Texas Social Innovation Initiative Virtual Press Conference

I mentioned in an earlier post that Social Velocity will be one of the consultant teams working on OneStar Foundation’s Texas Social Innovation Initiative (TSI).  The TSI is a partnership between OneStar, Root Cause, and Dallas Social Venture Partners, which gives each of seven innovative Dallas/Fort Worth nonprofit organizations, who competed among 60 nonprofits, more than $25,000 in cash and strategy assistance to support their growth and impact.

The seven nonprofit winners will be announced this Wednesday at the Governor’s Nonprofit Leadership Conference in Dallas.  As part of that announcement there will be a virtual press conference at 10:30 a.m. CST featuring a discussion by leaders in the nonprofit sector about how to stimulate social innovation in Texas. Participants are Elizabeth Darling, president/CEO of OneStar Foundation; Stacy Caldwell, executive director of Dallas Social Venture Partners; and Andrew Wolk, CEO of Root Cause. To participate in the conversation you can watch the stream on the Social Velocity blog below, and you can also follow the conversation on Twitter via the hashtag #TXSI.

UPDATE: The virtual press conference happened on Wednesday, December 9th, but you can still watch the taped virtual press conference here.

Tags: Andrew Wolk, Dallas Social Venture Partners, Elizabeth Darling, OneStar Foundation, root cause, Stacy Caldwell, Texas Social Innovation Initiative

A New Social Innovation Project Comes to Texas

There is something underway in Texas that I’m pretty excited about.  The OneStar Foundation, the Texas state office of nonprofit capacity building and social innovation and administrator of the state’s AmeriCorps grant, has just launched a new project called the Texas Social Innovation Initiative (TSI). TSI is a partnership with Root Cause, a national organization supporting social innovation and headquartered in Boston.

The TSI creates an opportunity and a marketplace for socially innovative nonprofit organizations to present a compelling case for support to scale their programs.  OneStar will pick six nonprofit organizations in the Dallas/Fort Worth area to receive consulting, networking and other assistance to create an investor pitch for growth capital to scale their results-driven program. The award for each nonprofit totals about $25,000 in money and services.  The project is modeled on Root Causes’ Social Innovation Forum, where nonprofits are given strategy consulting, executive coaching, and introductions to social investors.  Their goal is to “build a philanthropic investment community that will invest and re-invest resources based on performance, in order to increase progress in solving pressing social problems.”

OneStar’s TSI will similarly offer this introduction to social investors when the project culminates in June with a Fast Pitch event where these six nonprofits will present their growth pitches to Dallas Social Venture Partners and other individuals with money to invest in nonprofits.

Aside from the fact that it is so exciting to see this kind of social innovation activity in Texas, I’m particularly excited about this project because Social Velocity is involved.  We helped to review applications (which were amazing by the way–I was so impressed with what these nonprofits are accomplishing) from the 60+ nonprofits who applied.  And Social Velocity will be one of the consultant teams working with the six nonprofits to craft their growth plans and pitches.  I love helping a nonprofit organization take the results they are achieving  and translate those into a compelling ask of people who have money to invest.  Bridging that gap between work that creates social change and those who have money to invest in social change is a thrilling experience.

The six social innovators that will participate in this year’s TSI will be notified by OneStar today, and announced publicly at the Governor’s Nonprofit Leadership Conference on December 9th.  The work crafting their pitches will begin in January.  If the project is a success, there is potential to expand it to other parts of the state.  That would be amazing.  I’ll let you know how it goes.

Tags: Dallas Social Venture Partners, Fast Pitch, Governor's Nonprofit Leadership Conference, nonprofit, OneStar Foundation, philanthropic investment, root cause, scale, Social Innovation Forum, social investors, Social Velocity, Texas Social Innovation Initiative

Thoughts on Social Innovation

Last month I attended the Social Venture Partners International conference in Dallas. It was a great gathering of an organization that is helping to lead the movement for social innovation. In 25 chapters in the US, Canada and Japan, 2,000 social venture partners contribute time, money and expertise to the nonprofits in their communities. The goal is two-fold: 1) to create communities of lifelong, informed and inspired philanthropists, and 2) to make strategic investments that build long-term capacity for nonprofits.

Theirs is an innovative model for creating engaged philanthropists who understand the need to strengthen the capacity of the nonprofit sector.

While I was there, I met up with Stacy Caldwell, Executive Director of Dallas Social Venture Partners and the creator of their Maximizing Social Impact podcast series–interviews with some of the leaders in the social innovation movement.   She asked to interview me about my thoughts on social innovation. So here is the podcast of that interview:

Maximizing Social Impact-Nell Edgington

Tags: capacity, Dallas Social Venture Partners, Nell Edgington, Philanthropy, Social Venture Partners, Stacy Caldwell