This post was originally published on Enterprising.In as part of a theme issue called ‘JUGAAD- The Spirit of Free Enterprising India.’
Many cite freedom as a defining characteristic of entrepreneurship. As your own boss, you don’t have to answer to anyone and can operate how you want. But, what about others? As an entrepreneur, you have the unique ability to free others as well—from desk jobs, from hunger, from unsanitary living conditions.
How? By giving them jobs.
The India Labour Report 2009 reveals that the population will grow to 1.4 billion by 2026—83% of which is in the 15-59 age group. That’s nearly 1.2 billion additional workers in the workforce, about 12.8 million a year, the report estimates. But, where are these jobs going to come from?
Well, entrepreneurs, they should come from you. Entrepreneurship is not a new concept in India—we ranked fourth on Fast Company’s list of entrepreneurial countries in a 2004 article—but what is new is the idea of “employership,” or the creation of jobs where none existed before.
The term was coined by our editor Lindsay Clinton, and is another way entrepreneurs can contribute to society. Job creation has the ability to raise living standards and create a cycle that could alleviate many of the problems social entrepreneurs are working to solve—poverty, poor sanitation, lack of education—by providing people with a steady income.
Employership has the ability to give people self-sufficiency in a way a single-goal NGO cannot. By providing people with a steady paycheck, you give them the ability to break free from the cycle of poverty.
This idea of employership can be taken to the next level: employing specific groups of people that provide a strategic advantage. Take, for example, Mirakle Couriers. The Mumbai-based company employs only deaf adults—a group that receives discounts on Mumbai train transport. Kanak Resources Management employs ragpickers—who have plenty of experience—to assist with municipal waste collection. Not only does the company provide jobs to those who would have otherwise been unemployed or underemployed, it’s actually better off for having done so.
Social entrepreneurs are known for their innovation, for creating original solutions for society’s problems. Employership is easier than entrepreneurship—no reinventing the wheel involved. Think about the Mirakle Couriers example. A courier company in and of itself is not innovative, but deciding to employ only the hearing-impaired is. Even if the enterprise is simple in nature, providing jobs gives it the socially responsible edge.
Creating 1.2 billion jobs seems like a daunting task, but if just 20,000 people (less than .00002% of the population) started companies that employed 50 people, 1 million jobs would be created. That’s a decent dent in the 12.8 million demand.
Photo Credit: Flickr user Saptarshi Biswas
