March 21, 2002 | Read Time: 1 minute
Strategic Tools for Social Entrepreneurs: Enhancing the Performance of Your Enterprising Nonprofit
by J. Gregory Dees, Jed Emerson, and Peter Economy
Social entrepreneurship has attracted increasing attention as nonprofit leaders seek new ways to further their missions and generate funds, but little has been written specifically to help nonprofit leaders become effective entrepreneurs, the authors of this book say.
In an attempt to fill the gap, Strategic Tools for Social Entrepreneurs: Enhancing the Performance of Your Enterprising Nonprofit offers suggestions on how business techniques can help nonprofit organizations further their missions. “Social entrepreneurship is not a science that can be simply copied from the for-profit world,” the authors say, offering charts, examples, summaries, and case studies to help nonprofit executives put business concepts into practice.
Many of the chapters in the book were written by people who have led social ventures. For example, in a chapter about developing a competitive strategy, Jerry Kitzi, president of Social Venture Partners of Greater Kansas City, explores what it means to be competitive in the business world, uses examples drawn from successful nonprofit ventures, and includes exercises and checklists to help determine an organization’s competitive value.
Mr. Dees is a professor of social entrepreneurship and nonprofit management at Duke University, Mr. Emerson is a senior fellow and lecturer at the Center for Social Innovation at Stanford University, and Mr. Economy is associate editor of Leader to Leader magazine.
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons, 1 Wiley Drive, Somerset, N.J. 08875; (800) 225-5945; fax (800) 597-3299; http://www.wiley.com; 326 pages; $34.95; I.S.B.N. 0-471-15068-1.
