Reimagining and Scaling Livelihoods in a Socially Sustainable Manner

#Ethnography, #India, #SocialEnterprise #DesignAnthropology, #StartUps

Context:

A third sector skilling organisation sought to set up a social enterprise incubator intended to identify and support social enterprises with the potential to create resilient livelihoods in India. This came against the backdrop of the COVID-19 pandemic and ensuing migrant crisis that laid bare the vulnerability of the country’s informal sector. We carried out ethnographic research around identified livelihoods to identify challenges that social enterprises could solve.

Collaboration with LagomWorks:

We carried out long term ethnographic research on livelihoods in telemedicine and logistics. Research insights were translated to how-might-we statements that the challenges were based on. Our insights also defined the criteria on which the solutions proposed by early stage ventures or teams were evaluated.

Team

Impact

The social enterprise incubator invited early stage ventures or teams with an idea or product to propose scalable livelihood solutions for the challenges our research had suggested. A jury comprising representatives from industry, the government, and the third sector evaluated these ideas to identify those with the potential to scale. These received the opportunity to be incubated and access a wider ecosystem to grow their solutions.