It's Back!

Well, after almost exactly two years I've decided to restart this blog.  A lot has happened in those two years, I've now begun making inroads into the professional world (in a financial company... that is 100% owned by a charity), and learnt a lot about the world and people's economic views.  The economic system of the developed world still appears to be collapsing around our feet, with the greed of bankers and the capitalist system blamed for many of our woes.  Some things haven't changed, I still truly believe that capitalism can be used for good to help solve some of the world's problems.  It still isn't a perfect system and never will be but it does have the right tools for the job, if used by a skilled craftsman.

So what made me start the blog again?  A simple 20 minute video from TED.  I encourage you to watch it but I think the premise misses and important point.  Profit has become a dirty word.  The point of the video is that charities should be allowed to make profits for doing good.  However at the moment we attack businesses that make a profit too, so purely moving charities into the same category may not have the right effect.  What we need to do is rebalance the scales of effort and goodness with the profit they should create. 

I will always remember the comments of one of my left-leaning tutors at university who poured scorn on a recent charity ball, of which there were many at St. Andrews.  Her thinking was, why should a bunch of rich kids feel smug about raising money for charity when they had only done it to have a drunken night in posh attire.  Perhaps that is the thinking that harms charities so much.  We cannot continue to see charity as something we sacrifice for, that we give to as a way of feeling better about ourselves.  Instead why not see it as a way to profit, for ourselves and for the wider community?

There needs to be some convergence of business practice and charities as both have a lot to learn from each other.  There is no reason why a business cannot be working for the good of the communities it works in.  There is no reason why a charity shouldn't be able to run services that generate profit that allow it to expand its operations.  It seems many charities are set up with a good intention but a poor business plan and while nothing is wrong with good intentions they are not always enough to make what could be a good charity successful in the long term.

People naturally buy in to success, they want to be a part of it.  If a charity can be brave enough to show it can be successful then more people will buy into it.  KONY 2012 was an interesting example of a social action charity that went viral.  It had a defined aim and it knew how to exploit social media to get to that aim.  It quickly became unstuck as questions were raised over the spending of the charity behind the project and the very public breakdown of one of its key players.  However it did raise the profile of the organisation and the problems faced in Africa in a unique way that ultimately led to action being taken that would not have happened otherwise.  Whether the cause was justified or not, it achieved its aims in a way that most charities would be afraid to even contemplate.  Perhaps though, other charities and social organisations can learn a thing or two about breaking out from the traditional charitable mould.

Not all charities will be profitable or provide investment grade business propositions.  However there is a growth in social enterprises, for-profit organisations that give back to the community and financial bonds that invest in charities.  It is these areas that should be encouraged and developed, with their benefits given to the world as an example of how we can gather the best minds and the right resources to tackle issues that many would see as 'charity cases'.

And what should we do with the charities that will never be profitable?  Let's still 'donate' to charity.