What is a Social Entrepreneur?

I was recently asked to define “Socail Entrepreneur.” This is a term that is often miss-understood, or given a strange glance when mentioned to outsiders. The following is my definition of the practice.

A social entrepreneur is a designer of business whose intentions are not in capital gain, but instead in the advancement of the greater good of society. A social enterprise is one that thinks and operates as a non-profit organization would, but has interesting design in it’s planning so as to be able to sustain itself and actually create a profit as opposed to relying on government funding and funding from donors.

The Public School + “Fictional Entrepreneurship” Class?

I have submitted an idea for a class on “Fictional Entrepreneurship” to be taught at the Public School. If you are interested, please sign up!

THE PUBLIC SCHOOL is a school with no curriculum. At the moment, it operates as follows: first, classes are proposed by the public (I want to learn this or I want to teach this); then, people have the opportunity to sign up for the classes (I also want to learn that); finally, when enough people have expressed interest, the school finds a teacher and offers the class to those who signed up.

The class structure would be roughly as follows:

• A brief introduction to the concept of Fictional Entrepreneurship, it’s relevance in today’s culture, and examples of fictional business.
• Concept / Ideation time (think tank). As a class, we will all work togetehr to come up with a loose premise for the company (i.e. a tea store!)
• Break into groups / mini teams. The teams are as follows:

• Business Plan Design Team: What does this company’s business plan look like? Is it a series of drawings? Is it a collage? Is it written?
• Brand Identity Team: What is the name of this company? How does it present itself to the world? Why does it do it that way?
• Products / Services Team: What does this company do / make?
• Marketing Team: How does this company differ from others? How does it get the word out?

• Reconvene as a class and make presentations.
• Return to small groups, revise, and finish.
• The result: a business: potentially critical, definitely wacky.

If you are interested in the class, please sign up, and if you are interested in this workshop being taught at your venue, contact me leaving a comment here or emailing me directly @ matt@averynicedesignstudio.org.

In other news, this Saturday is the opening of MADE UP at the Art Center College of Design featuring a diverse group of artists and designers within the Design Fiction realm. The show should be fabulous, I know for a fact –