Social ventures pair social benefits from the world of
philanthropy with innovation from the business world. Yet, the extensive
innovation techniques and methodologies have not been fully re-tooled for the
use of social ventures. A methodology known as TRIZ is an example of such
techniques. Can it, and other techniques, be better adopted to spark innovation ideas
that fuel the next generation of social ventures?
Social ventures are similar to philanthropic organizations,
as compared to businesses, in seeking to accrue benefits to society as a whole.
Among iconic philanthropic organizations is the Carnegie Corporation, for which
the initial endowment was “27 times bigger than the annual federal government education
budget” as The Economist
notes.” Its founder Andrew Carnegie
wrote in 1889 “The Gospel of
Wealth” essay which gives us an idea about what philanthropy should do. He
writes “[…] the best means of benefiting the community is to place within its
reach the ladders upon which the aspiring can rise.” He recounts parks,
works of art and public institutions - indeed Carnegie Mellon University bears
his name- as ways for the rich to return “their surplus wealth to the mass of
their fellows in the forms best calculated to do them lasting good.” Social
ventures also seek lasting good.
There are distinctions, however, between philanthropic organizations
and social ventures, including financial sustainability. According to Unite
for Sight, which supports eye clinics worldwide, “Oftentimes, charitable
organizations survive at the mercy of their donors whose contributions vary
with the economic climate.” This applies to huge philanthropies in surprising
ways. In “The centarians
square up”, The Economist compares IBM to the Carnegie Corporation and
reckons that the latter had the greater impact in their first 50 years partly
because Carnegie’s funds size relative to the government’s. But as the
government’s budget grew, this presented an “economic climate” where Carnegie
Corporation’s impact dwindled. Unite for Sight offers this contrast to
philanthropy: “Social entrepreneurs manage donor contributions in an effective
manner, investing in social ventures which can then generate their own revenues
to sustain themselves.”
While social ventures are different from business in their
purpose, they are together distinct from philanthropy in the need and drive for
innovation. The Economist notes about the Carnegie Corporation “The absence of
an existential threat may have made it too comfortable.” In comparison to the
business world where IBM operated, technology innovation advanced with
competition and a promise to help solve unsolvable challenges. That is why The
Economist reckons that IBM had the greater impact in the following 50 years. Social
ventures are as innovative in business model and in use of technology. IBM
could be providing social good by the mere presence and innovation of its
technologies, but that is a byproduct. Social ventures are founded to deliver
that social good as their main product.
But the business world has benefited from a wealth of
innovation techniques and methodologies that have not caught up yet with social
purposes. One of these techniques is TRIZ, the Theory of Inventive Problem
Solving. As TRIZ40.com
explains, “For TRIZ, systems evolve towards ideality by overcoming
CONTRADICTIONS. TRIZ matrix gathers 40 Principles (known solutions) able to
overcome these contradictions.” For example, improving (or alleviating) harm to
an object while preserving the object’s area can be solved by several ways
including the principle of using cheap short-living objects. This is the
central idea of cathodic protection; protecting a metal from corrosion by
connecting it to a cheaper sacrificial metal.
The TRIZ example stated earlier can be used in a social
setting. For example, tourists flocking to the pyramids want to take a piece of
it with them. To protect the pyramids, small rocks are brought from the desert
to the vicinity of the pyramids. Unknowing tourists happily sneak away those rocks
and the pyramids remain unaffected. In a way, some point-of-use water filters design
cartridges to treat water, gradually degrading as “sacrificial” in place of a
human body. Some social ventures run on that technology.
When analyzing social ventures, one may find that they rely
on solving a contradiction. Indeed, during my workshops for social innovation, I
asked high school participants to come up with an idea that resolves
contradiction between desired values that clash in a certain social setting. However,
TRIZ techniques, as well as other innovation methodologies, are not readily
applicable to social ventures. You can search in vain for a guide on how to use
it in a social setting. To deliver social benefits like philanthropy, social ventures
need to innovate like businesses. Conducting research in the confluence of “technical
innovation techniques” with social ventures, or even rewriting those techniques
to fit this new setting, can strengthen the innovation pipeline for social
ventures. It can help entrepreneurs find new ideas and spur a new wave of innovations
for social ventures.
What social ventures which you have come across can be
explained as solving a contradiction in the TRIZ way?
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