In the last two weeks I’ve been at two major social impact investing events, both of which were conducted in the language of investors, and both of which left me actively searching for the perspective of social purpose organisations. There’s a lot of discussion about what social purpose organisations need to do to get investment ready, but where’s the conversation about what investors need to do to get impact ready? On September 3^rd, the second night of the SOCAP conference, I attended an event held by Echoing Green, who support young social entrepreneurs. One of the young entrepreneurs was attending SOCAP.  Four of her friends excitedly asked her what it was like. She said “I don’t know. I’m still trying to figure out if it’s for me. I go to these sessions, but I don’t understand what they’re talking about.” I asked her what the issue was. She said the language and the concepts were so foreign to her that she struggled to find meaning in the proceedings. Only that morning, Sir Ronald Cohen had said, “that’s what impact investment is about: enabling social entrepreneurs whether they’re working through not-for-profits or for-profits, to raise the capital they need in order to improve the lives of others, or the environment”. How did we fail to communicate this to our target market? Continue reading →