A business model describes the rationale of how an organization creates, delivers, and captures value – economic, social, or other forms of value. The process of business model design is part of business strategy.
Though most part of the desire for social business starts with and gets driven by passion, fruitful journey requires an intuitive approach to find and assemble all pieces of the puzzle continuously!
Business model is a great tool for describing core aspects of the business, including purpose, offerings, strategies, infrastructure, organizational structures, trading practices, and operational processes & policies. In reality, as more and more businesses are driven by opportunity or accidental successes, business model representation hardly exists!
Since every aspect of a commercial business is centered around money, P&L sheets + Cash Flow analysis drives business models mostly defined on-demand! It is hard to find a cross section of employee base, including several business leaders – that can articulate the business purpose and/or business model of the organization!
For a social enterprise, clarity, common understanding and continuous communication of the purpose are very important elements of design for sustainability. Else mortality of social enterprises will be alarmingly high!
Maintaining a visible description of the entire business of the enterprise helps in keeping this risk at large. It will also help in measuring and modifying individual elements to improve effectiveness of the organization.
Alex Osterwalder offers the most simplest and focused approach to building business models for Social Enterprises. Check it out and use appropriately
Update 11/2/10:
Check this one for a detailed analysis of business model relating the critical aspects of customer development into Social Entrepreneurship: Customer Development and Social Entrepreneurship
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