Two Books on Social Enterprises

Towards the end of 2019, almost around the same time, two books were published on one subject - Social Enterprises. Together, they make a great read. 

Thanks to the authors, I had an opportunity to read the manuscripts and offer my comments, which were incorporated as “advance praise” in these books. Am reproducing them below, as part of Shiv’s Reading Recos:

Farming Futures: Emerging Social Enterprises in India 

by Ajit Kanitkar and C. Shambu Prasad 

I would like to compliment the editors and the authors for three distinct contributions to advance the knowledge and practice in the social enterprise space. Firstly, for picking up as diverse a set of cases as possible, from every conceivable angle. Then for writing the cases as “organisations in making”, piecing the trials, tribulations and triumphs of the social enterprises as they evolved. Finally, for pulling out insights and helping us imagine an ecosystem in which social enterprises can thrive.

The editors aptly explain that the social enterprises are trying to occupy a space that is left by the government, the NGO sector and or the market actors, and thus are based on the foundation of values but practising the principles of business and profitability. However, most social entrepreneurs, with the exception of a few, end up subordinating the enterprise aspects to the social cause. To my mind, this is abdicating the responsibility to craft a business model that can

deliver both. I am not taking away the challenge in this task, because I know the enormous friction

in the encounters of these entrepreneurs with the larger ecosystem.

Innovation in this space is required to harness the power of “and”, i.e., leverage the capacity of

an enterprise to solve social problems, thereby enabling scale, and not succumb to the tyranny of

choosing between social purpose “or” enterprise objectives, after having started off on the social

enterprise path.

Given the difficulty of the challenge to innovate for this “and” paradigm, and the time it takes to

test & improvise the workability, and to prove scalability of the social business models, there is clearly a role for hybrid organisations and blended financing models. The two organisations must work parallelly, yet in a synchronised manner. Even the Impact Venture Capital Funds may like to evolve new integrated metrics for the performance of social enterprises, rather than looking at both the dimensions separately. Similarly, the incubators and accelerators helping the social enterprises too.

Social Entrepreneurship in India : Quarter Idealism and a Pound of Pragmatism

by Madhukar Shukla

Social enterprises do not succeed or scale easily, given the challenge they grapple with, while trying to fuse social causes with profitable business models. Passionate social Entrepreneurs craft them with considerable artistry through a lot of idealism and some trial & error. Often, even with the benefit of hindsight, some of them can’t explain why they succeeded. Certainly not to the extent another entrepreneur can replicate the “model”.

In this backdrop, Madhukar’s book is a boon to this domain. He analyses how the “markets of the

poor” are different, where the “opportunity structures” exist, describes the various “entrepreneurial models that enable the poor to access markets, and places the different “archetypes of social entrepreneurship” in that context.

The book is a must read for both the “been there, done that” social entrepreneurs intending to scale, and the “wannabe” entrepreneurs looking at social problems to engage with; or for that matter even for the Social Impact Funds trying to make sense of the “mad” proposals they receive all the time.

Dynamics of Crop Diversification

One routinely hears recommendations for crop diversification, saying that B crop is more profitable than A crop. The dynamics of crop diversification are more complex than that. In my experience, every farmer evaluates the B vs A trade-off, using a five-dimensional model, often intuitively. And, each of the dimensions have further nuances too.

1. For sure, net profit from one crop vs the other, is the most important variable. But, such profit will be seen from a twelve-month cycle perspective. At times, the chosen crop, depending on its duration from land preparation to harvest, limits the choice of next crop (or prior crop) that can be planted. Hence the twelve month cycle. I am keeping the cases of even longer term options like trees, out of the argument when I said twelve months. Profitability trade-off, often, also involves assigning value to the crop byproducts consumed off-farm for livestock or at home.

2. Another important factor is the effort involved in growing one crop vs the other. Some require more tender care or frequent monitoring vs the other. Or more physical drudgery. One crop may need more farm labour for an operation. Trade-off decisions then involve whether sufficient number of people are available within the family or one needs to hire. Then there are nuances, like labour barter – “I work on your farm and you work on mine”, if the window of that activity has flexibility of time.

3. Going beyond labour, the next factor involves access to resources, such as farm inputs, or credit to buy the inputs. Some of the resources place constraints on which crop can be grown; water for example, be it ground water, or canal water with the attendant restrictions, if any, on the release quantum and timings. Soil and climatic conditions, of course, are the more fundamental factors that limit choices of crops.

4. The fourth dimension is knowledge required to grow different crops. At a basic level, certain generic good practices on growing a crop like land preparation, planting density, irrigation and fertigation cycles, crop protection should the need arise, post-harvest activities etc. Then, every farmer requires certain contextualized knowledge on managing the crop as the growing conditions evolve, in terms of temperatures and humidity, besides any implications of the crop planted in the previous season, or limitations on the resources required etc.

5. Finally, probably most importantly, the risks involved in growing one crop vs the other. There are risks first in the production stage and then in marketing the crop produced. Some crops are more vulnerable to weather variations than the others. This is more important today, when the extreme variations have become the order of the day. Market risks include the extent of price volatility and liquidity of demand for a crop.

The market conditions will throw up a natural bias for one or the other crop in a given region for a profile of the farmer each season. If the Government or any other agency (say, a food processing company) would like to promote a particular crop or variety, first step is to make an assessment if the wind is hitting the tail or the head along all these dimensions and take advantage or neutralize respectively, so that the proposed crop is in the best all-round interest of the farmer.

Post-Googlism and Other Short Stories

This is the foreword I wrote for RC Natarajan’s “Post-Googlism and Other Short Stories”. The book  is now published and is available to buy at:

Amazon ~ https://www.amazon.in/Post-Googlism-other-short-stories/dp/938833700X/

Flipkart ~ https://dl.flipkart.com/dl/post-googlism-other-short-stories/p/itmff6e2pxeg9h7q?pid=9789388337007

Refreshing stories with a twist in the tale and humour sprinkled all over. That’s what Natarajan pulled off, with his very likeable work of fiction, otherwise known for his academic publications!

Forewords for fiction books are unusual, so when Natarajan called to request me to write the foreword for his book of short stories, my only reason to accept immediately without asking “why”, was an opportunity to read the stories a few weeks before you all do. I was keen because I tasted a sample when he WhatsApped a couple of them last month. 

That word “WhatsApped” would have meant nothing a few years ago. But, now we are in a “Post-Googlers” era, and you know what it is, whether you are a Digital Native in this era or a Digital Immigrant like me. 

With a title like “Post-Googlism etc…”, together with the format and lingo this generation is used to, IHND that these short stories will be enjoyed by them (IHND means “I Have No Doubt”, just in case you haven’t deciphered ;-) Having read all the stories, now I can also vouch that my generation, born in the 60s – same as Natarajan’s – or, in the late fifties and early seventies, will relate to the characters even better! So, if you are born any time between 1955 and 2005, you will love reading these stories.

While Natarajan says that all the stories are his “own imagination and do not represent any real persons or events”, you will encounter someone you know in a familiar setting in almost every story. Not just familiar with someone, actually, often you relate with one of the characters in the stories and emote so well with them that you forget you are reading a story. That’s not your fault, Natarajan’s characters and settings are so real.

Other than just a couple of stories that are melancholic, almost all of the stories have an element of humour, if not entirely humorous. And humour, across such a wide-ranging settings! From a hilarious exchange between a husband and wife in ‘Two Idlies’ to an all-too-familiar Likes & Comments routine on a Facebook page in ‘BMW’.

And the twist, every story has built one in. At the end. Whether it’s a one-page micro-short-story or a ten-page longish-short-story. Much like my favourite O’Henry used to do. In some of the stories, you can guess the twist early on, no surprises there because you are a smart reader, otherwise why would you be reading this book in the first instance.

Btw, I finished the book in one sitting. Very likely, you too will. It’s a page turner. 

In the end, I won’t be lying, if I say “I am already looking for the next set of short stories by Natarajan”. Share your WhatsApp number, I am sure he will send some your way too well before the next book is published…