Welcome back. The world is littered with failed attempts at social amelioration or problem solving. In this session we're going to look at a tool or technique that will enable you to get a deep understanding of the beneficiary, but not just the beneficiary with respect to the product or the solution you have in mind but the whole context that the beneficiary finds themselves in, and how would you propose will fit within the context. Going back to Max's early sessions the beneficiaries, the group of people or the person that you hope will benefit from the solution you have in mind. We know from the literature that many many times they're not responsive or not as responsive to a solution from an outside group as those with the intentions thought they should be or would be. What are the reasons for this? The primary reason is we have a product centric mindset or a solution centric mindset. In other words we have good intentions, we've conceived diverse solution with insufficient contextual understanding we're trying to deploy and then realized that there are also the factors that get in the way of the adoption or even the willingness to adopt by that group of beneficiaries. Some of those reasons are cultural aversion, for example gender specific cultural morays, sociopolitical challenge, they could be resistance from authorities, they may be infrastructure limitations for example unreliable power or insufficient or too expensive power or water, and then there may be seasonal realities that come to play. For example, in many parts of Southeast Asia with the monsoon season or even in Central Africa with the rainy season, logistics become very, very tough when there is heavy rain. In fact many areas become impassable during the two to three months of the rainy season. So we have a tool called the Beneficiary Experience Table or the Beneficiary Journey Map and we use this to understand not only what we envision them doing once they've adopted a solution, but before we even get to that to try and understand what they're doing currently. In other words, what are they doing today to attend to that need, or what are they doing today that is enabling them to endure, or survive, the conditions under which they find themselves? So for example, if we consider the animal feeds program from the book and, by the way, refer to chapter four in the social entrepreneur's playbook here. I learn ahead this idea of selling feed to enable poultry rearers or poultry farmers to raise chickens and in so doing increase the protein consumption of them and their families, but also increase their income. Well, not only we she have to produce high quality and acceptably priced feed for this initiative. She's going to have to train farmers. She's going to have to get the materials to them at the right time at an acceptable price. So there's a whole lot of activities, a whole lot of experiences if you will, including education that the beneficiaries will have to go through in order to enjoy or to benefit from this particular solution that she has in mind. And at at the end of the day, if the beneficiaries don't see the value in your total solution, they're likely to decide not to use it, or more likely to decide not to use it. So what we're going to do is use this framework to lay out each step of the series of experiences from beginning to end. That they will have to undertake, and then we're going to look at the total set of experiences and ask ourselves the question what needs to happen at each of those steps and here the detail really, really begins to matter. What needs to happen at each of those steps. Such that we can help the beneficiaries move from one to another and hopefully get to a point where they no longer need our assistance in doing so. Then we can use this to understand what the behavioral changes might be and that's the art in the science if you will. Is trying to understand, not only what they need to do differently, but how we're going to help them begin to learn how to do the requisite activities differently than they currently do today. We also use this framework to discuss what we have in mind and hopefully have it accepted by the group of advisors and some lead-steer beneficiaries. So this is the advisory group that we suggested you begin to put together at the onset of your venture and then also from the seed segment that Mac covered in his session, can we choose a few what we call lead-steer beneficiaries. And then go and put this proposal to them and see what their reaction is before we actually test anything on the ground. So let's walk through the framework. If a poultry rearer is going to successfully rear poultry and then sell it at the market such that there is a surplus. In other words they make more money than the cost saving current producing that poultry or rearing the poultry. They're going to have to do many, many things correctly before hand. And if these fail, then they won't get the outcome that we have in mind for them or that they have in mind when they decide to participate in this program. So let's start from the very beginning. Before they can even decide to rear poultry, they need to hear about this program. So somebody is going to have to let them know that this opportunity exist. And we'll talk a little bit later in this course about what that might be and how that might take place. Then they're going to have to decide to rear chickens. How does that happen? We don't know yet. But that decision will have to be made before they can engage in the process. They will need to raise money or funds if they don't have disposable income or sufficient savings to buy the raw materials in order to participate in this program. Once they've done that they will have to purchase feed and this is cash flow implications for them because once they've purchased the feed that money is out, they have to wait two months before the money comes back. They'll need to transport the feed to a poultry storage facility, somewhere close to where their poultry will be reared. Often times that is a room next to the primary room in which they will engage in the poultry rearing practices. The feed will need to be stored. There are all sorts of implications about safe storage for feed. Then they're going to have to purchase either during or immediately after the purchase of feed, they're going to have to purchase day-old chicks. And this means they're going to have to be able to engage with a chick supplier so that they can get the chicks when they need them and when they have to feed. The chicks also need to be transported to the poultry house, and possible they will need third party transportation, without it they can't get the chicks in, they can't get the feeding on time. In order to successfully rear chickens, a farmer or a poultry rearer must know when to feed them, how much to feed them, how frequently to feed them. They must know when to water them. What clean water practices are. They need to keep them warm if there's a winter season where it gets cold over night. The cages need to be clean and the birds only to be vaccinated against diseases. These are all practices without which the successful ring of poultry does not take place. So, somebody's going to have to educate these beneficiaries in these practices, and help them learn how to do them successfully. The beneficiaries will then keep some of these chickens for their own consumption, and then transport the surplus or the majority of the poultry to a market, so again they'll need transportation, we'll need to understand what transportation practices are such that the birds get to the market in good condition, healthy and a looking good for buyers who wish to purchase them. Then, I need to sell them at the market. We need to understand how that happens. Will I need to go a broker, to a retailer, can i just arrives somewhere and negotiate with the market operators to sell their chickens at a particular venue? All these things will need to be determined and costed such that they know with sufficient confidence that they can actually do this and you can potentially help them test it out. And then once they've successfully sold their poultry, they will now have income that they didn't have before, they may need to learn how to manage that. For example, will I want bank it, will I want to keep it in cash, will I want to somehow disperse that for the education, the healthcare, in nutrition of the children or the other family members. So, all of this things need to have happen in order to be successful micro enterprise for the beneficiary. And these are things that the social entrepreneur must consider in detail because without them, the venture will fail. So if we go back to the beginning and think about this a little bit. Our learner's idea was to produce high quality feed for poultry. Such that beneficiaries could use it to rear chickens, sell those chickens and take the surplus income, and consume what they need for a healthy diet. What we've just seen by the use of the journey map or the beneficiary experience table is all the steps that need to be put in play to enable this to actually take place. So the solution involves a lot more than simply producing high quality acceptable priced feed. And now we think about the reality time. As we've laid this out, we need to ask ourselves the question what must beneficiaries do differently from what they are doing today? And what is it going to take to motivate them to undertake these series of activities and behavioral changes? And frankly, do they even want to do it? So we think about this particular session and the beneficial experience table. What are the key takeaways? Well firstly, once we have an idea for a solution, once we have the target segment to start with, we want to make very, very certain that we understand the context, in which those beneficiaries love on the day-to-day basis. So that we can insure that our solution is tailored such that we have the highest possibility of success with that segment when we start. We use the Beneficiary Experience Table to understand the current set of practices or the living methodology or the nutrition methods that they employ today whether it's buying from retail or growing their own or from wholesale. And then we can map out the proposed future beneficiary experience table, should this successful adoption of this idea that we have get deployed. Then we can compare the two and ask ourselves the question, to what extent are they different, where are they different and what will we need to do differently or help them do differently in order for this to succeed? In other words, we need to think about before we even start what obstacles the beneficiaries must overcome to use the solution. Now we take this to our advisors and we ask them, does what we have reflect an understanding of what the beneficiaries are currently doing to address their problem? In other words, do the advisors agree that you understand sufficiently the current context of the beneficiaries? And then have the advisors signed off on your proposed Beneficiary Experience Table. And this is always saying, yes they've had a look at what we have proposed, they agree that they represents the reality of these been beneficiaries and that our solution in the eyes of the advisors might be plausible or deployable and they agree with it. Now what we can do is take this to the next step which is begin to understand or map out the cost and associated activities that will need to take place at each of these experiences. And ultimately get the sum analysis of whether or not this makes economic and social impact sense for the beneficiaries first and for the social entrepreneur second.
