The ninth Open Forum for social entrepreneurship, "Let’s Talk about A to Z of Social Enterprise,” was held at the Job Café in the Seoul Employment Information Service Center on October 27.
The forum was a featured global lecture for youths co-organized by the Work Together Foundation and the Hope Network.
Kim Alter from the Skoll Centre, Kudo Kei from Sodateage Net, and CHOI Hyuk Jin from Wonju Cooperatives told us about the real cases and experiences of social entrepreneurship and its entrepreneurs with global insight.
They all pointed to “happiness” as a condition of social entrepreneurs. Kim Alter said, “Life is very short to meet needs on every side; economic, society, and emotional demands. And you shall spend most of the time at work. So it will be the best if you can include these needs in work. We should be innovative to help people work happily; that’s where I feel happy, and I call it “fun.”
Kudo Kei jokingly said, “I don’t think you always feel happiness when you become a social entrepreneur. However, you're never unfortunate, at least. I have never seen somebody who was a social entrepreneur and committed a suicide.”
CHOI Hyuk Jin said, “Social entrepreneurs thinking innovatively are pioneers of the society, and they can live their lives according to their beliefs.”
On the other side, they also advised the youths about the challenges and difficulties they'll face as social entrepreneurs. Kudo said that the balance between dream and reality is the most important thing in managing social enterprises. He also added that we cannot achieve our dreams with only dreams. Therefore, we should dream of ideal situations, but see the reality to make a profit at the same time.
Kim put an emphasis on the idea that social problems are business opportunities, and explained that social enterprise is a good way to achieve a social mission and earn a profit. This forum gave the youths a proposition to think about how social enterprise creates new life standards.
It was meaningful that the forum envisioned the potential of social enterprise and shared opinions of social entrepreneurship with the youths, young social entrepreneurs, students, and so on as a part of HAN MA DANG Festival for Social Entrepreneurship 2008.