Do One Better with Alberto Lidji in Philanthropy, Sustainability and Social Entrepreneurship

An insightful conversation on serendipity, success and leveraging opportunities to improve the world. We explore how to breakdown the barriers to serendipity, spotting opportunities, connecting the dots, and turning serendipitous encounters into opportunities for success.

Christian Busch is an expert in entrepreneurship, social innovation, and purpose-driven business. He teaches at New York University (NYU) and at the London School of Economics (LSE), and directs the NYU Global Economy Program.

The conversation provides real-life examples and behavioural tweaks that are both thought-provoking and entertaining.  A must-listen for anyone who’s open to framing the world in a slightly different light and appreciating that one can be proactive when it comes to luck.

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The Foundation was founded in 2003 and focuses on school readiness; they invest approximately 10m Swiss Francs (roughly US $10m at the time of writing) annually supporting children to transition into school.

UN Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 4.2 is a key reference for their work, aspiring to ensure that by 2030: all girls and boys have access to quality early childhood development, care and pre-primary education so that they are ready for primary education.

Geographically, the Foundation works across six countries in Africa – Botswana, Malawi, Namibia, South Africa, Zambia and Zimbabwe – and also in Switzerland.  Roger’s mother is South African and his father is Swiss.

When asked what it’s like to work with Roger, Sandro replies that it’s pretty cool.  Roger is running the Foundation strategically and is very hands on. For Sandro, it’s not just about working with someone who’s very high profile, it’s also a matter of working with a philanthropist who truly wants to transform children’s lives for the better. It’s a lot of fun and a privilege; it is incredibly rewarding.

We hear how the Foundation has a strong executive team and is very lean. There are only around three team members based in Switzerland and another three based in South Africa. Their CEO is Janine Händel, who has been with the Foundation from the outset.

The Foundation’s approach is community based; they work with teachers through their partner organisations (the Foundation is not an implementing organisation); they work with local partners directly in the local communities they serve and have reached more than one and a half million children.

Sandro notes the Foundation is working on an innovative project right now called the ‘Early Learning Kiosk’, which is a tablet-based app that is used by pre-primary educators to train themselves; and it also helps teachers assess a child’s development.   It is easy to scale since it is a tablet-based solution.  They are currently testing the Early Learning Kiosk with 5,000 teachers; and we hear how it was developed with universities and local partners. Even though the Early Learning Kiosk is currently being tested, it is already available for download for anyone who wishes to sample it. Once testing is completed, the Foundation aims to scale it and deploy it across Africa. The Early Learning Kiosk is available for download on both Apple and Android tablets.

Sandro adds that the Foundation is in an enviable position, whereby they can combine rigorous testing and innovation with a strong brand name and a personality that can engage effectively with policymakers.  First they focus on excellence and then they use the power of Roger to promote their work.

During these challenging times with COVID-19, the Foundation aims to ensure that teachers learn, maintain and increase their competence while in remote areas.  There is a focus on teacher workforce and quality; and they need to use technology to strengthen the role of the teacher; not to replace the teacher. 

Sandro remarks that this is an exciting platform for scale; to reach millions of kids through various partners who are active throughout Africa.  The development of the Early Learning Kiosk at the beginning was in collaboration with Hansjörg Wyss, one of the biggest Swiss philanthropists.

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Peter Jones is one of the UK's best known entrepreneurs and in 2005 he founded the Peter Jones Foundation to improve the socio economic outcomes for young people by helping them develop enterprise skills. They aim to ensure at least 60% of the young people they work with come from disadvantaged backgrounds.

This wide-ranging conversation introduces listeners to the Foundation's various initiatives, including their Tycoon Programme, which aims to back children's and young people's business ideas by lending money to them that is risk free and encourages them to develop and execute innovative business plans.

The Foundation currently works with approximately 700 schools and has supported 12,000 young people to set up and run their businesses.

Bill Muirhead delves into the question of what, precisely, are enterprise skills and underscores the importance of learning through doing. There is room for the UK's school system to embrace enterprise skills more robustly and, indeed, Bill notes how these skills are vital to increasing self-esteem and confidence. 

In addition to working with schools, the Foundation has also developed a strong alumni programme that supports those young people who have engaged in its programmes over the years.

Bill's key takeaway for listeners: He asks you to talk to the educators and young people in your lives; we all have the opportunity to ask the question: what did you do today that was enterprising?  What's your school doing to encourage enterprise? If the answer is a blank stare, then look up the Peter Jones Foundation; explore its Tycoon Programme.  Have enterprise education on your radar. You may not have thought of it before but it's really important in the world that we're facing up to.

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World University Service of Canada (WUSC) is a Canada-based organisation dedicated to expanding education, economic and empowerment leadership opportunities for youth in Canada and around the world, with a particular focus on refugees, displaced youth and young women. 

WUSC has its origins in the 1920s and today has a team of approximately 15 staff in Canada and a strong presence in the frontlines of the developing world. They’re actively supporting refugees from eastern Africa – Uganda, northern Kenya, Malawi – and the Middle East – Syria and Iraqi refugees based in Jordan and Lebanon.  They’ve done some work in Myanmar and are exploring needs in Latin America.

We also hear how their current operations are being negatively impacted by the global COVID-19 pandemic. For instance, they were due to assist 140 refugees to come to Canada for the start of the 2020/2021 academic year but that’s on hold for now due to the spread of the novel coronavirus. 

Chris provides useful insight into the difference between the opportunities available in many developed countries, such as Canada, and countries of first asylum – the countries where refugees first go – which are usually in the global south and often struggle to provide higher education opportunities for their own populations, even without any refugees in the equation. 

The pathway to higher education for refugees is full of challenges. Funding is a hurdle; scholarships are often restricted to specific countries of origin, religion, age; the equivalency of academic qualifications is not always straight forward to assess; university admissions processes can be cumbersome for many reasons; and even in the final country of destination incoming refugees may experience xenophobia, racism and many cultural challenges.  WUSC tries to assist refugees to overcome all of these challenges. 

WUSC is fortunate to engage with like-minded organisations, such as the Shapiro Foundation.  Chris notes how Ed Shapiro is a philanthropist who is interested in expanding opportunities for refugees. He has engaged with a number of charities, both in terms of helping expand the work going on in Canada and, also, in exploring how Canada can share its expertise to help the work being undertaken elsewhere. 

WUSC has been working very closely with the UNHCR (the UN Refugee Agency) around expanding education pathways for refugees globally. They’re part of a global effort to share and develop capacities in other countries to do this kind of work. Chris sheds light on a report WUSC prepared in conjunction with UNHCR and UNESCO ("Doubling Our Impact: third country higher education pathways for refugees" – Feb 2020) which is useful reading for anyone interested in making an impact in this space. 

The key takeaway Chris shares with listeners: Think about the challenges that you’re trying to address, at the scale commensurate with the challenge itself. This has been a key piece for WUSC as they think of the growth of their own programming.

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Spring Impact is a registered charity in the UK and a 501(c)(3) in the USA. They help other charities and innovative organisations of various sizes and degrees of experience to scale up, replicate and increase their impact.

Dan sheds light on his professional trajectory and highlights how he learned a great deal by observing the likes of McDonald’s and Oxfam.

Unlike many commercial advisory firms, Spring Impact is happy to share their intellectual property (IP) so that others can learn from their processes and strategies. They publish a ‘Social Replication Toolkit’ that is publicly available and transfers insight to anyone who’s interested in learning more.

Interestingly, Spring Impact often works with organisations that are already well on their scalability journey – not just nascent ventures.  For instance, Dan noted Spring Impact works with several Skoll Awardees.

Spring Impact is also deploying much attention to drive forward the field of early childhood development (ECD). They have helped many clients in this space and are now looking at how they might be able to create toolkits and processes that would be of use to any ECD organisations looking to increase their reach.

Dan explains how they work with charity Boards and CEOs and, also, he notes that oftentimes the funding for their work actually comes from third party Foundations that have identified a specific charity in need of gaining scale and, consequently, they approach Spring Impact and fund their work in support of the charity in question.

Dan’s key takeaway: Keeping in mind the current COVID-19 backdrop, he notes that, yes, do think about emergency response and risk but, also, go ahead and hold your head up to the possibilities to really expand and create more impact. Once we’re in recovery mode post-pandemic, you should really think systematically and strategically about scale.

Visit The Do One Better! Podcast website for guest bios, episode notes and additional resources on a wide range of topics focused on philanthropy, sustainability and social entrepreneurship. Please subscribe to the show and share widely with others -- thank you!

ACEVO is a network of more than 1,400 CEOs and aspiring chief executives based in the UK. They represent members from organisations across all sizes. They are a charity themselves and aim to ensure the leaders they serve are able to make the most impact possible. They support leaders and, in turn, these leaders inspire their own organisations. ACEVO helps CEOs be the best they can be.

Vicky sheds light on how ACEVO’s members are responding to COVID-19 – a crisis that is stretching many charities to the limit. She notes there are serious concerns and, indeed, demand for charities’ services has gone through the roof. At the same time, many fundraising and income streams have been negatively impacted.  Yet, there is much hope and much consideration in the sector for how we can build back better.

ACEVO has actually weathered this pandemic quite well. They have had to shift all their events on to digital platforms but that has led to good engagement. Whereas before they were convening their members through 50 different in-person events annually, now they’re doing approximately four weekly events using digital platforms. Engagement with their members has increased, as have their membership renewal rates. Members see the value of being part of this community of CEOs and aspiring leaders at this time of crisis.

On 17th June 2020, ACEVO have a report on racism coming out called ‘Home Truths’. They have been working on this report for more than a year in conjunction with a partner organisation called ‘Voice for Change England’.

The report looks at racism within the charity sector. Its insight is derived through various sources and methods: by talking to people from Black, Asian, and minority ethnic (BAME) backgrounds who work in the charity sector; surveying more than 500 people; conducting in-depth interviews with people from diverse backgrounds; and holding roundtable conversations.

Vicky notes that the experiences BAME individuals have while working in the UK charity sector are often not good. This report aims to understand exactly what BAME individuals are experiencing in this sector and how best to address the problems highlighted.  The report is called ‘Home Truths’ because it delivers some fairly robust truth to, particularly, white leaders in the sector about how the sector is falling short in areas of equity and inclusion.

Vicky notes the problem is not just an absence of BAME people in the charity sector but, also, that those who are in this sector are often not having a positive experience. She also notes that, historically, organisations serving BAME communities are underserved in the funding arena.

During the podcast she also sheds light on ACEVO’s work and coalitions with other organisations who represent this sector, such as the Association of Charitable Foundations (ACF). Interestingly, she notes there is room to explore international coalitions.

Vicky’s key takeaway:  As leaders we need to imagine better to create a better world, so let’s not be limited in our imagination for what things could be, let’s think big and then work collectively to move towards achieving some of those bigger, bolder visions.

Visit Lidji.org for guest bios, episode notes and useful links. Please subscribe and share – thank you!

Debbie sheds light on how Sage – a business solutions company and accounting software developer – launched the Sage Foundation five years ago. She was instrumental in launching the foundation which, today, entices more than 13,000 Sage colleagues to volunteer their time (last year, they volunteered an aggregate of 31,000 days), works with 300 charities at any given time, and supports local communities through grants, resources and innovative initiatives.

Debbie notes that philanthropy and volunteering are a great way to create happiness and her passion is unmistakable.  We hear how the Sage Foundation focuses on young people, women and military veterans and engages around work-readiness, education and entrepreneurialism.

Each Sage colleague is granted 5 days per year to volunteer for a charitable cause close to their heart. This can take many forms and today, with the pandemic and COVID-19 impacting the world, they’re doing a great deal of remote volunteering – such as online mentoring, helping children to read or even working with wildlife charities by reviewing live cams and assessing animals’ migration routes.

Moreover, at the Sage Foundation they’re helping charities better manage their finances in the face of the novel coronavirus pandemic – for instance, by helping charities be more effective with their cash-flow and by facilitating knowledge-sharing between organisations. 

They’ve also launched the FutureMakers initiative, which is aimed at teaching young people aged between 11 and 18 about artificial intelligence (AI) and considering the likely impact AI could have on their future careers. In addition to volunteering and grants, the Sage Foundation also helps with resource by discounting their cloud-based software and supporting charities in their local markets.

Debbie shares her experience of what it was like to launch the Sage Foundation from scratch, how she advocated for this philanthropic initiative to sit at the very top of the Sage corporate structure and also gives insight into the work required to introduce the notion of a foundation and volunteering to the firm’s 13,000-strong workforce and, ultimately, ensuring everyone is strongly engaged with philanthropy.

Debbie’s key takeaway for listeners: “Action speaks louder than words. Get on and do it!”

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Carol became Chief Executive of Coram in April 2007 and was awarded a CBE in 2013 for her contribution to services for children and families. 

Carol sheds light on the charitable work of Coram in supporting the rights, welfare and education of children throughout its 280 year history.  She speaks of its Founder, Thomas Coram, describing his life and passion to help children.

The conversation explores a wide range of topics, from Carol’s professional trajectory and Coram’s impact to COVID-19 and pressures on funding.

The key takeaway Carol would like listeners to keep in mind: quoting Thomas Coram, carol notes that everyone ought in duty to do any good they can, and she prompts us to ask how each of us is serving. She concludes by quoting Anne Frank: How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before they start to improve the world.

Sanj starts off by providing an overview of ShelterBox’s origins; from a small outfit conceived 20 years ago in Cornwall, UK, to a global NGO providing disaster relief on the ground and via remote technical assistance. 

It has only been a few days since super cyclone Amphan made landfall in Bangladesh and eastern India, and the latest estimates are that 10 million people have been impacted and 500,000 have lost their homes; this is on top of already being in an incredibly precarious situation as they grapple with COVID-19 in extremely densely populated areas where coronavirus is present.

It’s worth noting that a Rohingya refugee camp in Bangladesh has 40,000 people per square kilometre, whereas Wuhan, China, where the novel coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) started has 6,000 people per square kilometre. 

Sanj remarks that when the cyclone hits people are losing their homes and then moving into even more crowded settings for shelter, which then adds to the risk of coronavirus transmission. Therefore, ShelterBox needs to act quickly to provide family shelter; they’ve also got to provide hygiene materials to help people keep their hands clean.

This is a disaster on top of a disaster. This super cyclone is a natural disaster which is an acute emergency; you also have the coronavirus which is becoming a chronic emergency; and you also have the much wider development disparity with people living in extreme poverty.  When you live in extreme poverty, you have less resilience and little ability to support your family. You don’t have a government that can provide you with a furloughing scheme and pay your wages, or that can bail out businesses, or provide healthcare.

Sanj recalls a conversation he had with someone in Monrovia, Liberia, in reference to the earlier Ebola outbreak.  The man noted that Ebola doesn’t scare him since he’s already exposed to many risks that are alien to most Westerners.  For him, dengue fever can kill him, malaria can kill him; he can’t afford healthcare, if he doesn’t work he’ll die. And so, for much of the world there is a lack of safety nets – the extreme poverty faced by millions is already life-threatening, on top of the acute and chronic emergencies.

Interestingly for a global disaster relief NGO, ShelterBox’s headquarters is in Cornwall, UK. They have approximately 110 staff in Cornwall and 20 staff in London.  Sanj describes ShelterBox as both a community and an organisation. It relies to a great degree on volunteer support, from Rotary Club members to individual ambassadors.

ShelterBox has created response teams that go out into the frontlines when needed – made up both of professional humanitarians as well as volunteers.  They have over 200 volunteers who are response team members in addition to their professional staff.

They run training programmes for volunteers that include a wide array of information, from how to run distribution to doing needs assessments.  Training makes a big difference.  They assess people for their qualities, for their appetite for learning and for their raw skills; but not necessarily their previous experience. They look for the potential in people.

ShelterBox works closely with the public and has a strong following of supporters. They’re working on developing more of an international base and now also have opened an office with a team full time in the Philippines and are looking at other countries, too.  They take pride in partnering with local organisations on the ground – sometimes in very difficult circumstances in Syria, in Cameroon, in Somalia – and sticking with them, investing in their capacity and ultimately handing over responses to them.

Innovation is important. They have a ‘Horizons Team’ whose job is to spot new products for distribution and getting on top of the tech wave – thinking about what the world is going to look like in 10 or 20 years, what’s climate change going to do, what’s the scenario for that disaster they haven’t predicted.  They’re also looking at new ways of working, such as remote technical assistance, which they’re currently doing in Paraguay with local partners.

Sanj sheds light on his professional trajectory. He was a Captain in the British Army and did two tours in Iraq, then joined the IRC (the International Rescue Committee) where he worked for close to a decade. He joined the Army in a pre-9/11 world. It was exciting and it was different, and he enjoyed the comradery, but through two tours in Iraq he did become disenchanted with what militaries do and can achieve versus what are the real human needs. So, he left with some good memories and some useful lessons. He then did a master’s degree and then went to the IRC – an organisation that taught him much about what it means to be a humanitarian and that’s where he got his grounding.

Today, Sanj notes that collaboration is improving between international NGOs and even with the UN, but there’s still a long way to go. Questions need to be asked around why do we have various NGOs doing the same type of work in the same country; why not have a single NGO doing each type of work and start to consolidate? There’s a long way to go but Sanj is very encouraged by the direction of travel. 

Sanj posits a pragmatic idea to improve how the global community tackles some of the more intractable development problems. He doesn’t believe we can look to a deadlocked UN Security Council to resolve some of the conflicts and global issues we face – to get the Paris Climate Accords up and going for instance. Rather, he feels we need to look at more regionally led solutions and alliances.  For instance, he points to ECOWAS (the Economic Community of West African States) one such example that can help where global frameworks struggle.  Likewise, he refers to conflict resolution in places such as the Sudan and South Sudan, where east African states have been very involved.  So, he believes that investment and support by Western countries in those types of mechanisms is a very pragmatic way to solve problems region by region.

Sanj’s key takeaway for listeners: As a senior (or aspiring) leader there is a fine balance to strike between having sufficient humility and having too much deference to what people think. It is important to keep the humility while having a lodestar that guides where we need to go without being afraid to bring people along for that journey.  Try to take time to get feedback from those around you to help you strike that right balance – this will serve you well.

Visit Lidji.org for guest bios, episode notes and useful links. Please subscribe and share -- thank you!

This episode follows from an earlier episode of The Do One Better! Podcast featuring Matt Reed, which aired in October 2019. It is worth listening to that episode in conjunction with this one.

This conversation sheds light on the Aga Khan Foundation and the Aga Khan Development Network at a global level and provides tangible insight to their work in India.

Matt Reed is CEO of the Aga Khan Foundation in the UK (and was formerly CEO in India between 2013 and 2016) and Tinni Sawhney is the current CEO of the Aga Khan Foundation in India.  Together, they provide a multifaceted account of how they’re helping the most marginalised communities and individuals.

The Aga Khan Foundation is one of 10 development agencies that together form the Aga Khan Development Network, founded by His Highness the Aga Khan.  They work across all 17 UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and aim to: 

1. Improve the quality of life, in all its dimensions, in all the communities where they are active

They’re active in approximately 20 countries across central and south Asia, east and west Africa, and the Middle East. They focus on the poorest of the poor, in some of the most remote regions of the countries where they’re active. 

Across the Network, they employ between 80,000 and 90,000 people – excluding the communities and volunteers they work with – and the Foundation itself works with approximately 40,000 civil society organisations annually.  Annual operations across all 10 agencies is roughly $5.5bn.

Tinni Sawhney sheds light on the work of the Aga Khan Foundation in India.  Their interventions span many sectors, including girls’ rights, women’s economic empowerment, gender equality, early childhood development and agriculture.  Prioritising the needs of women is central to all their work. 

On the issue of society’s attitudes in India towards women being active in the labour market; girls staying in school for as many years as boys do etc:  Tinni notes that oftentimes, women’s work is unseen and unheard. At the Aga Khan Foundation, they want to make sure women realise just how important women's work is both to the communities in which they reside and also in their own households. It is also important to help men realise that the work of women is so fundamental to the economic development of their work and, therefore, they need to allow women to step out of their home.

Tinni talks with passion about an intervention that helps schoolgirls and young women have a voice.  She sheds light into one programme that had identified that many girls were dropping out of school to stay at home and manage the house. But these girls definitely had aspirations. 

So, they launched learning centres that provided a welcoming environment and enabled participants to gain some qualifications and vocational life skills - also making them aware of their rights and entitlements.

This life skills education led girls to realise they could have a different life. In the eyes of their immediate household these were now women who were contributing to the running of the household economy, so that increased their status within the household and, importantly, within the community there was also a greater acceptance of women working.  

Many girls who complete this vocational training end up becoming role models to other girls in their communities. And, ultimately, that’s how change across the whole of society happens.

The Aga Khan Foundation is very much a facilitator and their interventions are sustainable, whereby they continue to yield benefit to local communities even after the Foundation is no longer directly involved, and whereby many of the benefits and ideas that result from their interventions actually originate within the local communities themselves.

Tinni goes on to shed light on her own professional trajectory and how she ended up becoming the CEO of the Aga Khan Foundation in India.  She notes that while growing up she didn’t feel she was going to be active in the development field. But that changed when she joined the Institute of Rural Management in Gujarat .  As part of her training she had to live two months in a village that had no running water and the only house that had a toilet was the house where Tinni was sent to live by her institute. That’s when she realised that if we are really going to make a change then perhaps this is the setting where one starts.  She was very enthused by Mahatma Gandhi’s sayings that India resides in its villages. That’s where Tinni found her calling. 

Tinni’s key takeaway for listeners: Sometimes we find the greatest stories of courage and empowerment among those we would think of as poor.  She has found some of the greatest stories of empowerment among the women she works with. She feels the potential to overcome great odds is present in everyone. With a little bit of support, people can take this potential so much further – one cannot even imagine. With a little support that potential can really become an agent of change. This is very inspiring!

Visit Lidji.org for guest bios, episode notes and useful links. Please subscribe and share widely with others – thank you!