Andrew Wolk and Colleen Gross Ebinger
Government and Social Innovation
Current State and Local Models
En 2006, then Lieutenant Governor Mitch Landrieu launched the Louisiana Office
of Social Entrepreneurship, putting his state at the forefront of a growing national
trend of government-led efforts to spur social innovation and better match
resources with results. In establishing this office, Landrieu aimed to make
Louisiana “the most hospitable place in the country for those who are launching
and testing the best, most effective new program models for social change.”1
Landrieu’s launch took place at a time when government leaders across the
nation were looking for a better way to address social problems. Faced with steep
budget deficits and minimal appetite for higher taxes, plus historically low
approval ratings of government—all exacerbated by a lagging economy that has
created greater need among citizens—government leaders set out to do more with
menos. A number of them began to cast their eyes toward the nonprofit sector and
explore partnership opportunities with nonprofits, foundations, and corpora-
tions.2
Mientras tanto, the nonprofit sector—particularly nonprofits and foundations
dedicated to social entrepreneurship and performance measurement—was
increasingly recognizing the influence of government on its work. The innovative
service delivery models that social entrepreneurs had developed, and that some
foundations were supporting, had often evolved as a direct reaction to what they
saw as failed government policies and systems, but now these organizations
Andrew Wolk is founder and CEO of Root Cause, a nonprofit organization that
advances enduring solutions to social and economic problems by supporting social
innovators and educating social impact investors.He is also a senior lecturer in social
entrepreneurship at MIT and was recently appointed a Gleitsman Visiting
Practitioner in Social Innovation at David Gergen’s Center for Public Leadership at
Harvard University.
Colleen Ebinger is director of Public Innovators at Root Cause, where she leads a
national initiative to support government leaders who are ensuring the creation and
growth of the most effective, efficient, and sustainable solutions to pressing social prob-
lemas. She began her career as a Peace Corps volunteer in Honduras, and later
launched a statewide policy and advocacy program for Latino immigrants in
Minnesota.
© 2010 Andrew Wolk and Colleen Gross Ebinger
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Andrew Wolk and Colleen Gross Ebinger
demonstrated an increased pragmatism about the role of government. According
to Kim Syman, director of New Profit Inc.’s Action Tank, social entrepreneurs and
their supporters realized that “if you’re really serious about solving problems in
this nation, you need to look at ways that government can partner with entrepre-
neurial leaders and you also need to stop spending money on things that don’t
trabajar. If we could find new ways to partner with government, we could take the
muscle and mandate of government and marry it to the frameworks of effective
nonprofit organizations and let resources follow performance.”3 If they were to
make real change, these organizations needed to connect back into the systems that
were touching many more lives than their individual work ever could.4
Leaders in the nonprofit and government sectors began to experiment with
new ways of working together: they developed policies, sought public funding for
research and development, used public dollars as growth capital to spread best
approaches to new locales, collected and analyzed data to better understand social
problems and the impact (or lack thereof) of strategies currently being employed
to address them, brokered partnerships between the nonprofit and business sectors
to leverage resources, and used government’s bully pulpit to raise the profile of
problems and approaches and to convene diverse stakeholders. In essence, estos
efforts forged an alternative to the two ideologies that have dominated political
rhetoric over the past several decades: the FDR-styled “government as service
provider” and the Reagan-inspired “government is the problem.”5 At present, estos
new efforts are providing glimpses of a still-emerging vision of government’s role
in addressing social issues—one in which government makes essential contribu-
tions to fostering social innovation and spreading the best solutions to social prob-
lems by developing new policies, directing resources based on performance, y
facilitating collaboration among organizations and sectors. As New York Mayor
Michael Bloomberg describes this vision: “If we are going to emerge from these
challenging times stronger than ever and remain the world’s leading superpower,
we need to reinvigorate government with the spirit of innovation and invention
that has always been America’s calling card. We are going to have to improve the
effectiveness and efficiency of government in dealing with age-old problems (de
poverty to health care), as well as the responsiveness of government to the latest
emerging challenges (from climate change to technology change).”6
This article offers an analysis of other models that have developed over the past
several years, especially in the three years since the founding of Louisiana’s Office
of Social Entrepreneurship. At all levels of government, these new frameworks for
solving social problems are crossing political, geographic, and cultural divides.
CURRENT U.S. MODELS
In Washington D.C. and in state legislatures and city halls throughout the country,
a new generation of government leaders is working with the nonprofit and busi-
ness sectors to create what Stephen Goldsmith aptly describes as “an environment
that enables continual innovation while demanding real impact and perform-
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Government and Social Innovation
ance.”7 They are part of a national experiment and testing ground in which the
public sector is finding and spreading the best solutions to our many pressing
social problems. As Sonal Shah, director of the White House Office of Social
Innovation and Civic Participation explains, “This is so critical to who we are as a
country. We have such a decentralized infrastructure, and it’s in connecting that
infrastructure that we find and understand the solutions. We already do that in the
economic space, but we also need to on social issues because social and economic
are two parts of the same point . . . Creating an environment where that can hap-
pen is important; it’s an important part of what the government has to do.”
At the federal level, the White House Office of Social Innovation and Civic
Participation is spearheading and coordinating efforts among federal agencies to
embed the principles of innovation in government. Competitive innovation funds
are now in place at the departments of education and labor, and the Corporation
for National and Community Service. Además, that office hopes to support and
learn from the emerging state and local models in order to ensure that this new
approach is infused into all levels of government.
Among state and local initiatives, two overarching structural models—office
and liaison—are emerging to support a host of activity types.
Office models are dedicated to demonstrating new approaches to encourage
innovation and spread proven solutions. With names that include phrases like
Social Entrepreneurship (Luisiana), Social Impact (Texas), Strategic Partnerships
(Denver), and New Urban Mechanics (Bostón), they have emerged at the city and
state levels around the country. Most of these offices are situated within govern-
mento, with two examples of quasi-government models that are a hybrid between
public and private.
Liaison models are designed to broker partnerships across government and
among the public, nonprofit, and business sectors. The liaison model can take one
of three forms:
1. The executive branch can establish a liaison between the government and foun-
dations in an effort to broker partnerships, leverage dollars from both entities,
and attack entrenched problems in a more systemic way.
2. Agency liaisons can be established to break down the silos within government
and provide a mechanism for forging effective public-private partnerships.
3. Independent nonprofit entities can be established to raise private philanthropic
funds, leverage volunteer hours, and cultivate community champions. These are
most frequently used with public education and parks/conservation.
Tables 1 y 2 (on pages 138 y 140, respectivamente) outline the types(s) de
models used for each known city or state effort. We analyze many of them through
the case profiles that follow.
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Government and Social Innovation
The Office Model
Within Government
Examples: Boston Office of New Urban Mechanics, Denver Office of Strategic
Partnerships, Fairfax County Office of Public Private Partnerships, Luisiana
Office of Social Entrepreneurship, Ohio Social Entrepreneurship Initiative
Following in the footsteps of the Small Business Administration and offices of eco-
nomic development, several state and local governments have established new
offices focused on supporting public-private partnerships and spurring social
innovation and entrepreneurship. These offices are often seen as neutral entities
capable of brokering relationships between government agencies and across sec-
tores. They also frequently become clearinghouses for the local social sector, principal-
taining data on nonprofit organizations and social services as well as data on
trends in key social issues areas. Housed directly within government, these initia-
tives benefit greatly from the support of an elected official, which is an advantage
as long as that person remains in office, but can make it difficult for these offices
to survive changes in political leadership.
Profile: Denver Office of Strategic Partnerships (DOSP)
Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper entered office with a background in
business entrepreneurship (having started the state’s first brew pub) y
the nonprofit sector (where he served on several nonprofit and founda-
tion boards). One of his goals as mayor was to bring the two sectors
together to more effectively tackle some of the city’s most pressing prob-
lemas. His first step was to launch the Denver Office of Strategic
Partnerships. Mike Roque, director of the DOSP, explains: “The issues of
at-risk youth and teen pregnancy were priorities. We surveyed who was
doing what and then went back and briefed [the mayor], proposing what
we thought the gaps were and how our office could address them.” They
addressed the gaps by writing grants, offering workshops, and building
partnerships.
Grant Writing. According to Roque, the DOSP is a “convener and cata-
lyst,” and one of its key objectives is to teach nonprofits and city agencies
to work together. The office strives to move organizations away from the
mindset that resources are finite, demonstrating, bastante, that “by working
together, the pie gets bigger for everybody.” Several years ago, the DOSP
took over managing the city’s grant-writing contract and conducted
trainings for city agencies and nonprofit organizations on the grant-writ-
ing process. They also established processes and protocols for researching
and writing grants, which resulted in over $30 million in federal and national foundation grants over the past three years. The year before the DOSP took over managing the contract, the grant-writing firm had writ- ten three grants and raised $250,000. Many of these grants have been col-
laborations between city agencies and nonprofit organizations.
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Government and Social Innovation
Workshops. For city agencies, the DOSP offers issue briefings and train-
ing on working with nonprofits. Organizations, mientras tanto, attend work-
shops that explain key city agencies, teach them how to work with said
agencias, and build their capacity to contract with the city. Además,
the DOSP provides energy efficiency workshops and hopes to encourage
the creation of multi-tenant nonprofit centers. Both initiatives aim to
lower organizations’ operating costs so they can provide more and better
services to additional people.
Building Partnerships. The DOSP has supported the formation and main-
tenance of several major issue-based collaboratives. The Youth
Mentoring Collaborative has increased the number of youth served by 25
por ciento, while decreasing the annual cost per youth by $400. The Teen Pregnancy Prevention Partnership consists of nine nonprofits and city agencies, which have teamed up to run a comprehensive teen pregnancy prevention pilot program in three at-risk schools. More recent collabo- rations include the Denver Transit Oriented Development Fund , which will provide one thousand new affordable housing units in transit corri- dors, and the Neighborhood Energy Action Partnership , which seeks to educate neighborhoods about and provide energy saving upgrades to homes. Quasi-Governmental Examples: New Mexico Center for Philanthropic Partnerships, OneStar Foundation: Texas Center for Social Impact Quasi-governmental offices utilize many of the same strategies as those located directly within government, but they are structured in a way that ties them less directly to the elected official who played a part in their founding. This approach gives offices more latitude in setting their own agenda and frees them from both the bureaucracy and political considerations that can deadlock some government initiatives. While a leadership transition has not yet occurred during the lifespan of the examples featured here, the quasi-governmental model is meant to provide greater protection from leadership transitions, so that the office is less likely to be eliminated or marginalized when a new executive is elected. The potential draw- back is that these offices may never reap the full benefits of a high-level govern- ment champion who feels responsible for their success. Profile: OneStar Foundation: Texas Center for Social Impact “We are really interested in ways that nonprofits can show impact. El [nonprofit] sector is a huge economic driver in the state of Texas. En 2008 solo, the state’s five health and human service agencies contracted over $6.1 billion with nonprofits to get their work done,” explains Elizabeth
Darling, president and CEO of the OneStar Foundation: Texas Center for
Social Impact. “Texas has a rich history of acknowledging the importance
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of civic engagement through volunteering and service in the nonprofit
sector.” OneStar was created in 2004 because Governor Rick Perry “saw
an opportunity to favor an independent 501(C)3 that would manage the
continuation of the legacy of support for service and volunteerism, el
Governor’s Faith-Based and Community Initiative, support capacity
building, and serve as the state’s service commission. These functions had
previously been buried in state government, and this new joint entity
would be empowered to work more freely.”
OneStar was created as a supporting nonprofit of the governor’s office;
its CEO and board are appointed by the governor, and it receives a por-
tion of its funding from the state. It does not report to either branch of
gobierno, sin embargo, and is incorporated as an independent 501(C)3.
While its founding activities revolved around traditional nonprofit
capacity building and around volunteerism and service, it has since
expanded its offerings to include research and learning, as well as a spe-
cial focus on social innovation.
Organizational Capacity Building. Texas has over 100,734 registered non-
profits and a 43.1% growth rate between 1998 y 2006; more people
work in its social sector than in the oil and gas extraction industry. Every
year the sector contracts to deliver tens of billions of dollars worth of
services on behalf of government, so it is in the interest of state taxpayers
to have these services provided by robust, high-performing organiza-
ciones.
OneStar’s Texas Social Innovation Initiative (ETI) is delivered through a
partnership with Dallas Social Venture Partners and Root Cause.
Modeled after Root Cause’s Social Innovation Forum, the competitive
process identified seven high-performing social innovators to receive
$25,000 worth of consulting, business planning, and coaching services, as well as statewide recognition among funders and policy makers. In addi- tion to TSI, OneStar also manages a Renewing Our Communities fund that was established by the state legislature in order to commit to a new kind of capacity building based on collaborative partnerships, planificación, and performance measurement. In this role, it served as a resource to the legislature and is now a partner in implementing legislation that creates liaisons in fourteen state agencies that are all dedicated to reducing bar- riers to partnerships between government and faith- and community- based organizations. Service and Volunteerism. As Texas’ state service commission, OneStar has put Texas on the map as the first state in the country to direct its entire AmeriCorps*State funding pool toward addressing a particular social issue: the educational attainment of Texas youth. The AmeriCorps*State program offers states the opportunity to determine a strategy for allocat- 142 innovaciones / summer 2010 Descargado de http://direct.mit.edu/itgg/article-pdf/5/3/135/1836975/inov_a_00034.pdf by guest on 08 Septiembre 2023 Government and Social Innovation ing resources to the areas and organizations where they will be used most effectively. OneStar is investing its entire 2009-2012 AmeriCorps fund- ing—an anticipated $30 million—in eligible organizations that are
addressing the education crisis in Texas.
Investigación, Evaluation, and Learning. By providing data on needs and
trends, OneStar helps nonprofits develop best practices, better under-
stand the underlying causes behind the issues they address, and realize
the importance of measuring nonprofit effectiveness in communities and
across the sector. Primero, it serves as a clearinghouse for research reports
and findings on the sector in Texas to keep the state and other nonprofit
stakeholders abreast of new developments. Segundo, it conducts strategic
research projects to collect data about the sector’s strengths and chal-
lenges to inform decision-making and practice. Tercero, it is developing the
Texas Connector, a geo-mapping system that showcases nonprofit infor-
mation across the state in relation to indicators of social service needs
and provides customized statistical reports by region.
The Liaison Model
Foundation Liaisons
Examples: Kentucky Commission on Philanthropy, Michigan Office of the
Foundation Liaison, New Mexico Center for Philanthropic Partnerships, Nueva York
Philanthropic Liaison
As partners with government, foundations bring additional capital to the table but
can also provide a wealth of knowledge and expertise on issue areas and local sys-
tem dynamics. Además, they can serve as a government’s research and develop-
ment arm, taking on pilot projects and experiments that are too risky for govern-
mento, but which, when successful, can be taken up by government and spread
across the larger public system. In New Mexico, Por ejemplo, the Center for
Philanthropic Partnerships (CPP) was launched in 2009 with key partners, eso
include the New Mexico Children’s Cabinet, chaired by Lt. Governor Diane
Denish; the Kellogg Foundation; and the Albuquerque Community Foundation,
which serves as the CPP’s fiscal partner and home base. CPP’s mission is “to sup-
port innovative, sustainable, cost-effective solutions to social problems through
building vital partnerships across philanthropy, non-profit, government and pri-
vate leadership” in four core areas: family economic success, food systems, civic
engagement, and early childhood education.
Profile: Michigan Office of the Foundation Liaison (OFL)
Soon after Jennifer Granholm was elected Governor of Michigan in 2002,
a group of foundation leaders met with her to pitch the idea of a founda-
tion liaison who could serve as an interpreter between sectors, así como
a broker of greater partnerships. This group had been part of a similar
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Andrew Wolk and Colleen Gross Ebinger
effort in the 1980s and offered lessons learned and strategies for imple-
menting a modernized version.
Granholm was enthusiastic, and the group approached other founda-
tions to cultivate a critical mass of supporters to back the proposal. El
Michigan Office of the Foundation Liaison opened in April of 2003, tres
months after Granholm was sworn in. Karen Aldridge-Eason, an execu-
tive on loan from the Mott Foundation, has served as foundation liaison
since the inception and is a member of the Governor’s Cabinet. The gov-
ernor’s office covers approximately 5 percent of the total cost of the office
through a combination of cash and in-kind services, with the foundation
community covering the balance of expenses.
The role of the foundation liaison is to convene all sectors for dialogue
and serve as an interpreter between them. En tono rimbombante, the OFL seeks to
help government recognize that foundations have value beyond their
ability to fund programs: they are experts on issue areas and people who
know the local community systems well. Aldridge-Eason explains:
"Cuando [foundations] come to our offices, they understand that they’re
not going to be pressured to give a grant; this is just a conversation right
now. The state understands the value of our philanthropic community.
They’re not just about money, but also about expertise, conocimiento. Ellos
can recommend the grantees that they’ve worked with in the past, quali-
fied consultants, etc.” She cites two examples of major projects that her
office has undertaken in recent years: college access and prisoner re-
entry.
College Access. En 2008, Michigan had the opportunity to pursue a feder-
al grant that would help create the infrastructure to increase college
access. Given the state’s history of a strong manufacturing sector, attend-
ing college had not traditionally been seen as a priority. With the eco-
nomic upheaval of recent years, college was becoming a higher priority,
and both the state government and the foundation community had been
independently pursuing strategies to build the requisite infrastructure.
Discovering this, the OFL brought both groups together into a dynamic
community working group that decided to establish the Michigan
College Access Network with a two-fold strategy. It would create a one-
stop web portal on how to plan, apply to, and pay for college, and also
build local and regional hubs around the state that would work with
community foundations and other local institutions to develop and sup-
port community networks. The Kresge Foundation offered a challenge
grant to community foundations to support local college access networks
developing and/or expanding within Michigan communities. The local
networks also received a planning grant from the state, and used it to
build a much more robust system of regional college access programs
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Government and Social Innovation
e instituciones.
Prisoner Reentry. Michigan has one of the fastest growing prison indus-
tries in the country, incarcerating people at a higher rate and for a longer
period of time than almost any other state, and thus representing a sig-
nificant expense for the state. De hecho, it was the only line item on the
budget that was growing during this period of economic restructuring.
Based in New York City, the JEHT (Justicia, Igualdad, Human dignity, y
Tolerance) Foundation was among the few in the country that would
fund prisoner reform programs. It began to explore potential changes in
Michigan and approached the Michigan foundation community to
ensure that, as Aldridge-Eason puts it, “the work would continue once
the JEHT Foundation leaves.” Upon learning of the idea, Aldridge-Eason
recommended that the initiative have a regional focus because prisoner
reentry is such a personal issue to the local communities involved. Ella
convened a private briefing between the governor and community foun-
dations and reframed the issue as instead being about “safe neighbor-
capuchas, safe children, etc.—the kinds of issues that all communities care
about.” The JEHT Foundation offered a $2 million challenge grant to help convince its stakeholders and to get them engaged at the communi- ty level, for example by participating in local steering committees and holding discussions with the local coordinator about the best way to model the reentry program. State Agency Liaisons Examples: Minnesota Innovation and Research Council, Texas Interagency Coordinating Group The conviction that government needs to embrace innovation in its own work— in addition to supporting its progress in other sectors—has led two states down the path of establishing state agency liaisons. While neither had been launched as of this article’s publication, their legislative processes provide a glimpse into the potential for this model. Profile: Minnesota Innovation and Research Council Spearheaded by State Representative Paul Thissen, a bill to establish the Minnesota Innovation and Research Council was introduced in the state legislature.8 This council would have identified high-level champions of innovation in each of the state agencies and brought them together with nonprofits, community foundations, and business leaders to focus on coordinating efforts for better results, with an Innovation Challenge Grant Fund serving as an incentive. Speaking about why the group decid- ed on a liaison model instead of an office, Thissen emphasizes “the need to embed the idea of innovation into agencies themselves. Part of the evolution of the proposal was to move away from this idea that there innovations / summer 2010 145 Descargado de http://direct.mit.edu/itgg/article-pdf/5/3/135/1836975/inov_a_00034.pdf by guest on 08 Septiembre 2023 Andrew Wolk and Colleen Gross Ebinger would be this [uno] place where innovation happens, rather than throughout the agencies where work gets done. How can we embed inno- vation into agencies?” Profile: Texas Interagency Coordinating Group In Texas, a law passed in 2009 established an interagency coordinating group with high-level liaisons from 15 state agencies “to remove intera- gency barriers to partnerships between state agencies and faith- and community-based organizations.”9 This group will be holding public hearings to gather information, receive feedback, and recommend leg- islative changes. Insights from the Legislative Process Minnesota’s proposed model was passed by both houses, but vetoed by the gover- nor, and the approach developed in Texas has yet to be put into operation. Still, the report of the Minnesota Grants Innovation Advisory Committee, which informed that state’s legislation, illustrates several lessons that came from this group of cross- sector leaders.10 First, the report identified a culture of fear among state agency employees, where innovation is often stifled by the bureaucratic and often compli- ance-oriented approach to accountability. While many enter government service with a desire to serve the public, they are consistently provided with disincentives to champion transformative change on programs or policies. While the council is designed to change this by bringing champions of agency change together and by providing seed funding to get collaborative ideas off the ground, it is a tall chal- lenge, and one that cannot be underestimated. One possible way to ease these bar- riers is to encourage and provide opportunities for agency leaders to meet each other, learn about the work of other agencies, and begin joint efforts. The committee also identified the need for executive branch support: “We absolutely need strong buy-in from the executive branch and from the commis- sioner level all the way down,” declares Thissen, “because the governor enjoys a platform and bully pulpit unmatched in the legislature.” With a gubernatorial elec- tion currently underway, he emphasizes that “whomever the next governor is, we need to figure out: ‘how do we leverage our resources better, how do we take the resources out there and free people to take their models to scale, to serve a lot more people in a more effective way?’” At the federal level, the White House Office of Social Innovation and Civic Participation is playing a similar role in convening a monthly group of innovation representatives from several federal agencies. Jim Shelton, who is assistant deputy secretary for innovation and improvement at the Department of Education, is part of that group. His department’s strategy for embedding innovation offers precise- ly the kind of comprehensive approach that other agencies can learn from. He explains, “[Our work includes] a little bit of everything—the i3 fund allows us to call for the best programs in the country and is a mechanism for learning about 146 innovaciones / summer 2010 Descargado de http://direct.mit.edu/itgg/article-pdf/5/3/135/1836975/inov_a_00034.pdf by guest on 08 Septiembre 2023 Government and Social Innovation what worked and why, and then scaling them. Policy pushes like Race to the Top allow you to get states and districts to think about being innovative. Interagency work allows us, in an environment with short resources, to leverage the work we’re all doing and to complement and counsel each other’s efforts. It all comes togeth- er.” Independent, Issue-Specific Liaisons Examples: AchieveMpls (Mineápolis), the Fund for Public Schools (New York City), Central Park Conservancy (Nueva York), Pittsburgh Parks Conservancy As governments strive to leverage all available resources to address critical social issues, some cities have established independent nonprofit entities to raise private philanthropic funds and leverage volunteer hours. Public education and parks/conservation are the two issue areas where this approach has particularly gained traction. Founding AchieveMpls CEO Catherine Jordan (now at the Bush Foundation) explains that, as with any intermediary, tensions can arise. “We’re not the district and not the community, but we’re in between. It’s by holding that space where we can convene and dialogue around the issues. It’s a challenging space to be in—one that’s valuable, but not for the faint of heart.”11 Profile: The Fund for Public Schools (Nueva York) Originally established in 1982, The Fund for Public Schools was reinvig- orated in 2002 as a core component of the district reform efforts of Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Schools Chancellor Joel Klein. It is a 501(C)3 organization dedicated to attracting “private investment in school reform and encouraging greater involvement of all New Yorkers in the education of [city] children.” The Fund has raised over $260 millón
since its 2002 re-launch, and has used that money for system-wide
reforms as well as to support individual school initiatives.12
Fund CEO Stephanie Dua describes Board Vice-Chair Caroline
Kennedy’s early emphasis on raising awareness: “She recognized that you
couldn’t build support without raising awareness. There was a real con-
cern previously about money being lost if given to the district directly.
[Kennedy] brought a new level of accountability to the organization and
emphasized building a commitment to education as a cause—so the
early work was about building awareness, as well as being a fundraising
effort.”
The Fund now manages well over 100 subsidios, with annual fundraising
fluctuating between $25 million and $45 million per year. While it main-
tains its independence as a separate 501(C)3, its offices are physically
located in the same building as the Department of Education. This fos-
ters a close working relationship with the chancellor and his senior lead-
ership as well as a high-level understanding of their priorities. Actualmente,
much of the Fund’s work can be categorized as either research and devel-
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Andrew Wolk and Colleen Gross Ebinger
opment or capacity building, with donor relations and grant manage-
ment as a supporting area that undergirds the first two activities. It ded-
icates a small portion of its time and resources to direct programming in
areas such as libraries, las artes, and mentoring.
Investigación y desarrollo. Dua explains that The Fund is “not ever look-
ing to fund something in perpetuity.” It is well positioned, sin embargo, a
use private funds to test a hypothesis or new approach: “We’re trying to
seed efforts that can have big impact, but that are still too new to be ready
for the use of taxpayer dollars. If proven successful, it will then be scaled
out across the district.”
The Fund takes advantage of its proximity to the DOE to “kick the tires”
on new ideas and help the senior DOE staff better understand the rami-
fications of proposals. “When a DOE staff member says: ‘We want to raise
money for X project,’ we have to really understand it, what it’s doing,
whether it makes sense for private funding. Then we play a translation
role for reform-minded businesses, individuals, or foundations to help
them understand how education theory is translated into practice, cómo
the DOE works, and the potential impact of their work.” Once a project
is under way, Dua and her team also bring funders to briefings with key
project staff to keep them abreast of the implementation process, success-
es, and challenges.
Capacity Building. A second core focus area of The Fund is building
internal capacity within the DOE. Projects of this type develop new inter-
nal functions or refine existing capabilities by bringing in external part-
ners for temporary support. Since its re-launch, The Fund has secured
private funding for several capacity-building projects. These have includ-
ed revamping the human resources department to make it more cus-
tomer driven toward teachers and staff, piloting the quality review
process of schools and building the expertise to conduct it in-house, y
improving the DOE budget process and laying the groundwork for
school-based budgeting.
Donor Relations and Grant Management. Particularly important to The
Fund’s work has been its ability to earn the trust and confidence of
donors and the community at large. This focus on grant accountability is
part of a larger effort to make it easier for private individuals and organ-
izations to give to the district. Across the nation, foundations and indi-
viduals have lamented the difficulty of donating to schools. Nueva York
City was determined to make the process straightforward in those situa-
tions when the proposed donation fit with the chancellor’s priorities. El
Fund takes seriously its accountability for the use of donations and “has
very honest conversations with donors—both on successes and on when
we are behind schedule. It’s very complex work—change management—
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it’s new work, and difficult to accomplish. We talk honestly with the
Department of Education and with donors and say where we’ve achieved
what we intended, where we’ve hit road blocks, and how we’re address-
ing those road blocks.”13
EARLY LESSONS LEARNED
The models we discuss here suggest that a new approach to governing is spreading
across the country. As we were writing this article, new initiatives continued to
emerge. In Massachusetts, por ejemplo, Governor Deval Patrick, together with his
Cabinet, signed a Social Innovation Compact at a high-profile event in April 2010.
Through the compact, both government and social innovators committed to pur-
suing new partnerships and support systems and to sharing information and
expertise between their respective sectors.14
Also out of Governor Patrick’s administration, the Massachusetts Executive
Office of Education, partnering with New Profit Inc. and Root Cause, launched an
initiative that helps to broker partnerships between social entrepreneurs and
school districts, aimed at implementing new approaches to reduce high school
dropout rates. According to Secretary of Education Paul Reville, the initiative pro-
vides an opportunity to make progress on the issue, even during a time of very lim-
ited resources: “We’re dealing with really horrendous choices among miserable
options right now and we need all the help we can get in working smarter, trabajar-
ing more effectively, working more strategically to meet the needs that haven’t
changed among the people that we care for and care about. Those needs have deep-
ened so we’ve got to get smarter about how we do this.”15
For all of the emerging approaches discussed here, it is too early to draw solid
conclusions about what works and why. Still, our interviews revealed five lessons
learned that were shared across the models:
Successful collaborations require concrete goals, definitions, y
expectations.
Each person interviewed for this paper identified deep collaboration as an impor-
tant tool for unleashing the power of social innovation, but each also mentioned
how much more difficult this was than they had expected. “Collaboration is always
a good idea, but when money is tight and resources are tight, it’s essential,” said
Mike Roque, director of the Denver Office of Strategic Partnerships. “People are
busy, collaboration and sharing power is hard. People throw around the term col-
laboration, coalition very loosely, and we’re very specific in our definition.
Agencies come together, often for money, but if money goes away, the collabora-
tion will stay together if it’s been set up correctly. We always have a written mem-
orandum of understanding to establish expectations.” Similarly, Greg Landsman
talks of the Ohio Social Entrepreneurship Initiative’s decision to define terms as
clearly as possible: “If you don’t put some parameters around what you mean by
social entrepreneurship, it can become anything to anyone. We’re not going to be
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dogmatic about it, but we wanted to pick a spot on the map and then go from
allá. It has helped control the conversation. Otherwise the conversation can get a
little unruly and it’s hard to know where to put your energy.”
While building collaborations is not new, the focus with which many of these
models are approaching collaboration and the central role it plays in their strategy
is striking. For many, their very mission and theory of change depend on develop-
ing deep and meaningful partnerships with other organizations and sectors. Nosotros
know this is crucial and that these entities face several challenges in making it
trabajar.
All agree that measurement is important, but they are searching for ways to
better assess their individual impact in collaborative efforts.
Everyone agrees that measuring results is critical and each of the initiatives we
detailed here has instituted a system for measuring the impact of its work. “We
now know what our data really measures, [y] we’ve gotten much, much better
en [analyzing] él,” says Judith Kurland, Boston Mayor Tom Menino’s former chief
of staff and current chief of programs and partnerships for the city. Still, many are
finding it particularly challenging to determine their own individual impact as
part of a collaborative effort. How do they assess whether the time and resources
that they dedicated to a project were relevant to achieving the social goal when
other entities were also involved? New measurement models are being developed
that would fill this gap; they may prove useful to these initiatives.
Partnering with the private sector to fund innovation research and
development can reduce government’s risk.
As some of these models show, foundations and other non-government actors
have the freedom to take risks on new, high-potential approaches to entrenched
problems in a way that governments rarely can. Foundations thus have the oppor-
tunity—and, we maintain, the responsibility—to search for and support those new
initiatives or approaches that have the potential for transformative change. Este
sometimes leads to the establishment of separate intermediary organizations that
are better positioned to raise private funds and to incubate and support innovative
practicas. Former AchieveMpls CEO Catherine Jordan—who raised over $24 mil-
lion in philanthropic funds for the public schools—explains: “There’s often not
complete trust in government systems. Foundations were not eager to give money
directly to the district, but they appreciated and often sought us out as the inter-
mediary. . .This position of being independent, autonomous, yet with good access
into the district is really critical.”
Some experiments will surely fail, but our nation’s history demonstrates that it
is precisely this tolerance for failure and risk that has created the environment in
which our greatest innovations and inventions have been born. Philanthropy can
provide the testing and vetting ground that will allow new and better approaches
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to emerge, and government can then provide growth capital to ensure broader
reach.
Government agencies are a key lever of change, but are often overlooked.
In several cases, the role of civil service leadership within government agencies was
highlighted as a key lever of change, given that agencies are still providing a signif-
icant percentage of human services—either directly or by contracting these servic-
es out to both nonprofit and for-profit organizations. As Elaine Kamarck, lecturer
in public policy at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government,
commented, “Reducing the cost of government cannot be done without simulta-
neously creating a competent and honest cadre of government employees. As the
tasks of government get more and more complex, government employees will need
better education and training in order to govern effectively and they will need to
reflect the composition of the peoples they govern.”16 A new style of professional
development and cross-agency relationship building could be developed that
would encourage this group of leaders to embrace innovation models and would
offer greater opportunity for leaders from different agencies to meet, identify
opportune areas for collaboration, and develop collaborative work plans.
Robin Brulé, director of the New Mexico Center for Philanthropic
Partnerships, describes the center’s attempts to help address the conundrum fac-
ing many agency leaders: “I often talk with people in agencies who say, ‘We know
there are better ways of providing these services, but we don’t know how to change
it to make it more accessible or align it with what other agencies are doing in this
area.’ It’s important for them to know that the center is a resource for advancing
these types of cross-sector integrative initiatives. We can help them by leveraging
resources and developing partnerships to drive policy change, improve cross-sys-
tems collaboration and integrate service delivery systems in more powerful,
impactful ways.”
A strong government champion opens doors and improves the chances of
success.
Most of the initiatives we describe here were launched by or in conjunction with
an elected official who championed the cause. This was the case with Mayor
Hickenlooper and the Denver Office of Strategic Partnerships, whose director,
Mike Roque, explains: “This is really dependent on a government champion and a
strong mayoral system. It would be much tougher if we had a weak mayor system.”
Elizabeth Darling of Texas’ OneStar Foundation echoes this sentiment at the state
nivel: “For us in particular, being linked to the Office of the Governor lends credi-
bility to our efforts. More than that, it’s a leverage point that—even though they’re
not involved in our day-to-day business—provides a statement to the state and
beyond that this work is important.” The bold leadership of these public innova-
tors lent credibility to the office or liaison and allowed them quickly to become
influential players.
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LOOKING AHEAD
As these models gain traction, they point the way toward a new, twenty-first-cen-
tury style of governing. By breaking down government silos and building bridges
across sectors, the models described in this paper focus intently on solutions and
impacto. Por supuesto, challenges remain, with questions about how to measure the
impact of involvement in a collaborative effort or how to structure an innovation
challenge fund in a way that maximizes available resources. Yet while the various
states and localities may ultimately settle on different answers to these specific
preguntas, they all agree on the larger point: this new approach by government is
allowing them to use resources more effectively and to make greater and faster
progress in addressing the important social issues of our day.
APPENDIX. GOVERNMENT AND SOCIAL INNOVATION:
SUMMARY OF EXISTING STATE AND LOCAL MODELS
Government Models (Estado)
Kentucky’s Commission on Philanthropy, established 2008.
http://www.kyphilanthropy.org.
Kentucky’s Commission on Philanthropy was launched by Governor Steve Beshear
to better align Kentucky’s public and private financial resources for work on social
asuntos. The commission will ask private and public funders to identify common
objetivos, adopt shared strategies, and collaborate on projects of common interest. El
commission’s first area of focus will be early childhood education and health. El
commission convened a Summit on Philanthropy in June 2009 as an initial means
of engaging potential partners.
Louisiana Office of Social Entrepreneurship, established Fall 2006.
http://www.crt.state.la.us/ltgovernor/socialentrepreneurship.
The Louisiana Office of Social Entrepreneurship was established to advance social
innovation by supporting the creation and growth of the most innovative, meas-
urable, and sustainable solutions to social problems in that state. It was founded in
2006 by then Lieutenant Governor Mitch Landrieu, in part as a response to the
devastation of Hurricane Katrina. Its initiatives have included seminars on social
innovation for public sector employees, business planning training for social inno-
vators, a social innovation business plan competition, and seminars on volun-
teerism and social entrepreneurship.
Massachusetts Executive Office of Education—Dropout Prevention Initiative,
established March 2008.
http://www.mass.gov/?pageID=eoehomepage&L=1&L0=Home&sid=Eeoe.
The Massachusetts Executive Office of Education, partnering with New Profit Inc.
and Root Cause, launched the Dropout Prevention Initiative to help broker part-
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nerships between community-based dropout prevention programs and school dis-
tricts with low graduation rates. Once districts have established partnerships, ellos
may then apply to a state innovation fund to support them in implementing new
approaches to reducing the dropout rate.
Massachusetts Office of the Governor—Social Innovation Compact, signed April,
2010.
http://www.mass.gov/?pageID=eoepressrelease&L=1&L0=Home&sid=Eeoe&b=p
ressrelease&f=20100416_social_innovation&csid=Eeoe.
Along with 41 organizations committed to social innovation, Massachusetts
Governor Deval Patrick signed a Social Innovation Compact designed to bring the
nonprofit, filantrópico, negocio, and government sectors together. The goal of
the compact is to maximize the state’s ability to establish creative problem-solving
relaciones, and to better utilize the state’s resources to increase the efficiency
and effectiveness of government services.
The compact ensures a commitment by all parties to advance cross-sector
partnerships and establish a lasting dialogue. With government as the catalyst, el
commonwealth and social innovators will work together to identify and imple-
ment proven, innovative solutions to persistent social challenges facing the state.
Minnesota Innovation and Research Council, proposed February 2010.
https://www.revisor.mn.gov/bin/bldbill.php?bill=ccrhf2227.html&session=ls86.
This council would have identified high-level champions of innovation in each of
the state agencies and brought them together with nonprofits, community foun-
dations, and business leaders to focus on coordinating efforts for better results,
with an Innovation Challenge Grant Fund serving as an incentive. Passed by the
House and Senate, the bill was later vetoed.
Ohio Social Entrepreneurship Initiative, established June 2009.
http://www.governor.ohio.gov/Projects/OhioSocialEntrepreneurshipInitiative/tab
id/1123/Default.aspx.
In partnership with the Ohio Department of Development’s Entrepreneurship and
Small Business Division, the Governor’s Office of Faith-Based and Community
Initiatives (GOFBCI) launched the Ohio Social Entrepreneurship Initiative to pro-
vide access to financing and funding information, training resources, and several
current examples for organizations working to establish social enterprises. El
Department of Development and GOFBCI are working together to expand social
entrepreneurship: low-profit ventures developed by for-profit and nonprofit
organizations in response to social problems. These efforts are pursued using
entrepreneurial principles that can involve producing market value, earning rev-
enue, and employing the chronically underemployed.
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Government Models (Local)
Boston Office of New Urban Mechanics, announced 2010.
In order to secure Boston’s role as the hub of municipal innovation, the Office of
New Urban Mechanics will focus on exploring and implementing innovations that
enhance traditional city services and operations. Under Mayor Thomas Menino’s
leadership, the office will develop and implement new ideas that improve city serv-
ice delivery, such as next-generation applications for the city’s Citizens Connect
iPhone suite. The office will also work to tap into local sources of innovation,
including residents, employees, communities, e instituciones.
Denver Office of Strategic Partnerships, established January 2004.
http://www.denvergov.org/Default.aspx?alias=www.denvergov.org/strategicpart-
nerships.
The Denver Office of Strategic Partnerships was created in 2004 to serve as a liai-
son between the city of Denver and the nonprofit and philanthropic sectors. El
office works with individuals, foundations, corporations, and nonprofit partners
to increase funding for cooperative initiatives, foster partnerships to support non-
profits, and engage the entire community in volunteer efforts.
Fairfax County Virginia Office of Public Private Partnerships (OP3), established in
its current form in 2008.
http://www.fairfaxcounty.gov/partnerships.
The Fairfax County Office of Public Private Partnerships fosters public-private
partnerships to stimulate positive change in the community and encourage civic
engagement. The office brings together representatives and leverages resources
from public and private sectors to address community issues that affect the quali-
ty of life in Fairfax County. Over the past 20 años, the office has fostered joint ven-
tures that range from adopt-a-family efforts to initiatives that address adult health
and dental care.
Los Angeles Office of Strategic Partnerships.
The Los Angeles Office of Strategic Partnerships is a public-private partnership
that serves as the liaison between the city’s executive branch and the nonprofit
comunidad. The office works to facilitate and support partnerships between sec-
tors in an effort to develop creative solutions to common problems. Current proj-
ects include facilitating the work of nonprofits through a nonprofit advisory group
and improving low-performing schools by assisting the mayor’s Partnership for LA
Schools.
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Quasi-Government Models
OneStar Foundation: Texas Center for Social Impact, established December 2003.
http://www.onestarfoundation.org.
Established by executive order of the Governor of Texas, OneStar focuses on
improved results for the people served by the nonprofit sector through nonprofit
capacity building, service and volunteerism, research and learning, and a special
focus on social innovation. It also serves as the state’s national service commission,
administering the AmeriCorps grant program, as well as the Faith-Based and
Community Initiatives Office. OneStar Foundation is a supporting nonprofit of
the office of the governor.
Foundation-Government Liaison Models
Michigan’s Office of the Foundation Liaison, established 2003.
http://www.michiganfoundations.org/ofl.
Michigan’s Office of the Foundation Liaison was created at the suggestion of foun-
dation leaders and with the support of the governor. It is a cabinet-level position
funded by foundations to identify and broker strategic partnerships between the
state and foundations likely to result in policy reforms that would improve the lives
of children and families in Michigan. The OFL is funded by foundations. Lo hace
not serve as a fundraiser for state government.
New Mexico Center for Philanthropic Partnerships, established June 2009.
http://www.newmexserve.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id
=169&catid=57.
The Center for Philanthropic Partnerships (CPP) was launched in 2009 with key
partners including the New Mexico Children’s Cabinet, chaired by Lt. Governor
Diane Denish; the Kellogg Foundation; and the Albuquerque Community
Base, which serves as the CPP’s fiscal partner and home base. CPP’s mission
is “to support innovative, sustainable, cost-effective solutions to social problems
through building vital partnerships across philanthropy, non-profit, gobierno
and private leadership” in four core areas: family economic success, sistemas alimentarios,
civic engagement, and early childhood education.
The Philanthropic Liaison to the City of Newark, established 2007.
http://www.michiganfoundations.org/s_cmf/bin.asp?CID=5498&DID=22242&D
OC=FILE.PDF.
The Philanthropic Liaison to the City of Newark was created by the Council of
New Jersey Grantmakers (CNJG) to work with Mayor Cory Booker’s administra-
tion to leverage philanthropy’s impact on the city. In collaboration with the Office
of the Mayor, CNJG hired the city’s first liaison—modeled after a similar position
in the state of Michigan—to harness interest, foster greater effectiveness, y
attract resources toward policy and programmatic areas that affect Newark’s resi-
abolladuras. A director-level position, the liaison helps identify and broker strategic part-
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nerships between the city and foundations to leverage public-private opportunities
to improve the lives of Newarkers.
Independent, Issue-Specific Liaisons
Achieve Mpls—Minneapolis, Minnesota, established January 2002.
http://www.achievempls.org.
AchieveMpls is the nonprofit organization dedicated to supporting Minneapolis
estudiantes. The support it offers takes many shapes, including program manage-
mento, program support, and additional resources offered to the students, profesores,
and administrators of the Minneapolis Public Schools.
NYC Fund for Public Schools—New York, re-established 2002.
http://schools.nyc.gov/fundforpublicschools.
The Fund for Public Schools is dedicated to improving New York City’s public
schools by attracting private investment in school reform and encouraging greater
involvement by all New Yorkers in the education of children. This includes work-
ing to secure critical funding for system-wide education reform initiatives, facilidades-
tating strategic public-private partnerships, managing a targeted set of programs
to support city schools, and building citywide public awareness.
Nonprofit Facilitators/Conveners
Bull City Forward—Durham, North Carolina, established Fall 2009.
http://bullcityforward.org/.
Bull City Forward is a community-led effort to address challenges in Durham’s
neighborhoods and increase the city’s economic prosperity by increasing the level
of social innovation and entrepreneurship there and, Sucesivamente, establishing Durham
as a national model of innovative community and economic development. Esto es
being done through a set of coordinated strategic interventions: building an “on-
ramp” of opportunity for youth across the city; recruiting and retaining best-in-
class social innovators and entrepreneurs to the region; supporting emergent
entrepreneurs with mentoring, networking, and education opportunities; incubat-
ing promising concepts and teams and connecting them with start-up capital;
developing clear and rigorous metrics of success and scaling the most promising
enterprises; and creating a policy environment.
Phoenix Project—Virginia, established January 2006.
http://www.phoenixproject.org.
The Phoenix Project works to develop social entrepreneurs in Virginia through
leadership programs and public convenings. It partners closely with over 40 columna-
leges and universities and with municipalities to develop partnerships that can
build entrepreneurial, scalable, and sustainable solutions to the challenges of
severe poverty while simultaneously providing a powerful context in which to pre-
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pare the next generation of social entrepreneurs. Phoenix Project also organizes
statewide events where leaders from the public, privado, nonprofit, y académico
sectors can network and discuss shared strategies for accelerating social entrepre-
neurship.
1. Mitch Landrieu, keynote address at Fourth Annual Conference of Social Entrepreneurs, Nueva York
University Stern School of Business, Berkeley Center for Entrepreneurial Studies, Abril 13, 2007.
2. For more on these early efforts, see Andrew Wolk, Advancing Social Entrepreneurship:
Recommendations for Policy Makers and Government Agencies (Cambridge, MAMÁ: The Aspen
Institute and Root Cause, 2008).
3. Interview with Kim Syman, Marzo 2010. Unless noted otherwise, all quotes in this article are
taken from our interviews with these innovators.
4. For an overview of social entrepreneurship and the field’s interest in government, see Andrew
Wolk, Social Entrepreneurship and Government: A New Breed of Entrepreneurs Developing Solutions
to Social Problems (Washington DC: SBA Office of Advocacy, 2007).
5. On the shifting role of government in relationship to the public and business sectors, see Stephen
Goldsmith and William Eggers, Governing by Network: The New Shape of the Public Sector
(Washington DC: Brookings Institution, 2004). Also see also Wolk, Social Entrepreneurship, 157-
177.
6. Stephen Goldsmith, The Power of Social Innovation. (San Francisco: Jossey Bass, 2010), xiv.
7. Goldsmith, xxvii.
8. The details of the bill are at https://www.revisor.mn.gov/bin/bldbill.php?bill=H2660.0.html&ses-
sion=ls86.
9. Texas House Bill 492 http://www.legis.state.tx.us/tlodocs/81R/billtext/pdf/HB00492F.pdf.
10. Recommendations on improving collaborative activities between the state, not-for-profit organ-
izations and the private sector: A report to the Minnesota Legislature (Calle. Pablo: Office of Grants
Management, 2009). http://www.admin.state.mn.us/documents/reports/collaborative_activi-
ties_study.pdf.
11. AchieveMpls was born out of the 2001 merger of two organizations: the Youth Trust (part of the
mayor’s office) and the Minneapolis Public Schools Foundation. The leaders of both organiza-
tions had resigned; the boards decided to merge and install Jordan as CEO of the newly formed
AchieveMpls.
12. Fund for Public Schools website,
http://schools.nyc.gov/FundForPublicSchools/AboutUs/default.htm.
13. “Quality Review,” New York City Department of Education,
http://schools.nyc.gov/Accountability/tools/review/default.htm.
14. The text of the compact is available at http://publicinnovators.com/blog/mass-governor-signs-
social-innovation-compact.
15. Reville, keynote address at School Readiness in Massachusetts: Actionable Information for
Funders, Government, and Nonprofits, Bostón, Julio 7, 2010.
16. Elaine Kamarck, Government Innovation around the World (Ash Institute for Democratic
Innovation. Harvard Kennedy School of Government, 2003)
Governance and
http://unpan1.un.org/intradoc/groups/public/documents/apcity/unpan015626.pdf.
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