follow their example? The Social and Commercial Two-Step
Are hybrids really innovative structures or simply stopgap measures? Join Mumbai-based Lindsay Clinton in the conversation. Is a "Social Economy" really possible?
Where are the big success stories, the social sector equivalents of Google or Facebook? Will the funding continue to flow to unsustainable, though eminently worthy, social enterprises? Join Rod Schwartz in a provocative conversation.
Do you have suggestions for Social Edge or for this newsletter? Send us feedback. Hope to see you on The Edge and on Twitter @socialedge! Victor d’Allant
Executive Director, Social Edge
250 University Avenue
Palo Alto, CA 94301 | 
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