Mission, Inc.

Until recently, most business thinkers have thought of “social responsibility” as limited to noble best practices in areas like charitable partnerships, environmental impact, and employment practices. But the tide is turning. Business leaders today understand there is much more to do, while nonprofits are coming to understand that earned income may be the only means to survive deep cuts in other sources of funding. For organizations and leaders looking to make a deep impact, social enterprise—profit-earning business ventures that prioritize their social mission impact--has become the strategy du jour. Unfortunately, the path to success in this arena has been, until now, unclear. Motivated leaders yearn to do more, but they neither understand what their social impact can be nor how to deliver it. More and more traditional business leaders are attracted to the idea of launching a socially responsible enterprise or operating as a social enterprise, but they adequate...