Impact Entrepreneurship 101 - Thank you CSI Toronto!

One of the things I’m thankful for, living and working in Toronto, is the Centre for Social Innovation (CSI). They are a true beacon in the nonprofit and social impact space, and a powerhouse of innovative ideas. It’s from CSI that I first learned about co-working spaces, community bonds, social purpose organizations, and so much more.

So I was beyond grateful this year to join the inaugural Impact Entrepreneurship 101 (IE101) course delivered by Climate Ventures, a joint initiative of CSI and Foresight Canada. It’s the first time they’ve combined the social and environmental entrepreneurship streams into one course, geared toward folks in ideation phase. The course provided me with structure, feedback and support to develop and nurture my impact idea (about regenerative agriculture, which I’ll post more about in a few weeks. I’ll also post in the coming weeks about some of the exciting ideas that my cohort peers are working on).

10 weeks + a wonderful cohort + brilliant, supportive instructors who are themselves impact entrepreneurs. Plus access to the CSI network of purpose driven organizations working towards a better present and future. What a dream!

If you are an early stage, aspiring impact entrepreneur (social and or environmental impact), I really encourage you to look into IE101. And Climate Ventures has other accelerator programs for climate or social entrepreneurs at various stages. I also encourage you to read more about CSI’s groundbreaking social innovation work.

I also wanted to point out that the course was a good example of smart social impact sponsorship. I paid attention to the sponsors for the original social entrepreneurship 101 course and the new iteration. Both of the sponsors are in the financial services industry. My new impact project will be in need of financial services, and I’m now more likely to do business with and support them, not only because they sponsored the program, but also because I see them as like-minded. They, like us, want to invest in social purpose organizations and social innovation. And in a crowded financial services market where the offerings are pretty comparable, that’s a great differentiator.

This is what good social impact and corporative giving strategies can do. Make people pay attention and see your company’s social and climate investments as another reason to choose you.

For more info on how we approach social impact and corporate giving strategies, book us for a virtual chat over tea.