Not everything that you, me or someone else dreams up as a solution to a pressing social problem is necessarily a brilliant social change innovation.

Perhaps the classic example is the castoffs that Americans donate and which are sent overseas. Did you know Americans donate 2.5 billion...

Next week, I am speaking at Emory University in Atlanta (and grabbing a hot dog at The Varsity). Each year, I teach at the UC Berkeley Blum Center for Developing Economies.

Without fail, students ask me how and where to apply their talents, knowledge and...

Falsely, neophyte social entrepreneurs often suppose that innovative social change starts with a great idea -- a brilliant insight. Maybe.

The missing social entrepreneurial skill, says Liberia's Chid Liberty, Founder/CEO of Liberty and Justice, is "really understanding the people we are trying to provide opportunities for."

"Find...

Veteran social entrepreneurs are unequivocally telling new recruits to social and economic justice careers to focus on personal mastery of basic life skills before "helping others."

In a newly-released video from iOnPoverty, six seasoned social change leaders from Africa and the United States speak out about personal growth...

On May 10, 2011, Vinod Khosla, Sun Microsystems founder and a big-dollar social impact investor, told The Economist*: "I wanted to see if I could have a social impact. I quickly realized that any non-profit activity I could do would be no more than a drop in the...

This blog is a failure. I started out to write a few suggestions about failure as a tool for greater social impact. I failed.

We know un-scrutinized failure leads to more of the same. The National Transportation Board (your tax dollars at work) automatically investigates every airplane crash so that...

The Camp David skeet-shooting photo of President Obama reminded me of my own rush shooting a gun.

In my own case, 20 years ago I was duck hunting at Disneyland's shooting gallery in Frontierland. Stay with me here. Like any dad, I was bonding with my son. Handing...

Too many social change leaders are bruised. As Arianna Huffington notes in her Sunday blog post from the World Economic Forum, this issue is no longer soaking in California New Age hot tubs.

Even as they strengthen communities, they are fragile, tired, lonely and struggling to hold...

Usually I turn my head, avert my eyes, turn off the sound. Sometimes, I fast forward (thank you, TIVO).

I hate watching creepy television ads from the worthiest of charities. You know the ones:

Mournful music plays. A pitiful photo of a starving or abused or deformed --...

With all the furor about the looming federal "fiscal cliff," your personal fiscal cliff shouldn't be left to fate.

Economic uncertainty can translate to big anxiety when it comes to your job -- especially in the social sector where resources seem to be even more precious.

If you...

It's been a rough couple of weeks for Mitt Romney and Lance Armstrong.

Very public figures with very vocal followers who've taken very big nosedives in their public reputations.

Armstrong is caught cheating at sports by allegedly injecting drugs into his body. Romney is...

Next month, I'm going to save a mom from dying in childbirth. I am not a doctor, not even a trained paramedic. I don't plan to make a donation or heroically travel to some impoverished village in some distant and dangerous place to volunteer.

On November 6th for a...

The notion of the independent, rational economic actor is a fictional crock of ideology -- disconnected from real life, disorienting to healthy communities and a destructive idea for social change agents and job-seekers alike.

Even the most rabid free-market libertarian and rightwing economist knows (or should know) that group...

Just landed your first job with a cool nonprofit or social enterprise? Fresh from school and a few internships? Brimming with ideas to change the world and ready to step up?

"Accept grunt work with grace. Grunt work is necessary. In my first job, I made some decisions, but...

You just landed a job. Congratulations.

Even better, your new job doesn't pit your ethics against your student loan debt and, with any luck at all, it even builds a better world. In the social change catchphrase of our times, as part of a life with meaning, you now have...

After barely graduating from high school with a 1.6 grade-point average, Whitney Smith was the first person in her family to go to college. "I was a terrible student in high school. I was a fat kid, bored, silly, but pretty smart, so I was labeled a geek. I was...

Tiffany Persons is Shine on Sierra Leone's charismatic Founder/CEO, a dedicated mother and a successful Hollywood-based casting director. Four years ago, I was her mentor.

Today, roles are reversed. Her tough truth-telling about economic development work and social sector volunteerism now make her my mentor. Possibly...

"If there is one word that defines what I really care about, it is justice. I named my son Adili. It means ethical, just and fair in Swahili."

Wanjiru Kamau-Rutenberg, 34, is the mother of three-year-old Adili, a wife of ten years, an American political science professor and the CEO of Kenya-based Akili Dada, which she founded in 2005 to advance African women into leadership positions. She was recently honored by the White House as a "champion of change."

Multitasking rock star that she is, with brutal candor she owns up to her shortcomings: "I accept being mediocre. I am not perfect. Even if I focused on just one or two things, I still would not be perfect at them."

As the psychologist and philosopher William James famously noted, "The art of being wise is the art of knowing what to overlook." From talking with Wanjiru in front of the iOnPoverty.tv cameras, I would add wisdom includes knowing what never to overlook.

"We have forgotten to acknowledge when we hold power. We act as if money doesn't matter. That's really dishonest." Personal security and earning a decent salary underpin successful social entrepreneurs. Don't be "so miserable that the people you purport to help would rather you were not in their lives," she says with straightforward matter-of-factness.

You are most efficient, effective and reach people deeply when you're acting from a place of self-consciousness and self-awareness. It's about trying to heal the world from what you [personally have] experienced. It is not about 'the other who is poor.'

To newcomers to economic justice work, she advises, "Learn everything you can, identify the things you care about and then get started. Don't wait for permission."

Embrace the human contradictions that characterize every change agent. She reports with an arching grin, "I spend all day running an organization empowering young women and relax at night by reading novels about women who get carted off into the sunset by burly men."

Honestly, my family always gets the short end of the stick, but I have an amazing husband. I think Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg is right: the most important choice a woman makes for her career is whom she marries.

It's all worth it, but do I have doubts? Yes. I go through moments of doubt, but the calculation is where your life brings the most value to the world.

The most useless people are people driven by guilt. The most useful people are driven by a sense of abundance.

"Do not copy/paste someone else's life." Advice for every social entrepreneur, every one of...

In the easy lexicon of social entrepreneurship, words like courage, grit, character, valor and moral fiber are missing-in-action. I read plenty of job descriptions from nonprofits and for-profit social ventures alike, which require Quicken books or a second language, but overlook quick thinking or the language of empathy.

As David...

Patrick Gleeson's day job is running an investment portfolio with the slogan "Investing in Social Change Initiatives." He is the chief executive officer of Meyer Family Enterprises, a dynamic social impact investing fund founded by the incomparable Bonny Meyer (who masquerades at your local wine shop...