When a leading journal devoted to Canadian philanthropy covers topics like social finance and social innovation, it’s a good sign that momentum is building. The latest issue of The Philanthropist features more than a dozen extremely well-written articles on exactly these topics. We’d like to congratulate The Philanthropist for pulling together such an outstanding team of writers, and moving the conversation forward on how Canada can become a global leader in spurring and financing social innovation.

It is not uncommon to hear that the concepts of social finance and social innovation are presented in a way that is not accessible to the average person. Geraldine Cahill's Primer on Social Innovation is an important resource that defines many of the common terms and concepts in the world of social finance/innovation, including several several "hot" topics in social finance: program-related investment (see Bill Young's recent post), impact investing (lots happening with the Social Venture Exchange initiative), and the role of enablers (in case you missed it, check out the newly-launched Social Finance Task Force).

Three articles specifically speak to key trends and opportunities related to social finance in Canada.

Ted Jackson's article describes the challenging financing context for civil society organizations (CSOs), and what they must do to recalibrate their current financing strategies and tactics. In the article, several important issues are raised - revenue diversification of nonprofits, reaching out to new classes of donors and investors, reimagining the role of foundations to moving simply beyond grantmaking, and the development of new social finance intermediaries that can deliver the benefits of social finance to local communities. The article is a timely and thoughtful remainder that the structural social issues we seek to address require a multi-pronged approach and the necessity to "reload" if we are to make a dent in the biggest challenges the lie ahead of us.

For Nora Sobolov, the inspiration for the Community Forward Fund stemmed from her continued frustration (and that of her colleagues in the nonprofit sector), around issues of financing. The article describes a number of the key challenges that many nonprofits often face when seeking to stabilize and grow their organizations. Referencing George Overholser, Nora describes how an important shift in how nonprofits and funders think - moving from "buying to building" - is an essential one to build sustainable organizations. But this requires supporting changes in the types of capital, supports and strategy of each of these organizations, and is often not straightforward. Yet, as elaborated on in the article, there are numerous examples of how this is being done in practice, and strategies which can be applied to other organizations looking to transform themselves into more resilient and independant entities. The article ends on a positive note that inspires action, reminding us that while there is much to do, there is much already being done - and that experimentation and implementation will continue to be key drivers of progress.

Nino Antadze and Frances Westley build on their pioneering work around social innovation to address an important question related to funding: How do we know what to grow? It is a timely article since many in this space - myself included - have a desire to apply the phrase "scaling up" to many new concepts or ideas we come across in the social sector. Drilling down into the core issues and tensions around this concept, and how the dominant approach ("market model") may not be sufficient to understand the complexity of scaling social innovation.  They propose an alternate approach - scaling up through convening, connecting and brokering - that is a more authentic representation of how social innovation scales up in practice, and the subsequent implications for the stakeholders in this process (including funders). 

I'd encourage you to check out The Philanthropist website for a full list (and links) to all of the articles included in this ground-breaking issue. Happy reading!