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Liam's got issues: July/August

22 July 2010
Liam Black

Liam Black, co-founder of Wavelength

Contact him via www.thesamewavelength.com or via Twitter @LiamABlack

Even some of the bright new class of Oxford University MBAs are getting the  message about social entrepreneurship, says Liam Black

In an Oxford University banqueting hall resplendent in my purple sparkly dickey bow I get to my feet. I am delivering the after-dinner speech to the graduating Executive MBA class. Average age 35 to 40, these highly successful, driven, wealthy masters of the universe are from all over the world, rising stars in diverse industries – hedge funds in Chicago, property in the Middle East, media in Holland, telecoms in Russia.

I congratulate them on completing a difficult course and keeping their jobs/businesses and family lives on the road. Polite smiles. But, I continue, the world does not need more MBAs. Polite smiles changing to curious frowns. My words are being translated into the ears of various proud mothers around the table. By the look of one mum’s scowl, she clearly does not like having her dessert delayed and/or this weird bald white guy telling her that her son has wasted his time and maybe her money.

Anyway, plough on. No, the world does not need more MBAs – it needs business leaders and entrepreneurs to take a stand for social justice. How much more money do you need? Bring your talents, resources, networks, smarts and passions to bear on finding business solutions to the challenges we face as a world. Use the international connectivity this graduate community represents as a platform to challenge inequality instead of it being another barrier to the poor and powerless. Be socially enterprising wherever you are.

Applause. Sit. Drain glass. Glad that’s over. Queue of people to see me.

Texan: ‘Liam, that was really eloquent’.

‘Why, thank you.’

‘Bullshit but eloquent.’ Oh.

‘There is business, there is charity, let’s not confuse the two.’

Next, Russian gazillionaire. ‘Didn’t understand a word but thanks so much for coming.’ Hmm. Next up, young guy who runs a property firm in the Middle East. An hour later we’re still talking.

I had inspired him and his goal for 2011 is to open a social enterprise hotel in Kigali. Can I help? What Kigali, Rwanda, I asked, obviously amazed. Yes, Rwanda. Fascinating guy and hugely ambitious to make a difference in the world. ‘Am I a social entrepreneur?’ he asks, ‘I’m not sure about the definition.’

Ignore all that crap, I sagely advise. Social entrepreneur is what social entrepreneur does.

Liam Black is co-founder of Wavelength. Contact him via thesamewavelength.com or via Twitter @LiamABlack
 

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Talking of Gazillionaires....

Submitted by Jeff Mowatt on 24 July 2010 - 8:00am.

It's February 2008 and the Ukrainiam lunch at Davos where Sir Richard Branson is calling on business to focus on social problems. His host in one of Ukraine's richest moguls and in the audience Muhammad Yunus, Bill Clinton, Tony Blair, Bill Gates and Matthew Bishop.

http://pinchukfund.org/en/news/archive/2009/01/29/986.html

We'd been doing just that in Ukraine for the past 6 years and the words being used could have been lifted from a very public strategy paper we'd delivered 2 years earlier.

There's a picture of a boy on the following campaign his name was Andreyuska and he'd starved in state care while they were lunching at Davos. While Davos talks, social enterprise walks without them.

http://www.change.org/petitions/view/the_abandoned_children_of_ukraine

Jeff Mowatt
People-Centered Economic Development

p-ced.com
people-centered.net