Social Enterprise Conference Makes Headlines

The Harvard Business School (HBS) Club of Philadelphia hosted its 2008 Social Enterprise Conference at the Comcast Center last week, allowing non-profit leaders to gather and focus on strategies that will make them more effective in their work.

Leaders from non-profit organizations attended the conference to regroup during an economic downturn, focused on translating their strategies into results, using a method called the Balanced Scorecard, where each organization is challenged to look at different areas for ways to improve.  "We have a dedication to civic contribution in the club," said Denean Williams, an HBS alumni who has held several officer's positions in the club's initiatives. "We perform that commitment to the community in a couple different ways. The first thing we do is engage in active philanthropic fundraising to support this initiative. We raise money through our club dues, [and] through direct contributions to this initiative. And also through coordinating several local foundations and corporations to give to this program.”

“We then use the proceeds for this program to do a couple things, one of which is we give two or three scholarships per year for executives to attend a one-week intensive full-time executive education training," continued Mr. Williams. "The second thing we do is sponsor this conference, which is a one day affair, and the third thing we do is put together a breakfast speaker that would address the non-profit community. The vision is for our club to contribute back to the community."

Steven Burke, the chief operating officer of Comcast, addressed the non-profit leaders talking about the building of the Comcast Center and the challenges faced by corporations and non-profits alike in the struggling economy. He highlighted how the current economic troubles could be seen as an opportunity for non-profits, making them stronger and more efficient.

"Our company, like many companies, has grown very rapidly in the last 10 years or so, and when you grow rapidly and you're successful, all of the sudden you add administrative headcount here and there," said Mr. Burke. "We've used this as an occasion to go back and say, 'do you really need these heads, do you really need this kind of structure given were we see the world is going?' That has resulted in some reductions in our workforce, which is never fun. But now we have what I think is not a worst-case scenario, budget-wise, but a very tough assessment. The most important thing a management team can do is try to make sure that everyone sees the world as it really is, not the world that they wish it to be."

The non-profit leaders face many unique challenges, and not just from the economy. The emphasis on business strategy the conference offers helps the leaders to address issues that many non-profit organizations face in good times and bad.

"I think that many non-profits usually start out with mission statements that are aspirational," said Bill Clark, the Executive Director of Philabundance, the region's largest hunger relief organization. "The staff that you have typically are driven by the aspirational mission of delivery, to where we hire relatively few MBAs," said Mr. Clark. "The work [the HBS does], both in these one-day sessions as well as the ones we participated in, the week long session up in Cambridge is kind of a recognition of the professionalism that's required."

JoAnne Fischer, the Executive Director of the Maternity Care Coalition, agrees. Her organization works to help ensure medical care for pregnant women. "I think the emphasis on strategy has been extremely valuable," she said of the conference. "I think our work around the theory of change that we talked about last year and this year, the emphasis on the balanced scorecard that looks at every aspect of your organization, your means as well as your ends, I think is an important tool to non-profits who have to be increasingly competitive."

Patricia Coulter is President and CEO of the Urban League of Philadelphia, a national affiliation of non-profits with the mission of achieving social and economic equality for African Americans. She feels that the conference is much more reflective for her. "The conference is almost like a great time-out for someone in my position," she said. "My days are generally full, there's usually more than I could ever dream to get to, and I find myself moving from one thing to the other and engaged a lot. When I come here, to a session like this, it's a great time out for me to think, listen, grow, interact, and I don't get that on a regular basis."

Sharmain Matlock-Turner is President and CEO of the Greater Philadelphia Urban Affairs Coalition (GPUAC), an organization that partners with all segments of the community to ensure each person has the opportunity for educational and economic success. She first attended the conference early on, serving as a panelist. She said that the conference is a great reminder of why the non-profits are there. "You get very caught up in the tactical, you've got this to do, that to do," she said. "And in the non-profit world, because every dollar is so critical for program delivery or program service, that carving out money and time and people to help you think about the future of the organization, where are we going, why are we doing this, what's the external environment telling us about our world and what we need to do, having an opportunity to participate at the HBS as well as through the other sessions has really kept me focused on the strategic."

Stacey Childress, an HBS professor who ran a case study for this year's conference attendees, agreed that the reminder aspect of the conference is important. "What I really want them to do, is to go back to their organizations with a renewed sense that one of their primary roles as a leader in the non-profit sector is to take on hard problems on behalf of the rest of us," she said. "That's what their job is. And because of that, part of their role needs to be continually setting their expectations higher and higher in service of their clients, and having a really concrete frame for seeking that."