Inner Development Goals The Youth Summit

INNER DEVELOPMENT GOALS (IDGs) is a blueprint of the capabilities, qualities and skills we need in order to achieve the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

We want to educate, inspire and empower people to be a positive force for change in society and find a more purposeful way to look at our lives and the lives of the people around us.

WHY

In 2015, the Sustainable Development Goals gave us a comprehensive plan for a sustainable world by 2030. The 17 goals cover a wide range of issues that involve people with different needs, values, and convictions. There is a vision of what needs to happen, but progress along this vision has so far been disappointing. We lack the inner capacity to deal with our increasingly complex environment and challenges. Fortunately, modern research shows that the inner abilities we now all need can be developed. This was the starting point for the ‘Inner Development Goals’ initiative.

WHAT

The IDGs will provide an essential framework of transformative skills for sustainable development, a field-kit (in co-creation now) on how to develop these necessary skills – open source and free for all to use. The current IDGs framework represents 5 categories and 23 skills and qualities which are especially crucial for leaders who address SDGs, but fundamentally for all of us! It is the greatest possible accelerator to reach the Sustainable Development Goals and create a prosperous future for all humanity.

HOW

The IDGs initiative has co-creation at its center with ongoing development and input from more and more experts, scientists, practitioners and organisations around the world. In 2021 the first IDGs report was published that explains the background, method and framework with 5 categories and 23 transformational skills.

The report represents the results of the two online surveys based on input from 1000+ participants. We co-create in a community together with 23 supporting organisations and have conducted so far three MindShift – Growth that Matters Conferences with 3000+ active participants in total.

Click here to learn more and apply.

Author image

Inner Development Goals

posted March 29, 2022

This might be for you.

Sustainability International’s Alliance with ConsenSys – Leveraging Technology for Social Impact

Abstract

Social entrepreneur Chinyere Nnadi (Nnadi), Co-founder & CEO of Sustainability International (SI), had started his non-profit organisation to provide innovative solutions using technology to alleviate poverty in Africa. Since childhood Nnadi had beheld adversity in Nigeria that had been grappling with oil pollution due to decades of oil drilling and spills in the Niger Delta.  Nnadi observed that the environmental damages in Nigeria had resulted in the loss of livelihoods of farmers and fishermen, causing appalling public health hazards and mass unemployment. To end this misfortune, Nnadi’s SI team launched various projects ranging from infrastructure developments to providing education to girls and creating healthcare awareness. SI had also partnered with various government agencies, companies and NGOs and was using breakthrough technologies such as BIOCLEAN™ Biotechnology to restore the oil-contaminated sites. When Nnadi observed that widespread systematic corruption and distrusts among locals in Nigeria could hamper his initiatives, he started focusing more on utilising breakthrough technologies in his projects.  Towards this end, Nnadi’s SI collaborated with ‘Blockchain for Social Impact Coalition’, an initiative of the US based ConsenSys in mid-2017 to cleanup the Niger Delta and eventually improve the socio-economic condition of Nigeria. Would Nnadi be able to realise his dream of  alleviating corruption, poverty and improve the socio-economic condition of the region? Would SI be able to ‘solve the 20th century problems with 21st century solutions’ in Africa?

AuthorsShwetha Kumari
InstitutionAmity Research Centers, Bangalore, India
Competition Year2018
PlaceRunner Up
TrackSocial Entrepreneurship
Key WordsChinyere Nnadi, Africa’s Socio-economic condition, Niger Delta, Nigeria, Social entrepreneurship, Blockchain for Social impact , Oil pollution, BIOCLEAN, ConsenSys, Shell companies and NGOs, Environment and Economy, Oil spills and loss of livelihoods , One Farm, Virtual Reality Storytelling, Podcast Series – "Transitions, Development infrastructure
CoursesEthics and Social Responsibility
Target AudienceBusiness Management Students
Permission rightsThis case is part of the oikos free case collection. Download a free online copy below. If you are a faculty member and you are interested in teaching this case, you can request a free teaching note by sending us an email to freecase@oikos-international.org.
DownloadFree Case

Author image

oikos International

posted June 5, 2018

This might be for you.

Dharani: Nurturing the earth, fostering farmers’ livelihoods

Abstract

Timbaktu Collective is a non-profit organization in southern India, working for the sustainable development of rural communities with an emphasis on ecological principles and social harmony. One of the core areas of its work is with small farmers in the region who remained marginalized in a fiercely competitive market dominated by large players. Inspired by its success with organic farming and in collectivizing rural people Timbaktu Collective promoted a business enterprise for procuring, processing and marketing the organic produce of farmer-members in the district of Anantapuramu.

In 2008, Dharani Farming and Mutually Aided Co-operative Society Limited (Dharani) was started as a farmer owned, cooperative enterprise that procures and sells the members’ organic produce. This case discusses how Dharani not only developed external markets for small farmers’ organic produce but also articulated an ethical model of local production, distribution and consumption. For nearly a decade, Timbaktu Collective and Dharani have worked together to increase membership in the cooperative from only 70 in less than a dozen villages to 1800 in 35 villages in 2015. Dharani recorded net profit of over Rs 15 lakh in 2014-15, despite repeated droughts in 2014 and 2015. Besides financial benefits to members, land fertility had also improved substantially: acreage of certified organic land had grown from 80 acres in 2005 to 7500 acres in 2015. With a network of 246 retailers, bulk buyers and direct consumers, Dharani’s brand of products, “Timbaktu Organic” had also been firmly established in 40 towns and cities of South India

But Dharani’s operations had to expand significantly if they had to benefit all the farmer-members of the cooperative. For this Dharani has to (1) increase procurement of farmers’ organic produce from the current level of 300 tons to 1500 tons,  (2) increase value of the procurement from Rs 1 crore to Rs 5 crore and (3) increase net profits from Rs 24 lakh to Rs 50 lakh. How could Dharani continue its growth as a business enterprise while remaining a socially responsible and ecologically sensitive, famer-owned cooperative?

AuthorsJoseph Satish V & C Shambu Prasad
InstitutionsUniversity of Hyderabad, India & Institute of Rural Management Anand, India
Competition Year2017
PlaceFirst Prize
TrackSustainable Entrepreneurship
Key WordsCSR, Socially Responsible Investing, Environmental Performance, Social Performance
CoursesSustainable Finance, Strategic Management, Finance, Business Sustainability, Business and Society, or Environmental Entrepreneurship
Target AudienceMBAs, Undergrads
Permission rightsThis case is part of the oikos free case collection. Download a free online copy below. If you are a faculty member and you are interested in teaching this case, you can request a free teaching note by sending us an email to freecase@oikos-international.org.
DownloadFree Case

Author image

oikos International

posted June 19, 2017

This might be for you.

Refugee Labor Market Integration – An Impact Investment Case Study

Abstract

The dislocation of millions of people in various conflict zones of the Middle East and Africa is one of the greatest humanitarian catastrophes of our time. Given the complexity of the issue, various ways of solving the associated challenges have been implemented; reaching from emergency camps in conflict zones to innovative integration services in host countries. With overloaded government processes and too little funding, it is of utmost importance to fund and scale up effective integration services. Successful integration depends to a large extent on promoting the required abilities to build a self- sustained life. As such, labor market integration of refugees becomes of crucial importance first and foremost for themselves, yet successful integration also bears major upsides for the broader society.

One example of a successful integration service is SchlaU Schule, located in Munich, Germany. By providing young refugees with an education that is acknowledged on the German labor market, young refugees can integrate faster and build self-sustained lives through the improved facilitation of labor market integration. Today, organizations like SchlaU Schule often lack funding to operationalize and scale up their services. Hence, identifying successful services that generate social impact and implementing smart ways to allocate funding to those organizations, while generating financial returns, are urgent issues to be solved.

Students tackling this case will work at the intersection of social impact and financial return. Students are encouraged to design an impact investment case targeting refugee labor market integration that not only creates social impact, but also financial return for investors. Thus, entrepreneurial thinking is combined with rigorous financial modelling to align both financial and social returns in a meaningful way. The goal of the case is to allow students to think entrepreneurially, conceptualize financially viable and socially meaningful solutions, and identify ways to implement these in the real world.

AuthorMarc Haßler
InstitutionMaastricht University School of Business and Economics, The Netherlands
Competition Year2017
PlaceThird Prize
TrackSustainable Finance
Key WordsCSR, Socially Responsible Investing, Environmental Performance, Social Performance
CoursesSustainable Finance, Strategic Management, Finance, Business Sustainability, Business and Society, or Environmental Entrepreneurship
Target AudienceMBAs, Undergraduates
Permission rightsThis case is part of the oikos free case collection. Download a free online copy below. If you are a faculty member and you are interested in teaching this case, you can request a free teaching note by sending us an email to freecase@oikos-international.org.
DownloadFree Case

Author image

oikos International

posted June 19, 2017

This might be for you.

New Report: Digital Economy and Sustainability

Digitalization – the increased use of information and communication technologies (ICT) – is affecting all areas of our lives. Rapid progress in the development of hardware and software is steadily moving us towards a fully-digital society.

The ways how we learn, communicate, and consume are cases in point. Applications and devices make it “easier” (in inverted comma, because sometimes technology makes things more complicated or confusing) to do routine work or to stay in contact with each other. Many of them have already become so embedded in our daily experiences that it is hard to imagine living without them. Instant e-mail delivery, navigating with online maps, and an internet at our fingertips, available 24/7, has become second nature to us. The increased use of digital technologies to transfer money, to hail a taxi or to control energy consumption provides an illustration.

The impact of digitalization on our lives is profound. A typical day in the internet today comprises 2.3 billion GB of web traffic, 152 million Skype calls, 207 billion e-mails sent, 36 million purchases on Amazon, 8.8 billion videos watched on Youtube, and 4.2 billion Google searches.  The speed with which digital technologies continue to make inroads into societies is constantly on the rise. And the lines between the old economy and a new digital one are becoming increasingly blurred.

Against this background, Christoph Rappitsch explores the opportunities and risks of the digital economy for a broad sustainability agenda and thus for people, communities and the planet in the first oikos Associate Report.  Enjoy the read!

Author image

oikos International

posted May 10, 2017

This might be for you.

Addressing sustainability and inequality at a global level : how other worlds (may) emerge

Increased global interconnectivity has encouraged a prevalence of forums that seek to organise and facilitate action on sustainability and inequality on a global scale. A body of work has examined such global forums and the theoretical contexts in which they operate but there is little which examines the nature of engagement through these forums to address issues of sustainability and inequality. This thesis explores social actors’ participation in two global forums, the World Economic Forum (WEF) and the World Social Forum (WSF), with the aim of creating more sustainable and equal worlds. It has been structured around four overarching research questions as follows. RQ1. What are the perceived relationships between dominant and dominated social actors in global sustainability debates? RQ2. How do different social actors perceive the global field as embodied by the two world forums? RQ3. How do different social actors perceive the struggle in the field, and the strategies adopted? RQ4. How do different social actors perceive the lasting impact of their own participation in the field? Using Bourdieu’s social theory, I propose that the research settings of WEF and WSF are enactments and representations of a global field of power (RQ1). In this global field of power, social actors use global capital, a form of symbolic capital, to define the doxa of the field, that is, the taken-for-granted assumptions about issues of sustainability and inequality that require response, how they are defined and how they should be resolved (RQ2). I discuss the tensions and dilemmas of social actors as they enact strategies within the field to promote conservation, succession and/or subversion of the doxa in relation to these issues of sustainability and inequality (RQ3). The nature and extent of shifts in the global field of power as perceived by social actors is shown, with the aim that such shifts will support the creation of other more sustainable and equal worlds (RQ4). The empirical material gives participant impressions of their own involvement, which has implications for the identities, roles and activities of global social actors.

Author image

oikos International

posted March 21, 2017

This might be for you.

Evaluating the launch of a first Social Impact Bond in Switzerland

Investments are the key driving forces for the progress of our society. A new trend is being developed with impact investments, ensuring the societal value creation of the financial capital invested. Within this context, this paper introduces and critically characterizes a new product called Social Impact Bond (SIB). Reviewing the mechanism in the first part, the research raises the question about further practical implementation and benefits of this financial mechanism in the centre of continental Europe, specifically in Switzerland. This feasibility study raises the questions if (1) an interest for such mechanism exists in Geneva and (2) if a launch in 2015 could be taken into consideration. Examining the question in depth with a SIB expert, a local government officer and two heads of State as well as additional stakeholders, a real interest for this conceptual approach could be confirmed. Additionally, further steps for a launch of SIB are conceptualised providing specific points of contact to develop the mechanism in 2015

Author image

oikos International

posted July 21, 2016

This might be for you.

The value of skills training in the improvement of the socio-economic status of microfinance beneficiaries

The research paper examined the value of skills training on the socio-economic profiles of beneficiaries of microfinance in the Northern Region of Ghana. The main interest of the study was to look into how skills training combine with microfinance enhances beneficiaries’ ability to cater for the education of their dependents, improves their ability to afford health care for their families, and to acquire more household assets as well as enhancing their empowerment.
The study adopted both qualitative and quantitative research designs drawing into both primary and secondary data. The research instruments used to gather data from sampled beneficiaries were interviewer administered questionnaires and focus group discussions. A purposeful random sampling technique was used to draw a total of 107 respondents from the clients of Grameen Ghana. The sample consisting of 82 beneficiaries enrolled into skills training and 25 beneficiaries without skills training from the same organization. A total of six (6) focus group discussions were held; four (4) with groups receiving skills training and two (2) with groups without skills training. The models used for the analysis of the data included descriptive statistics, regression, and paired sample t-test.
The outcomes of the research revealed that skills training complements microfinance services to improve the socio-economic status of beneficiaries, in relation to the education of their dependents, their family access to health care and empowerment. Conversely, the study has found that skills training have no influence on the household acquisition of assets.

Author image

oikos International

posted July 18, 2016

This might be for you.

The Development of Microfinance Institutions in a Multi-Tier Framework

Microfinance industry has achieved an unprecedented growth over the last two decades. Consequently, the landscape of the microfinance institutions (MFIs) has evolved to include a diverse array of institutional types. As a result of this increasing diversity, several classifications of MFIs based on performance and institutional set-up emerged to address the needs of donors and investors. Today, definitions that classify MFIs into tiers based on several dimensions that include size, maturity and sustainability are increasingly used by practitioners and researchers. The first part of this thesis presents the widely accepted tiered classifications of MFIs. The second part of the thesis analyzes the institutional development of six top-tier MFIs by investigating the changes in ownership, governance and human resources management across tiers. Finally, the thesis explores the commonalities and distinctive patterns in MFIs that advanced tiers over time, by examining the speed of growth, capital structure and performance.

Author image

oikos International

posted July 6, 2016

This might be for you.

Catalyzing a Shared Sustainable Future: Responsible Banking at Yes Bank

Abstract

As a leader in sustainable finance in India, Yes Bank reached the milestone of mainstreaming sustainability within its core business principles with a vision of evolving as the ‘Best Quality Bank of the World in India by 2020’. The sustainable corporate performance of the bank focussed on the triple bottom-line ethos, wherein the three interlinked measurement elements — people, planet, and profit — were interwoven with its business strategy. According to Yes Bank, its sustainable finance initiatives not only assisted it in creating value for stakeholders but also had a long-term positive impact on the community as a whole. The sustainable finance guidelines of the bank enabled it to integrate social, economic, and environmental policies into its business framework, and this attracted investments from Foreign Institutional Investors (FII) and Foreign Portfolio Investors (FPI) for building a clean and green India. The bank’s active presence in areas like development banking, micro finance, financial inclusion, agriculture, and investment in sustainable ventures created an enabling environment for the most disadvantaged stakeholders in society to aspire for a sustainable future and also enabled the bank to come up with some innovative products and services. As a sustainability leader for India, the bank’s sustainable finance approach distinguished it from its rivals and helped it emerge as a leading bank in the country despite its being a late entrant into the market. However, the bank admitted difficulties in communicating its sustainable objectives to its stakeholders.

This case is designed to enable students to: 1) Understand the concept of sustainable finance and understand why new age banks like Yes Bank were focusing on the triple bottom line ethos; 2) Study and analyze the sustainable finance principles and practices of Yes Bank; 3) Discuss and debate whether the sustainability initiatives of the bank delivered tangible results in terms of having a social, economic, and environmental impact on the community in the long run; 4) Understand the key concern for Yes Bank — communicating its sustainability initiatives to stakeholders — and explore the ways in which it can address the issue.

AuthorsDebapratim Purkayastha, Benudhar Sahu and Trilochan Tripathy
InstitutionIBS Hyderabad, IFHE University, India
Competition Year2016
PlaceRunner-up
TrackSustainable Finance
Key WordsSustainable finance, Responsible banking, Socially responsible investment, Climate change, ESG dimensions, Environmental Management Systems, Natural capital considerations, Green bonds, Microfinance, Financial inclusion, Bottom-of–the Pyramid customers, Sustainability Reporting, Stakeholder tension, Stakeholder engagement and dialogue, Communicating sustainability
CoursesFinance, Corporate Social Responsibility, Corporate Sustainability
Target AudienceMBA
Permission rightsThis case will be published at the Case Centre shortly. You can download an inspection copy below.
DownloadInspection Copy

Author image

oikos International

posted June 27, 2016

This might be for you.