Shawn Smith

To understand social entrepreneurship, it’s best to speak to one of Canada’s leading experts. Shawn Smith is the co-founder of RADIUS – Simon Fraser University’s social innovation lab and venture incubator based at the Beedie School of Business – and, in addition to holding an MBA from Oxford as a Skoll Scholar in Social Entrepreneurship, he’s learned much of what he knows from working as the past founder of social ventures Impacto Quito, Global Agents for Change and Education Generation. Having graduated from youth leader to new father, Shawn explained, by email, why research can launch good careers and even better ideas – and why social ventures can be a great tool to do both.

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To some, ‘systems change’ can seem like a very academic term. What does it mean and why should it matter to everyone?

By systems change we really just mean trying to understand the bigger picture of why a problem is happening, and being intentional about doing work that can impact that whole system rather than just a little part of it. It doesn’t mean YOU have to work on the whole system, just that with a little research and better understanding of why something isn’t working well, you can aim your own efforts in a way to have the most impact, and to make sure you are contributing to actually changing how things work for the better, rather than just applying a temporary bandaid to a problem. 

It’s an approach you’ve taken as a serial entrepreneur through many projects that have, collectively, showcased how we can change the world in different and innovative ways. What set you on this path?

It’s only recognizable as a path by looking backwards. Along the way I have just been interested in different problems, found others who are similarly motivated to improve things, and tried each time to do the best I can to make things better. I can point to this or that incident or opportunity, but really I think it’s just about picking a place to get started, trying to surround yourself with others who also care about making the world a better place, and being really honest with yourself at each step about whether you are really having an impact, and how you might deepen or improve the way you try to approach problems. 

You have an MBA from Oxford and have led non-profit projects, but you’ve become a champion of – and a global expert in – the blending of business and social causes. Why do you believe in social innovation and social enterprise? Has it made the traditional non-profit redundant?

100% not! Non-profits can be a beautiful way to help make society better, and they often provide vital services and supports that simply could never be provided by a social enterprise. I don’t think it is either or, but rather about trying to figure out which model makes the most sense in a given situation. Social enterprise or social business is great when you can improve a system or address a problem in a way that people are willing and able to pay for, as that means your impact can be more financially sustainable. However many issues don’t fit this mold, and I think we lose a lot if we think everything has to be profitable or to generate money to be a “good” solution – there are many ways we can share more, or redistribute resources to help address common problems (say watershed restoration) or to support those less well off (truly affordable housing solutions), that are just not likely to ever be profitable or generate revenue. I actually think social enterprise and entrepreneurship is a powerful tool, but a specific one that can only be used when the conditions are right. 

I do believe in social innovation, but in a way that is simply saying we can be innovative in addressing our social issues, and that new and better models are always possible. I think we tend to overcomplicate it with fancy definitions. I would also caution that much wisdom and many brilliant solutions have been lost from our past, whether from Indigenous communities or otherwise. Sometimes social innovation has a way of thinking everything has to be new, but we would also do well to look for what we may have lost in trying to move forward so quickly. 

You were one of the early believers in the value of social ventures and now it’s become quite trendy. Is that a positive or is there a downside? Has the term social venture lost its meaning a bit, just like other buzz words, such as sustainability?

Yes and no. I think it’s wonderful that people are looking to embrace new tools, and social innovation and social ventures have much to offer as we try to address some really challenging shared issues. Increased interest means more people learning from one another, more resources for this work, and more attention being paid to the outcomes so they can influence other actors like policymakers and funders. At the same time, it’s important not to think everything is a social innovation or a social venture, as I mention above. Transitioning to a more just and sustainable world requires activism, policymakers, entrepreneurs, non-profit leaders and everyday citizens making a difference in their neighbourhoods – it’s not which is better, rather we need more of all of the above. 

You helped launch RADIUS at SFU. What is RADIUS and why is it an example of how a high school student can blend passion and mission with career?

RADIUS is a social innovation hub – that means it is both a place where people can find support for themselves and their own ideas, and also a place where we develop specific projects of our own to help improve systems like refugee and newcomer settlements in Canada, inequities in public health or building a more inclusive and just inner city in Vancouver. At any given time, we employ around 20 people as staff or contractors, all of whom are being paid to do work that directly contributes to helping solve social problems, so I certainly hope we’re an example of a place people can blend passion and mission with career! The jobs include everything from working on our accounting and finance, to developing new projects with entrepreneurs, to managing our communications – I think it’s also important to remember you don’t have to start something or lead a project to make an enormous difference, many career paths can be applied to social impact by bringing those skills to impactful organizations that need them.

Empathy, rigour and impact: they underpin your work at RADIUS. Why? And do we need this approach across society, not just in social innovation labs, or is there a danger of too much of a good thing? 

These words are just reminders for us about some guiding principles in our work.

• Empathy means we need to be careful to work with and for people who are experiencing a problem, to deeply understand their perspective and follow their leadership and experience as we try to develop solutions. We are not solving issues for people, but with them.
• Rigour means we are willing to ask ourselves hard questions about whether something is really working, or what we need to learn, change or stop. It also means being transparent, and sharing what we learn, even if it means sharing that we failed at something. 
• Impact means that just doing the work isn’t good enough, we need a relentless focus on whether it is actually having an impact on the system we want to change. We have limited resources, so we need to try to be thoughtful in deploying them in a way that creates as much positive impact as possible. 

I would say we could use more of all of these things in society, though again there is no single prescription for how everyone should act, and other organizations may choose a different set of guiding principles that serve them very well. 

Do you ever worry that the social innovation community tends to skew to one side of the political spectrum?

I honestly think social innovation just means a willingness and ability to generate new solutions that work better than the current ones. Anyone can do that, from any political perspective or geography. We overcomplicate it in many ways, and associate it perhaps with particular segments of society, but there is no reason. Social ventures are in many ways very friendly to conservative ideals, as they strive to use the tools of the market to generate self-sufficient models that can support their communities, and to take the pressure off of government solutions. We are striving for a society that is more just, more inclusive, more sustainable, more dynamic, and I don’t see any reason those represent the goals of any one part of the political spectrum. 

The students you’ve worked with have been able to take some fairly bold ideas and create truly useful solutions. In working with innovative young minds, what has it taught you about how we might better approach some of our bigger, shared challenges, like safeguarding our biodiversity?

I think what I’ve been most struck by over time is the risk that my own assumptions blind me to how change might effectively happen. If you get too used to one set of tools, language, networks, assumptions, you start to only see a limited set of ways to proceed. In my case I’ve spent a long time understanding social ventures and market-based solutions, but as I gain experience it becomes clear that this can be an interesting and important part of the equation, but not without recognizing the broader set of changemaking paths and skills. If we want to take on challenges like safeguarding biodiversity we need to understand the systems around this, and why they aren’t working – this will include talking to business leaders, policymakers, activists, entrepreneurs and scientists, and then picking a way to contribute to this bigger picture. 

A mentor of mine, Al Etmanski, would say to think and act like a movement. Who are all the other people who are motivated by the same issues, and what are they doing? How can you contribute to help that whole movement take a step forward? Sometimes that will be starting a new venture or idea, but often it will be joining another team, advocating for a policy change, or taking other actions. 

To the student wondering how they can even determine if they’ve got the right stuff to be an entrepreneur, what would you say? How do you start on a path that leads to a RADIUS and beyond? And should they start now?

Start now! You don’t have to become an entrepreneur, but you should find ways to try out starting or supporting new projects and ideas, to see what you like and don’t like about it, and to learn about the ways you feel you can best contribute. This might tell you that you like starting things yourself and taking the risks and work on to try to make it successful, or perhaps you like being a bit more in the background but developing skills that can make a real difference on a team. They are all needed, but I would just suggest you keep an eye out for others who are motivated to try to make a difference, and get involved – you can’t predict your path in advance, but you also can’t start developing a direction until you are in motion. Get moving and learn as you go. You will definitely fail at some points, we all do, just remember that if you aren’t running into road blocks you aren’t learning much. 

You’ve learned a lot in your journey and you’re still young and, doubtlessly, still learning. With that said, what’s the one thing you know now that you wish you knew at 15?

Great question! A few things come to mind:

• There are many, many paths to a fulfilling and impactful life and career. Society, and education systems, have a way of making it look like there are only certain clearly defined paths you need to take. You have to take this course to get into that one, then that course to get that degree, and that degree leads to this job. The truth is those paths exist, but there are many others that are less obvious and less well defined – you shouldn’t be afraid to try to seek your own path and try things that others think might be risky or different. 
• Most people are just making it up as they go along. It is easy to be intimidated by people who have power or impressive jobs or whatever, but the honest truth is most people are just trying to figure everything out as they go, and you can too. Trust yourself – be humble and make sure you are learning and improving as you go, but you have much to contribute. 
• Our society is fundamentally unjust, and we all have a responsibility to do everything we can to make it more inclusive, just and sustainable. Power and wealth are overly concentrated, many of our current systems make it worse, and we need young people who are willing to question the status quo and seek to use their privilege and power in the pursuit of everyone’s wellbeing, including a healthy natural environment.