Inspirations: BoP-Protocol.org and e4sw.org

Things have been pretty quiet around the BRINQ Workshop, only a few posts in the last six months, so what have we been up to?

Well, besides trying to get things started in Brazil again, I've been doing a lot of work for other folks, most particularly Enterprise for a Sustainable World (ESW), a new organization started up by Cornell University professor and Sustainability guru Stuart Hart, whose book "Capitalism at the Crossroads" we covered here before.

Stuart Hart was an old professor of mine at UNC's Kenan-Flagler Business School (before he headed north to Ithaca) and along with CK Prahalad is one the founders of business strategy in the Base of the Pyramid. Stu's approach to the BoP is one of deep listening and participation; he advocates that by looking beyond poor communities as just places to "sell more stuff" companies will gain access to greater benefits: disruptive innovation, strong market relationships, better reputations, and yes, market growth. Stu is also one of the people who invited me to particpate in the Base of the Pyramid Protocol pilot in Kenya… and of course to hire me to work at ESW and to join the new Protocol team in India.

I've also been working with Stu & co. designing the web sites for ESW and the BoP Protocol, in addition to a Drupal-based project management site to support Protocol teams in the field. You can also browse a web-version of the BoP Protocol, previously only available as a PDF.
Check them out!

BoP-Protocol.org
e4sw.org
BoP-Protocol.org e4sw.org

[For the technically inclined, BRINQ.com has also switched hosting providers (twice) and the Workshop has been upgraded to Wordpress 2.0!]