Jeff Skoll Welcomes Guests to the 2009 Skoll World Forum
Jeff Skoll welcomes guests to the 2009 Skoll World Forum.
With: Jeff Skoll
Thank you very much Stephan Chambers for those kind words. I'm not sure what else I've founded but it's wonderful to be here. It gives me great honor to welcome all of you to the sixth annual Skoll World Forum on social entrepreneurship and it humbles me to know the efforts that all of you go to, to come here, it is a long way for many of you.
This year we have 785 delegates from 65 countries on six continents which makes this the largest Skoll World Forum ever, and I know we all enjoy coming here for the lovely Oxford weather. But this year we threw in the financial recession as well. Next year we're going to toss in some locus. But since nothing can stop a social entrepreneur, please accept our sincere appreciation for being here in these difficult times. Once again the staff of the Said Business School and the entire Oxford community, have done a wonderful job of preparing for this event.
I'd like to officially welcome Pamela Hartigan on as the new Director of the Skoll Center. Pamela came to us from the Schwab Foundation where she was Executive Director, so it's no surprise that she has hit the ground running. I'd also like say a special thanks to Stephen Chambers, Alex Nicholls, Liz Nelson and the entire Skoll Center team, for their dedication to making this event a success.
It's great to be back for the sixth world forum. In past years. I've jokingly compared the relatively short tenure of the forum to Oxford's nine hundred years of existence. But these days given that long-standing organizations are disappearing almost daily Making it to a six year is actually a pretty momentous thing.
So, in keeping with past years I'd like to renew our tradition of giving creative gifts to the leadership of the Said Business School to say, thank you. Last year I turned to the traditional wedding gift list to see what would make sense, and for the fifth anniversary the traditional gift was wood.
This year, the traditional gift is candy or iron, which seemed an interesting combination. But what gift could one give that would really reflect our current circumstances? Then it dawned on me that there is really only one thing that makes sense to focus on this year. It's a story that's dominated the news cycles world wide, and this time for once it isn't Brittany Spears.
I'm talking about the economy. For most of us, this is the most challenging economic environment we've ever experienced, and I know this will be a huge topic of discussion over the next couple of days. At times like this it's natural that we try to simplify. We need to return to fundamentals. We need to remember the basics.
And so, this year, my gift is reflection of the need for a simpler approach to finance. It's a financial tool that predates collateralized debt options, sub prime mortgages, exchange traded funds, and even the plain vanilla bank deposit. Here it is. The venerable piggy bank has a couple of lessons to impart.
First, it's easier to put money in then to get money out, and there's a reason for that. The piggy bank is supposed to encourage kids to save money and use it for something that they really need. It's about deferring gratification. It's about understanding that our decisions today will impact our options tomorrow, and I have a feeling that if a few more people had remembered that lesson, we wouldn't be quite in the situation we're in.
Second, it's not pretty but it's functional. Often people get stuck in trying to find the perfect solution to problem. As a whole, the world has spend billions of dollars trying to do studies and projects and process to fix whats wrong. And often these are based on theories from a think tank that are thousands of miles away from where the solutions will actually be deployed.
There's something to rolling up your sleeves, and digging in , and doing the work that actually leads to a real change, and you don't need a pretty theory or framework around it. Thankfully, there are people who have internalized both of these lessons, and many of you are in the audience today. A lot has changed since we met last year.
Our questions about creative capitalism have become questions about the viability capitalism. Our observations about the rate of growth between rich and poor have become observations about who's growing poor more quickly, and some of the headlines today would make us believe that the great depression is right around the next corner.
And, yet, here we all are at Oxford at a conference on social entrepreneurship. The Skoll World Forum is beyond capacity and oversold. Despite falling travel budgets, why? I think it's a recognition that the world needs the work that you do more than ever. It's a recognition that top down approaches and theoretical models are not always the best way to get the change. And that real hard work on the ground, is often what produces real lasting change.
It's a recognition that social entrepreneurship is one of the most highly elaborate models for change, that there is. And it is a recognition that we need to approach the big challenges that we face with global solutions, because we're all increasingly interconnected. There are big challenges out there that we have to deal with; climate change, Middle East peace, pandemics, nuclear weapons, water scarcity to name a few, and the economic crisis hasn't made any of these problems go away.
In fact, it's made it more difficult as resources and attention have turned to other things. But that puts an even greater premium on finding the best solutions to maximize our leverage.
We're here because we want to work together to meet these challenges. We're here because we know that our colleagues have found solution to some of these problems and are anxious to share their knowledge with us. We're here because we're tough minded optimists as Sally Osberg of the Skoll Foundation likes to say. I believe that social entrepreneurs are the key to unlocking the two most important doors that I feel are keeping humanity back. One is the opportunity gap where people never have the opportunity to improve their lives or the lives of their communities, and second hope gap where people don't even believe that real change is possible.
Social entrepreneurs solve the opportunity gap by giving people the chance to make a difference in their own lives and the lives of their communities. Social entrepreneurs overcome the hope gap by giving people the belief that better days lie ahead. What you do is the difference between a future of despair or a world of sustainable peace and prosperity.
It's really that important. Your work and your resolve make such a difference in the world, and you inspire others, including me, to try to make the difference as well. So, thank you for coming, and let's have a great forum.
It's also a
pleasure to have many dear friends here tonight, one of whom I have the opportunity to introduce as our next speaker.
Roger Martin is a great thinker, analyst and writer. Roger has been the dean of the Rotman School of Business at the University of Toronto since 1998. Under Roger's tenure, Rotman has emerged as one of the top business schools in North America, recognized for it's innovative curriculum. Before going to Rotman, Roger was a director and CEO at the Monitor Company, a cutting edge global, strategic, management firm and he also founded the Monitor University.
Roger is a leading light on issues of global competitiveness, integrative thinking, business design, and corporate citizenship. He chairs the Ontario task force on competitiveness, productivity and economic progress, and he serves on the boards of Thomson Reuters and Research In Motion, so if you have questions about Blackberry, Roger's the guy to ask.
And he's trustee at the hospital for sick children and is on the advisory board of Social Capital Partners. A prolific writer, Roger has published several books including his recent work, 'The Opposable Mind, How Successful Leaders Win Through Integrative Thinking'. He's written a number of Harvard Business Review articles as a columnist for Business Week Online, and contributes on a regular basis to leading Canadian, U.S., and British publications, including the Financial Times.
Roger is also a true supporter of social entrepreneurship, and it gives me great pride that to acknowledge that Roger has been a board member of the Skoll Foundation for the last five years. Roger's going to kick us off tonight by talking about power. Specifically the paradox of power, how power is changing and how thinking about power in different ways can allow us to be more effective in what we do.
Ladies and gentlemen, Roger Martin.
This year we have 785 delegates from 65 countries on six continents which makes this the largest Skoll World Forum ever, and I know we all enjoy coming here for the lovely Oxford weather. But this year we threw in the financial recession as well. Next year we're going to toss in some locus. But since nothing can stop a social entrepreneur, please accept our sincere appreciation for being here in these difficult times. Once again the staff of the Said Business School and the entire Oxford community, have done a wonderful job of preparing for this event.
I'd like to officially welcome Pamela Hartigan on as the new Director of the Skoll Center. Pamela came to us from the Schwab Foundation where she was Executive Director, so it's no surprise that she has hit the ground running. I'd also like say a special thanks to Stephen Chambers, Alex Nicholls, Liz Nelson and the entire Skoll Center team, for their dedication to making this event a success.
It's great to be back for the sixth world forum. In past years. I've jokingly compared the relatively short tenure of the forum to Oxford's nine hundred years of existence. But these days given that long-standing organizations are disappearing almost daily Making it to a six year is actually a pretty momentous thing.
So, in keeping with past years I'd like to renew our tradition of giving creative gifts to the leadership of the Said Business School to say, thank you. Last year I turned to the traditional wedding gift list to see what would make sense, and for the fifth anniversary the traditional gift was wood.
This year, the traditional gift is candy or iron, which seemed an interesting combination. But what gift could one give that would really reflect our current circumstances? Then it dawned on me that there is really only one thing that makes sense to focus on this year. It's a story that's dominated the news cycles world wide, and this time for once it isn't Brittany Spears.
I'm talking about the economy. For most of us, this is the most challenging economic environment we've ever experienced, and I know this will be a huge topic of discussion over the next couple of days. At times like this it's natural that we try to simplify. We need to return to fundamentals. We need to remember the basics.
And so, this year, my gift is reflection of the need for a simpler approach to finance. It's a financial tool that predates collateralized debt options, sub prime mortgages, exchange traded funds, and even the plain vanilla bank deposit. Here it is. The venerable piggy bank has a couple of lessons to impart.
First, it's easier to put money in then to get money out, and there's a reason for that. The piggy bank is supposed to encourage kids to save money and use it for something that they really need. It's about deferring gratification. It's about understanding that our decisions today will impact our options tomorrow, and I have a feeling that if a few more people had remembered that lesson, we wouldn't be quite in the situation we're in.
Second, it's not pretty but it's functional. Often people get stuck in trying to find the perfect solution to problem. As a whole, the world has spend billions of dollars trying to do studies and projects and process to fix whats wrong. And often these are based on theories from a think tank that are thousands of miles away from where the solutions will actually be deployed.
There's something to rolling up your sleeves, and digging in , and doing the work that actually leads to a real change, and you don't need a pretty theory or framework around it. Thankfully, there are people who have internalized both of these lessons, and many of you are in the audience today. A lot has changed since we met last year.
Our questions about creative capitalism have become questions about the viability capitalism. Our observations about the rate of growth between rich and poor have become observations about who's growing poor more quickly, and some of the headlines today would make us believe that the great depression is right around the next corner.
And, yet, here we all are at Oxford at a conference on social entrepreneurship. The Skoll World Forum is beyond capacity and oversold. Despite falling travel budgets, why? I think it's a recognition that the world needs the work that you do more than ever. It's a recognition that top down approaches and theoretical models are not always the best way to get the change. And that real hard work on the ground, is often what produces real lasting change.
It's a recognition that social entrepreneurship is one of the most highly elaborate models for change, that there is. And it is a recognition that we need to approach the big challenges that we face with global solutions, because we're all increasingly interconnected. There are big challenges out there that we have to deal with; climate change, Middle East peace, pandemics, nuclear weapons, water scarcity to name a few, and the economic crisis hasn't made any of these problems go away.
In fact, it's made it more difficult as resources and attention have turned to other things. But that puts an even greater premium on finding the best solutions to maximize our leverage.
We're here because we want to work together to meet these challenges. We're here because we know that our colleagues have found solution to some of these problems and are anxious to share their knowledge with us. We're here because we're tough minded optimists as Sally Osberg of the Skoll Foundation likes to say. I believe that social entrepreneurs are the key to unlocking the two most important doors that I feel are keeping humanity back. One is the opportunity gap where people never have the opportunity to improve their lives or the lives of their communities, and second hope gap where people don't even believe that real change is possible.
Social entrepreneurs solve the opportunity gap by giving people the chance to make a difference in their own lives and the lives of their communities. Social entrepreneurs overcome the hope gap by giving people the belief that better days lie ahead. What you do is the difference between a future of despair or a world of sustainable peace and prosperity.
It's really that important. Your work and your resolve make such a difference in the world, and you inspire others, including me, to try to make the difference as well. So, thank you for coming, and let's have a great forum.
It's also a
pleasure to have many dear friends here tonight, one of whom I have the opportunity to introduce as our next speaker.
Roger Martin is a great thinker, analyst and writer. Roger has been the dean of the Rotman School of Business at the University of Toronto since 1998. Under Roger's tenure, Rotman has emerged as one of the top business schools in North America, recognized for it's innovative curriculum. Before going to Rotman, Roger was a director and CEO at the Monitor Company, a cutting edge global, strategic, management firm and he also founded the Monitor University.
Roger is a leading light on issues of global competitiveness, integrative thinking, business design, and corporate citizenship. He chairs the Ontario task force on competitiveness, productivity and economic progress, and he serves on the boards of Thomson Reuters and Research In Motion, so if you have questions about Blackberry, Roger's the guy to ask.
And he's trustee at the hospital for sick children and is on the advisory board of Social Capital Partners. A prolific writer, Roger has published several books including his recent work, 'The Opposable Mind, How Successful Leaders Win Through Integrative Thinking'. He's written a number of Harvard Business Review articles as a columnist for Business Week Online, and contributes on a regular basis to leading Canadian, U.S., and British publications, including the Financial Times.
Roger is also a true supporter of social entrepreneurship, and it gives me great pride that to acknowledge that Roger has been a board member of the Skoll Foundation for the last five years. Roger's going to kick us off tonight by talking about power. Specifically the paradox of power, how power is changing and how thinking about power in different ways can allow us to be more effective in what we do.
Ladies and gentlemen, Roger Martin.
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