Knowledge is power. And often times the major difference between a person who succeeds and the person who fails is knowledge. What do you know? In this article, Impacty tells you the kind of knowledge which is deemed important for social entrepreneurs. These are the seven (7) areas to take a course or grab some knowledge on.
1. Storytelling
Storytelling is an area of study which will expose you to how best to tell your story for impact, for profit, for marketing, for engagement. The human psychology is attracted to genuine, interesting and relatable stories. Can you tell good stories?
2. Business Management
Continually sharpening your business acumen is a wise choice for any entrepreneur, and social entrepreneurs are no exception. Well, the internet has made it relatively quick and easy to enroll for courses that expand your entrepreneurial skills and knowledge base at your time, on your terms and at your pace.
It is important to run your social organisation as a business and actually indeed, it is.
3. Strategy Courses
Strategy courses are important for business and this is the same for social entrepreneurs. Doing strategy courses include topics like: defining your goals, designing your business, piloting your venture, and scaling it. This should also include developing and testing innovative solutions, assessing risks, sizing up the competition, and exploring ways to spread impact through financially sustainable means.
As a matter of fact, there is a course worth $49 which is offered by Courseera in this area of study. This four-week University of Pennsylvania course takes students a step further than in the class listed above, walking them through turning their passion for changing the world into concrete, actionable business plans for launching a venture designed to achieve a social goal.
4. Digital Marketing
Digital Marketing courses have increased in value since the world moved online because of the pandemic. Having this knowledge would more than a plus to you this season. Google offers this course for free. It is something to take advantage of.
5. People Management/ Human Resources
PM/HR courses could be just what you need to get the best out of the volunteers you have or your staff. People management principles do not change. They remain same. This knowledge is power as working well with volunteers has the power to increase their output and even the general output of the organisation.
6. Social Media for Social Change
Social Media is a large community to tap into; the largest community in the world. Even so, not everyone using social media is important to you. You need to identify your audience and engage them too.
Christine Beggs, Creative Director and Founder of Ripples Edge Media, teaches this MOOC for Udemy. The fee for this course is incredibly small when you consider the super helpful bit of information you’re going to walk away with. Ms. Beggs is going to give up the social media goods as she helps you grasp how other social entrepreneurs use it as a tool to enhance their mission
7. Social Innovation Management
If your enterprise has an innovation, then you should take courses on this. It’s one thing to innovate and another to manage it for optimal output. It is also another thing entirely to know best how to protect that innovation.
Read our article on patenting your innovation here.
