November 13, 2011 | Read Time: 3 minutes
Hybrid organizations that have both for-profit and charitable missions—increasingly known as “for-benefit” enterprises—are explored in a special report on “The Good Company” in Harvard Business Review (November).
Because most nations require organizations to declare themselves as either for- or nonprofit enterprises, writes Heerad Sabeti, “many socially minded entrepreneurs end up shoehorning their vision into one structure or the other and accepting burdensome trade-offs in the process.”
But change may be on the horizon, the magazine says. As a key example of hybrid enterprises, it points to the “community operated and oriented plans” for health coverage that are provided for in the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.
The formalization of a structure providing for for-benefit groups could create a “fourth sector,” the publication says, one that “is likely to shape the future of capitalism.”
For more, go to: http://www.hbr.org
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Corporate CEO’s rule the ranks of Fortune magazine’s “40 Under 40” list of the hottest young stars in business (November 7). But a trio of nonprofit movers and shakers have elbowed their way onto the list.
At No. 30 is Salman Khan, the 35-year-old former hedge-fund analyst who started Khan Academy, a nonprofit organization that creates and distributes free online tutorials on math, science, and other subjects. Right behind him, at No. 31, is Charles Best, founder of DonorsChoose.org, because, Fortune writes, donations for his charity, which raises money for public schools, “are on track for $40-million this school year, nearly double from two years ago, and now total $90-million since 2000.”
Scott Harrison, the 36-year-old founder of the five-year-old group Charity: Water, also gets a nod. He earned his No. 38 ranking, the magazine says, for raising $46-million to help bring clean water to 2 million people in the developing world.
“With a name-drop from President Obama and 1.4 million Twitter followers,” Fortune writes, “Harrison says the charity’s major obstacle now is finding the equipment to dig more wells faster.”
For more, go to: http://www.fortune.com
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Planned Parenthood Federation of America’s recent battles over government aid are only the latest brush with controversy for the organization, which has its roots in Margaret Sanger’s World War I-era activism on behalf of birth-control access, notes The New Yorker (November 14).
For decades Americans have had a complicated relationship with the idea of spending government money on reproductive health, and on contraception of any form.
However, the magazine reports, today’s debates about cutting government aid to Planned Parenthood have thrown a spotlight on the group’s advocacy muscle. “Last spring, while under siege,” the article says, the charity “gained more than a million new supporters. It also spent a great deal of money and resources fighting political and legal battles, often against adversaries with deep pockets.”
Cecile Richards, head of Planned Parenthood, tells the magazine that she sees no conflict between the group’s charitable and lobbying arms. “The more patients we see, the stronger advocates we have,” she says. “And the stronger advocates we have, the more patients we see.”
For more, go to: http:///www.newyorker.com
