These series of guest posts are written by the teams attending the Tetuan Valley Startup School 2011 Fall edition. This post is written by the P2PLending team, formed by by María del Carmen Mochón, Enrique Cárcamo and Raúl Sánchez.
Is there any humanity left in the finance industry?
Is our society so alienated when it comes to business, that we cannot see that in the end it all comes to people? Social entrepreneurship spirit, give us faith to believe there is still a drop of humanity when money is in stake.
As the organization Ashoka defines; “Social entrepreneurs are individuals with innovative solutions to society’s most pressing social problems. They are ambitious and persistent, tackling major social issues and offering new ideas for wide-scale change.”
To this definition, I would add that these entrepreneurs seek the success of their own business, this means; making money!! But they do it through a social benefit for the community. Money and humanity fit in the same sentence in these activities. When thinking of every single business, from the smallest shop, to the biggest corporation, we must not forget that there is always a person behind decisions, families behind that person and society behind those families. If we all realize this, we can start believing in change, and change will come to us.
Through our favorite example of social businessman, we want to encourage all those people with an entrepreneur heart, to do not forget their human nature.
MuhamadYunus is the founder of the Grammen Bank – the Bank of the poor. He founded Microfinance activities, which until this moment has proved to be the most efficient way to fight against poverty.
Microcredit is the extension of very small loans (microloans) to those in poverty designed to spur entrepreneurship. These individuals lack collateral, steady employment and a verifiable credit history and therefore cannot meet even the most minimal qualifications to gain access to traditional credit. Microcredit is a part of microfinance, which is the provision of a wider range of financial services to the very poor.
The main lessons we have learned out of this Peace Nobel Prize banker are:
- Charity is not bad, but providing poor with the tools for development is what will make them become self-sufficient and escape from their situation.
- Business can have a human face, making your entrepreneur initiative profitable is not in dispute with making a social benefit.
- Everyone can make a difference, and one by one we can all make changes happen.
