university towns for three days. For many the fun is reconnecting with people like Karen Tse the fearless founder of International Bridges to Justice. For me the excitement is in meeting new people such as the team from VisionSpring - an organization that delivers simple reading glasses to the poorest by developing an Avon-like distribution scheme, thus creating two winners: Individuals needing simple magnifying glasses, enabling them to continue their craft work and the Avon-like ladies who with a bit of micro-credit begin earning an income.OBSERVATIONS
Venture Capitol Arrives
The VC types were there to explore business models for financing social ventures. – Having lived 25 years in Palo Alto I am quite familiar with VCs (some of my best friends are…). But this group was different in that they were not seeking for a 10X return on investment, but rather high social return. The VCs seemed most interested in how to scale successful social ventures. Scale, the ability to grow successful ventures, is THE issue for social progress. Such VC's include:
Steve Beck of SpringHill Equity Partners.
Brad Gambill and Hari Nair of Innosight Ventures.
Could Be So Much More
As one of the speakers, Lord Puttman, noted, most educational systems are trapped in mindset, dictated by the needs of the industrial revolution. The same is true for the Skoll Forum; it is trapped in an archaic academic format, which does not leverage the talent gathered.
Areas of Conflict
Met several in individuals working in areas of conflict such as David Haskell who described his work helping entrepreneurs in Syria & Jordan as, "Swimming upstream in toxic waters."
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