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Social Entrepreneurship is found when an individual, group, organisation, or network seeks systemic and sustainable change on our most significant social problems.
Social Entrepreneurs create the innovations that will be “patterns for change” in what government, businesses, community groups or citizens will do to address these problems.
The New Zealand Social Entrepreneur Fellowship has been established as a peer learning community of outstanding New Zealand change-makers. Every six months this Fellowship meets to explore the skills of social enterprise, and to share experience on creating and supporting social innovation. The Fellowship has been brought together by the Social Innovation Investment Group — a key group of grant-makers, philanthropists, and community leaders who are fostering social innovation and social entrepreneurship in New Zealand. The Fellowship is part of a series of initiatives aimed at supporting and developing the next generation of social entrepreneurship in New Zealand.
“ For me the word “entrepreneur” means someone with drive and ideas, a person with the potential and passion to create something new where there was nothing before — someone with the knack for making a lot out of very little. Social Entrepreneurs are doing just that: creating a better New Zealand by combining inventive ideas with energy and resources. Very often, fresh approaches to development and community work can be traced back to inspired self-starters, who understand instinctively the who, why, what and how of community work. They sweat blood to make an idea happen. You can’t buy that sort of enthusiasm — you can only try and support it when you find it. ”
— Stephen Tindall, founder of The Warehouse retail stores, and founder and trustee of the Tindall Foundation
“ Social Entrepreneurs don’t just want to organise problems. They want to heal them. In doing so, they often create new organisations, programmes or schemes ... or try to change the culture of their existing organisations. They explore innovations and role models that move beyond just reacting to and managing the problems ... towards being pro-active and transforming them.”
— vivian Hutchinson, Organiser of the New Zealand Social Entrepreneur Fellowship
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