Where does “belief” fit into social entrepreneurship? What kind of role does it play?
To Sally Osberg, it is all about deeply and truly believing that you can achieve what everyone else considers impossible. A social entrepreneur’s belief is in his or her conviction that he or she can overcome what others see as an insurmountable challenge and create transformative and lasting change.
Sally explains, “Social entrepreneurs have been accused of being overly optimistic. One of our core values at the Skoll is what we call tough-minded optimism—that’s my belief about how social entrepreneurs go about optimism.
“They see the opportunity, and they ask themselves ‘If not me, who? If not now, when?’
“They pull up their socks; they get to work. They keep in their sights this vision for what can be made not just better, but transformed – and that’s what they work toward.
“Now that’s optimism on steroids, but it has the rigor, determination, and the discipline underneath it, that, to me, is so quintessentially socially entrepreneurial.”
