Tuesday, March 02, 2010

When should it be a for-profit; When should it be a nonprofit

This is a little dangerous. I'm going to recommend a specific podcast I just heard--not dangerous. Dangerous is recommending the whole series.

First, the individual podcast:
A presentation (and question and answer session) by Priya Haji , the CEO of World of Good at a Stanford University social entrepreneurship class. You can find the podcast here.

What is so interesting is that World of Good is a for profit company and a separate non-profit corporation. Haji really thought about and explains why each was created. Near the end is a great explanation of when it makes sense to have a for-profit company and when it makes sense to have a nonprofit organization.

Now the dangerous part:
Based on that one podcast (and the first 5 minutes of another podcast I'm listen to and the list of other episodes), I'm going to recommend the whole Social Innovations Conversations series. You can find the series here.

The series is also available at the ITunes Store.