While many entrepreneurs have built their wealth in the private sector and chosen to become philanthropists later in life, we are now seeing more entrepreneurs using their businesses to solve social problems.
Globally, new business models are emerging that blend corporations with governments and social organizations. Nonprofits and for-profit companies can join forces to form hybrid business models led by a new generation of social entrepreneurs. These leaders are successfully tackling social issues while generating profits for shareholders.
The extensive use of ethical practices such as impact investing, conscious consumerism, and corporate social responsibility programs have fueled the success of these 10 social entrepreneurs.
Key Takeaways
- Social entrepreneurs aim to start new businesses that contribute positively to the greater good of society.
- Many socially conscious companies are for-profit businesses, but they also focus on solving social problems.
- These types of businesses often give back to their local community and help those in need.
- Social entrepreneurship is on the rise, with funding coming from investors who focus on socially responsible investing and environmental, social and governance criteria.
1. Bill Drayton
Bill Drayton is recognized as one of the pioneering social entrepreneurs of our time.
Drayton founded Ashoka in 1980, “to envision a world where everyone is a change-maker.” We take a multi-pronged approach to finding and supporting social entrepreneurs around the world. Our priorities are three-fold:
- Social Entrepreneurship: We select promising “Ashoka Fellows” from around the world and provide them with the knowledge, funding, and logistical means to make a difference.
- Empathy and Youth Change: We support and inspire young people on their journey to become change makers.
- Organizing for change: We partner with businesses, schools and business advisors to reinvent standard business models, creating opportunities to inspire, nurture potential and address problems.
Drayton also serves as board chair for Get America Working!, Youth Venture, and Community Greens.
2. Rachel Brassen
“Yoga Girl” by Rachel Brathen The New York Times She has a bestselling book and social media handle with over 2 million followers.
Not only will Rachel introduce her audience to life-changing practices for personal growth and community connection, but she also hopes to connect teachers with people in need of healing in her online community. She hopes to improve the lives of many by helping her followers find the beauty within themselves.
“What happens when social media becomes a social mission?” Brattain asks. She runs two non-profit organizations: Sgt. Pepper’s Friends, an animal rescue group in Aruba, and the Yoga Girl® Foundation, which helps women and children in need.
Her online channel offering wellness, yoga and meditation services, oneoeight.tv, has transformed into a website and company where she serves as CEO, from which she inspires yoga practitioners and many others around the world to find balance, foster inner healing, live mindfully and give back to their communities.
3. Shiza Shahid
Shiza Shahid, co-founder and international ambassador for the Malala Fund, manages the business operations of Malala Yousafzai, the teenager who in 2014 became the youngest person ever to win the Nobel Peace Prize.
Like Malala, Shahid was born in Pakistan and first reached out to her in 2009, helping to organize camps for her and other Pakistani girls. In 2012, Shiza rushed to Malala’s bedside after she was shot by the Taliban for her advocacy for girls’ education.
Inspired by Malala’s desire to continue campaigning for gender equality and education, Shahid decided to help her develop her campaign strategy. Shahid founded the Malala Fund to help empower women and girls by advocating and expanding access to education.
4. Blake Mycoskie
After a trip to Argentina in 2006, Blake Mycoskie founded TOMS Shoes as its founder and chief shoe purveyor with his own money.
Originally, TOMS committed to donating one pair of shoes for every pair sold. The company has expanded the One-For-One campaign to support water, sight, childbirth and anti-bullying efforts. Mycoskie uses the TOMS brand to raise awareness of issues like global poverty and health.
The company donated $10,000 to each of 10 nonprofits in 10 countries, with the money going to provide mental health services to people in need. As of 2020, TOMS has donated 100 million pairs of shoes.
Now, TOMS’ expanded “impact model” calls for the company to donate one-third of its profits to “grassroots good causes,” meaning the company’s funds will go towards cash grants and partnerships with nonprofits working to create impact in three areas: “mental health, access to opportunity, and ending gun violence.”
In 2023, TOMS funded 39 organizations in 17 communities in 11 countries around the world.
Social entrepreneurs often focus on the six Ps: people, problem, plan, prioritize, prototype and pursue.
5. Scott Harrison
Scott Harrison left his lavish life in New York City behind and headed to the coast of West Africa to volunteer with Mercy Ships, a hospital ship charity.
The trip was a turning point, and in 2006 Harrison founded Charity:Water, a non-profit organization dedicated to providing clean water to every person on the planet who needs it.
As of 2022, it has provided safe, drinkable drinking water to 29 countries around the world, raised over $750 million, and completed 152,000 water projects.
6. Muhammad Yunus
Professor Muhammad Yunus is known for popularizing microfinance and microcredit, which formed the basis of Grameen Bank, which was founded in 1983.
Yunus won the Nobel Prize in 2006 for founding Grameen Bank, which is based on the principles of trust and solidarity and provides villagers with capital to empower them to lift themselves out of poverty.
According to Grameen Bank, as of May 2022, 90% of its approximately 9 million borrowers are women, and their loan repayment rate is 97%, a higher recovery rate than any traditional banking system.
The distinguished professor is the recipient of international awards including the U.S. Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2009, the Congressional Gold Medal in 2010, and the 2021 Olympic Laurel.
7. Jeffrey Hollender
Jeffrey Hollender is best known as the former CEO and co-founder of Seventh Generation, a popular natural products company.
He is currently a leading consultant, speaker and activist on corporate social responsibility. He has written seven books, including How to Make the World a Better Place.
Hollender is also co-founder and CEO of Hollender Sustainable Brands, which sells sustainable products for sexual and personal health, including condoms, tampons, lubricants and pads.
Hollender is an adjunct professor at New York University, co-founder and president of the American Council on Sustainable Business, and serves on the boards of directors of Greenpeace USA, Healthcare Without Harm, and the labor rights organization Verite.
8. Xavier Helgesen, Christopher “Kreese” Fuchs, Jeff Kurtzman
The three co-founders of Better World Books, a B Corp online bookstore that funds literacy efforts around the world, all deserve recognition as successful social entrepreneurs. The founders met at the University of Notre Dame, where they began collecting unwanted books and selling them on the Internet while coaching the football team.
Helgesen is co-founder of Off Grid Electric, a company that provides renewable energy to homes around the world.
Fuchs later became chief operating officer of Trek10, a company that helps customers use Amazon Web Services.
Kurtzman previously served as CEO of Aid Through Trade, a company that sold handmade Nepalese accessories to the U.S., where she grew sales by 125 percent, and is also co-founder of Operation Incubation, a nonprofit that provides low-cost, low-maintenance incubators to developing countries.
Since 1998, the Schwab Foundation has awarded social entrepreneurs who address major issues facing global society. For the 2025 awards, the Foundation has created a new category: the Collective Social Innovation Award, inspired by the collective model developed by social entrepreneurs to tackle widespread systemic problems that can only be solved by organizations working together to achieve lasting change.
9. Mark Koska
Mark Koska is redesigning medical equipment to create a cheap, non-reusable syringe that can be used in under-resourced clinics, an innovation that helps prevent the transmission of blood-borne diseases.
Koska founded the SafePoint Trust in 2006 and has provided 4 billion safe injections in 40 countries through auto-deactivating syringes.
The 2015 Schwab Foundation Social Entrepreneur of the Year Award recognized Koska for his pioneering solutions to global health problems. The World Health Organization (WHO) released the Global Policy on Safe Injections in February 2015.
10. Sanjit “Bunker” Roy
Sanjit “Banker” Roy grew up in privileged circumstances in India. During a visit to several rural villages in India, he had a life-changing experience that determined him to find a way to improve socio-economic inequality in the country.
In 1972, Roy founded Barefoot College, a grassroots-organized, solar-powered pro-poor college with a mission to help rural communities get basic services and solutions to help them lead self-reliant, sustainable lives. Roy describes Barefoot College as “the only college where teachers are learners and learners are teachers.”
In 2017, Princeton University awarded Roy a Juris Doctorate in recognition of the many important benefits his activism and ingenuity have brought to India’s poorest communities, including innovation, prosperity, security, empowerment, self-sufficiency and hope.
What is Social Entrepreneurship?
Social entrepreneurship is a concept that relates to businesses founded with the mission of promoting social good. These are often for-profit ventures that use technology and ingenuity to solve serious problems of social importance, such as hunger, disease, lack of water and other basic necessities, inequality, and environmental issues.
What is Socially Responsible Investment?
Who were the first social entrepreneurs?
While there have been many businessmen throughout history who have focused on social issues, the term “social entrepreneur” was first coined by Ashoka founder and CEO Bill Drayton in 1980. Today, he is known as the “father of social entrepreneurship.”
Conclusion
These 10 inspiring social entrepreneurs are using business to generate profits while simultaneously solving some of the world’s toughest social problems. Innovation comes in many forms, and it’s amazing to be able to put insightful ideas to work to help solve global social problems. Social entrepreneurs are taking the road less traveled and building thriving hybrid businesses with triple bottom lines.
