Article #2: Educating the Minds of Caring Hearts: Comparing the Views of Practitioners and Educators on the Importance of Social Entrepreneurship Competencies
This article is based on a study that examines what competencies (defined as knowledge, skills, and attitudes) are required for success as a social entrepreneur, and surveys 150 social entrepreneurship practitioners (among them top managers, founders, and funders of social enterprises) to gather the data. Implications for social entrepreneurship course development are also discussed.
Key points from the article:
1) The top 5 ranked competencies are: Ability to problem solve; Build effective teams; Management of financial capital; Ability to lead/develop others; Ability to communicate with customers, suppliers, and other stakeholders.
2) The bottom 5 ranked competencies are: Manage administrative work; Empathy or compassion; Ability to identify social problems; Develop volunteers support; Value social impact more than financial.
3) There are differences in rankings between for-profit, non-profit, and hybrid organizations. For example, for-profit and hybrid respondents rated the ability to sell and market the organization, ability to develop collaborative relationships, creative use of resources, and confidence in succeeding at a difficult task more important than non-profit social enterprise respondents.