TiE's session on The Pivotal Role of Entrepreneurship in Addressing Global Poverty

Part of my job is to leverage every networking opportunity to get the word out on the company. With that intent, and also to learn a bit more about social enterpeneurship, this afternoon I drove down to Santa Clara for TiE (The Indus Enterpreneurs) member networking session titled "The Pivotal Role of Entrepreneurship in Addressing Global Poverty".

If you are an enterpreneur living close to a TiE chapter, and haven't been to their events, it's definitely worth checking out (they always have great Indian food at each gathering). Not surprisingly, the crowd at the Silicon Valley chapter is a good mix of mostly Indian enterpreneurs and seasoned industry execs, so it's pretty decent networking. Today was a bit different, because instead of promoting our individual companies, the crowd was more interested in how enterpreneurs can play an active role in tackling global poverty.

Dr. Bill Musgrave from The Enterpreneurs Network(TEN)-Silicon Valley gave the keynote, with many anecdotes on enterpreneurs finding viable business models serving the "bottom of the pyramid". Particuarly striking was his quote of former president Clinton: "I have never seen uneven distribution of intelligence, but always seen uneven distributions of opportunity". Dr. Musgrave argued that to make the grand changes needed to address global poverty, governments and large corporations haven't proven to be much effective, but it is rather the enterpreneurs who are most effective at empowering the poor. His call of action to the roomfull of enterpreneurs was to seek out such opportunities and make a difference.

The session also gave 2-minute "open mike" pitch slots to any interested attendee to promote their company/cause. I was particualrly impressed with Vipin S (?) from Intel who's starting a program in India to enable local farmers to grow crops for biodiesel fuel. Also interesting was Navaneethan Sundaramoorthy's pitch on Association for India's Development's local chapter , which has a collection of development projects that harness the collective resources of local Indian diaspora.

I couldn't pass this "open mike" opporutnity to talk about my friend Mahabir Pun's work in Nepal. Mahabir and I went to the same college in Nebraska. Upon graduation, while I took the more common path of getting a job and later launching start-ups, Mahabir went back to Nepal, back to the same rural village where he grew up, and started a grade school for the local kids deprived of education, and also started several income-generating micro-projects. I should do a post describing his work in detail, but check out Himanchal Education Foundation's web site in the meanwhile, which is the foundation that tries to get financial help and recruit volunteers for the school. It is a very inspiring story of sheer will that is making a difference without much help from government and NGO's who are now finally warming up to this project.

Afterwards, I got a chance to chat with several other folks who are somehow involved part-time with similar social projects, big and small -- and as I write this, I feel a lot more hopeful about these enterpreneurs making a lasting social impact. I sensed a similar drive to make social changes as we have in launching new companies and seeking successful exits. Key is, how effective will we be in pooling our resources and provide helping hands (I should say, empowering hands) to organizations such as Mahabir's himanchal.org. Just like with any new venture, we don't have the answers when we start, but with the right will, we will find a way.

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