by Alicia Conway

Change for the change agents: Just as people are starting to nail down a somewhat concrete definition of social entrepreneurship, the change agents of the world are greeted with another phrase.  Are you ready?  Social intrapreneurs.  With this one, though, you may have already guessed what it means – making sustainable social and environmental change from within more traditional corporations.
 
The concept behind the catch phrase has been around for awhile, and as change agents inside current businesses and business schools, we are in a prime position to put the pressure on and to ask the tough questions. 
 
SoCap and BeDo are doing it. The Social Capital Markets Conference (SoCap) aims to bring people together to figure out how to build social enterprises that make a better world.  They did just that in the first weekend of September.  BeDo coordinated an Intrapreneurs Event  to discuss opportunities for social intrapreneurs or “the new quarterbacks”, as BeDo lovingly calls them.  Attendees discussed how to best tap and grow networks of like-minded peers who are willing to work within the current corporate structures to make a better world.
 
Speaking of networks – I, like the majority of my classmates, chose UNC’s Kenan-Flagler Business School because of the school’s strong focus on sustainability. Turns out we’re leaders on the social intrapreneurship front, as well. Our chapter of Net Impact will be partnering with our Career Management Center and the Center for Sustainable Enterprise to hold the Career in Sustainability Forum.  This event will show MBAs how they truly have the power to interlace sustainability goals into every aspect of business – something that is at the heart of my own personal future goals as a business leader.
 
The event will include representatives from more traditional companies with the goal of enticing a cross-section of students at the event who may otherwise shy away from those solely marketed as “sustainable.”  Students will be able to network on a different – and I would argue, higher – plane.
 
The aim is to show current and future business leaders how they can truly affect sustainable change wherever they are and with whatever tools they may have at their disposal. 

I am excited about the event, and hope that the momentum behind this newer concept continues to grow.  It’s not enough to state that the face of business is starting to change.  It has changed.  And if we future business leaders can effect change from outside as well as from within, the positive effects will undoubtedly snowball.

Alicia Conway is currently an MBA student in the class of 2011 at UNC’s Kenan-Flagler Business School. Years ago, as a serendipitous spectator of a non-profit case competition, she was blown away by how MBA students were utilizing the efficiencies of business as change agents, positively impacting society as a whole. She knew b-school was where she needed to be, and now it’s where she is.