Prof Stephan Chambers

This course is compulsory on the Executive MSc in Social Business and Entrepreneurship. This course is not available as an outside option to students on other programmes.

The social business, as any other firm, has to understand its environment and undertake consequent activities to enable sustainability and effectiveness; this challenge is complicated by the requirement to achieve not only profit or financial sustainability, but also environmental sustainability and mission-driven social impact.  Foundations of Social Business II specifically introduces students to three critical aspects of this interaction between the social business and its environment: social finance; marketing; and technology.   

The course focuses on the opportunities for and external constraints on social business.  Its purpose is to introduce students to the environment of both opportunity and threat in which pro-social business exists.  A primary challenge for any social business is funding. The course looks in detail at the varieties of financing available to social ventures (impact finance, social finance, grant finance), and introduces emerging social finance mechanisms that are enabling innovative collaborations and resourcing to solve social problems.  Social businesses must be able to analyse and respond to the markets in which they are situated, and the course explores the concepts and tools of marketing.  Finally, no business, whether social or commercial, can ignore the emerging importance of technology as an opportunity and perhaps a threat.  The course explores the use of technology, including AI, to analyse and to respond to complex task environments; it explores the potential for technology to improve the internal productivity of the firm including through radical decentralisation of the organisation.

Ten integrated lectures / seminars of three hours each, delivered across two modules (teaching blocks)

One formative assessment exercise will be offered: a practice essay.

Social Finance

• Patton Power, A. (2021). Adventure Finance: How to Create a Funding Journey That Blends Profit and Purpose. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan.
• Allman, K.A. and Escobar De Nogales, X. (2015). Impact Investment: A Practical Guide to Investment Process and Social Impact Analysis. Hoboken, NJ.
• Nicholls, A. and Emerson, J. (2015). "Social Finance, Capitalizing Social Impact." In A. Nicholls, R. Paton and J. Emerson (eds) Social Finance. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Greene, S. (2016). A Short Guide to Impact Investing. Case Foundation.

Technology

• Fruchterman, J. (2025). Technology for Good: How Nonprofit Leaders are Using Software and Data to Solve Our Most Pressing Social Problems. MIT Press.

Proposal (50%).

Case analysis / study (50%).

Assessment will be through an individual coursework proposal (50%) and an e-exam (50%)