Creative Distillation - Transcript for Episode 47: Andrea Prado (INCAE) on Venture Creation and Growth in Low-Income Markets (LA Road Trip!)
Stefani HÌý 0:06 Ìý
Welcome to another episode of Creative Distillation. Your hosts Jeff and Brad from the ²ÊÃñ±¦µä is Leeds School of Business discuss entrepreneurship research while enjoying fine craft beverages. Our final conversation at the now legendary cocktail party at the 19th Annual Social Entrepreneurship Conference at begins with Brad and Jeff speaking with Andrea Prado, Associate Professor of Management and Organizations at in San Jose, Costa Rica. They talk about her latest paper, , published in 2022 in the , and looking at how to bring products and services to low income rural communities in developing countries. If you think the answer is to give everything away, you'll be surprised by her findings. At some point, Social Entrepreneurship Conference Co-Coordinator and friend of the podcast, and , President and CEO of , crash the party, bringing their own interesting take to the conversation and making a good time truly great. Enjoy and cheers!
Jeff YorkÌý 1:33 Ìý
Welcome to Creative distillation, where we distill entrepreneurship research into actionable insights. I am Jeff York, research director at the Deming Center for Entrepreneurship at the Leeds School of Business at the ²ÊÃñ±¦µä, joined as always by my co host.
BradÌý 1:47 Ìý
Hi, Jeff. It's Brad Warner. I work with a lot of Deming and I didn't want to go into the titles.
Jeff YorkÌý 1:52 Ìý
We are in at the University of Southern California. We are still in LA here. Again, it's the 19th annual social entrepreneurship Research Conference. And we are going to continue our innovation of letting our guests introduce themselves. So take it away guess. Hello.
Andrea PradoÌý 2:08 Ìý
So my name is Andrea Prado. I'm a Costa Rican. I'm an associate professor at INCAE business school. And I do research in social entrepreneurship in sustainability strategies and on healthcare management.
BradÌý 2:22 Ìý
But I also think there's something deeper. I think you and Jeff have known each other for a long time. Well, yeah,
Andrea PradoÌý 2:27 Ìý
that is totally true. We were PhD students.
Jeff YorkÌý 2:31 Ìý
We were I think we met at the precursor to this conference. In Denmark. Yeah, we met Khan Hagen. Yeah, I remember that. How
BradÌý 2:41 Ìý
long did it take you to get your PhD?
Jeff YorkÌý 2:43 Ìý
Ah, me. Yeah, I just got this cracker jack boxes on like the source and mailed in, mailed it in and showed up like, three weeks later, he's going where's
BradÌý 2:52 Ìý
this is actually, it's important. It's interesting. Really know. What's interesting is I think my PhD for how many years? I don't know, let's say 10 years.
Jeff YorkÌý 3:04 Ìý
Well, I graduated in 2009. So
BradÌý 3:07 Ìý
okay, so in. So 15 years ago, what was the average length of time it took a student to get a PhD?
Jeff YorkÌý 3:13 Ìý
Five years, four or five years? Yeah. Has it changed? Yeah, it's gotten longer.
Andrea PradoÌý 3:17 Ìý
Five or six? It depends on where you got your data, and how much you so what's
BradÌý 3:22 Ìý
what's happened in those 15 years?
Jeff YorkÌý 3:25 Ìý
What do you think? Why do you think it takes longer for people now?
Andrea PradoÌý 3:28 Ìý
I think they have to go out into the market to try to get a job with a publication or when we went when we went out, that was not enough. So job
Jeff YorkÌý 3:36 Ìý
requirements have changed? Yeah, they've gotten really charter, it's become much more competitive. And it says go out with a paper. On average, how many do you think that it takes somebody to publish one of these papers started the project? Okay. So
BradÌý 3:48 Ìý
before this evening, I would I would think, a year or so. But I have heard a 10 year timeframe. And I've also heard an eight year time frame, which actually blows my mind. Yeah,
Andrea PradoÌý 3:59 Ìý
that's what it takes a paper. So when I met Jeff, I was working with with a professor called Jeffrey Robinson, who was the organizer of that conference. Yes, and we were working on a paper on my first year of the PhD, and it actually got published this year.
Jeff YorkÌý 4:20 Ìý
That's a credit. That was the paper you presented that conference.
Andrea PradoÌý 4:23 Ìý
But the point is papers also, not just getting the degree, but papers sometimes take 10 years.
Jeff YorkÌý 4:30 Ìý
So if you if you are required to have a paper to get a job, and it takes you know, I mean, so these PhD students are going out, they gotta get it done in like six years. I mean, people do go get jobs without papers. But it's hard.
BradÌý 4:45 Ìý
In the sense you're predicting prediction. So the prediction as a layperson, I'm hearing is that it's going to take PhD students even longer. The trend is it's good maybe does it go from six years to eight years because you need this published? Paper.
Andrea PradoÌý 5:00 Ìý
I mean, it's just if you go out and try to get a job, if it takes that much it kind of sends a weird signal. Yeah, in the sense of being able to finish things, and hurry up.
Jeff YorkÌý 5:17 Ìý
Let's get you a drink before we delve any further into the time it takes to be and give you post traumatic stress disorder.
Andrea PradoÌý 5:25 Ìý
If I remember how long it took me to publish that,
BradÌý 5:29 Ìý
that's incredible, though. 10 years, I mean that that's dedication. That's, there's so many things that
Andrea PradoÌý 5:33 Ìý
go I mean, honestly, it's not that rare. Not all the papers take 10 years, but some papers do.
Jeff YorkÌý 5:40 Ìý
I published a paper this year that I started with two of my PhD students SIPTU and Michael congar. And we had this thing we were gonna like write a paper in a week, I was like, I got these data here, you guys get this day, we're gonna write paper in a week. And we did actually write a paper in a week. And that was eight years ago. We published
Andrea PradoÌý 6:10 Ìý
not just me,
BradÌý 6:11 Ìý
writing. So and it takes people eight years to figure out that it's better to pitch to a VC on a sunny day.
Jeff YorkÌý 6:18 Ìý
It's
BradÌý 6:19 Ìý
not my paper, you know, that wasn't yours. I love that.
Jeff YorkÌý 6:23 Ìý
You love that example.
BradÌý 6:24 Ìý
I love that example. Write that paper. Is it some guests that we've had on here?
Jeff YorkÌý 6:32 Ìý
I can't wait to bring Gary in his paper. He's gonna, it's gonna be fun. But the point
BradÌý 6:36 Ìý
is, is that some of the people this is not you, Andrea at all. But some of the people that we've had on this podcast, it is this has taken you 10 years to figure this thing out. Right? There is some common sense involved.
Andrea PradoÌý 6:51 Ìý
There are things life happens. You know, some people get married, some people have kids, other projects and projects come maybe you don't work on a specific paper, but you work on other papers. So
BradÌý 7:03 Ìý
so i don't know i for me, as an entrepreneur, there's always a sense of urgency.
Jeff YorkÌý 7:08 Ìý
Well, there's not that people have a sense not like people don't want to publish
BradÌý 7:12 Ìý
at least another question for me. How many drink? Oh, get
Jeff YorkÌý 7:17 Ìý
get a drink. So we are here in Los Angeles and we've been hitting the greater Los Angeles area and having all sorts of lovely beverages. You can choose to mix this fine cut water room that comes from San Diego. What are your thoughts on rum from San Diego?
Andrea PradoÌý 7:33 Ìý
I don't know. We have very good rum. Actually. America where it comes from? Yeah, I haven't tried these. I tried.
Jeff YorkÌý 7:41 Ìý
Well, we have we have this and you can mix it with Portuguese blend pineapple mint leaf soda. This is from real soda in real bottles, which a local company here that makes they have over 2800 sodas, and he makes 70 of his own. Or you could choose to mix it with something called brainwash.
Andrea PradoÌý 7:57 Ìý
So one is blue and the other one is green. That's true. I will go with the green one.
Jeff YorkÌý 8:02 Ìý
Okay. Okay, here we go. Let's pour you some that Portuguese blend mixed with cut water room. Let's take this sucker. So what is it is certainly green.
Andrea PradoÌý 8:14 Ìý
It says award winning rum. It says it says it won an award.
BradÌý 8:18 Ìý
I don't know. Somebody's grandmother said Wow. You're doing great.
Jeff YorkÌý 8:24 Ìý
Cheers. Tara plastic. Cheers. It's great to see you. Thanks for Nice to see you
Andrea PradoÌý 8:29 Ìý
too. All thank you for inviting me to this podcast. Well, you
Jeff YorkÌý 8:31 Ìý
haven't. Really I think this is good. Yes.
BradÌý 8:38 Ìý
Good. Yeah. What is well mean? Good or surprising? It's just Truong.
Jeff YorkÌý 8:45 Ìý
Soda, you can have more? Yeah. Joel, you
BradÌý 8:48 Ìý
need another one.
Jeff YorkÌý 8:49 Ìý
You already got one. This is producer Joe's new favorite thing. He likes this because you know, when the rats come by this gives them a little nipa courage.
Andrea PradoÌý 8:58 Ìý
I have a fluorescent drink. It is very
BradÌý 9:02 Ìý
matches your personality? Oh. That's a good thing.
Jeff YorkÌý 9:11 Ìý
Okay, so now you may continue your line of questioning.
BradÌý 9:14 Ìý
So my point is, no, this is not an
Andrea PradoÌý 9:18 Ìý
interrogation. This is these corage Those who are listening might be considering doing a PhD because it's a great experience is the best job. It is a it is a great experience, the process of doing it, achieving it and then the type of things that you can do. Yeah.
Jeff YorkÌý 9:37 Ìý
Look at this, for example, this is what we're doing. Now,
BradÌý 9:39 Ìý
when the other thing is, is that we're surrounding ourselves with people that are doing research and trying to change the world. Yeah, that's awesome. That's awesome. But the the one thing we haven't talked about is it's not that you do one paper and let it land. You can have multiple projects going at the same time. Correct.
Jeff YorkÌý 9:54 Ìý
That you have to almost get you have to I mean, you didn't have a portfolio approach is what it is. because you because you can't control the outcome.
BradÌý 10:02 Ìý
So so we were talking about one paper, but actually the body of work at one time is how many? It varies. How many do you have working on right now, Jeff? For
Andrea PradoÌý 10:13 Ìý
four years about, right?
Jeff YorkÌý 10:15 Ìý
You gotta have about four going and it is a portfolio approach. Because, you know, much like entrepreneurship or investing, like you can put a lot of work time to these things, but, but then they go to get reviewed journals. And the journals we target at worst have like, like a 95% rejection rate, right? And I guess, Andrea, I rarely target any journals that probably have anything below like 90% rejection rate, right. So as best case scenario, you got like a 10%.
BradÌý 10:41 Ìý
So my challenge to the table is Be bold, right? Seriously, that you be bold means go? Well, well, well beyond the obvious and challenge, conventional wisdom. I think that's the whole point. That's what it is. But we've had some that haven't been so challenging. And
Jeff YorkÌý 11:03 Ìý
I challenge your assumption last night
BradÌý 11:05 Ìý
that we had time on time has spent a lifetime I think being bold. Yeah, right. And I think that that's really admirable,
Jeff YorkÌý 11:13 Ìý
right? Absolutely. I know I have nothing that admiration for He's a wonderful scholar and more importantly a really, really nice guy and he
BradÌý 11:20 Ìý
had pushback early in his career and he kept going. That's the
Jeff YorkÌý 11:23 Ìý
gig. Oh, Brad is now one of my favorite going in are
Andrea PradoÌý 11:30 Ìý
now we have one of the organizers of the conference joining us yes very excited to see you again.
Sophie BacqÌý 11:35 Ìý
Nice to see you. I'm glad to be back
BradÌý 11:40 Ìý
okay, we have to though What are you drinking that's
Jeff YorkÌý 11:43 Ìý
for you a drink she's a can of water.
Sophie BacqÌý 11:46 Ìý
And so this is a very fancy so you're probably
Jeff YorkÌý 11:49 Ìý
wanting to watch this P agree shows down with a nice drink of cut water room. And word winning. Mixed with this.
BradÌý 11:59 Ìý
You wouldn't be the first to try Braemar. Oh yeah, I think this is like Saturday Night Live after you've done five episodes. You get to put on the red jacket and brainwash
Jeff YorkÌý 12:16 Ìý
Alright, so here we go.
Sophie BacqÌý 12:19 Ìý
Oh, it's blue.
Jeff YorkÌý 12:20 Ìý
It's certainly
Sophie BacqÌý 12:21 Ìý
play and it's gonna electric. It's gonna blow my mind.
BradÌý 12:25 Ìý
In Indiana. Cheers.
Jeff YorkÌý 12:31 Ìý
You're drinking brainwash
BradÌý 12:32 Ìý
sponsored by. All right, you're such a good sport.
Jeff YorkÌý 12:38 Ìý
Okay, so now, what are we cheers? Okay, this is truly becoming the real. So we're going to talk about one of your papers, or at least, at least your work in general, you gave us sort of a general overview what you've been working on lately?
Andrea PradoÌý 12:54 Ìý
Well, I have been working on how to bring products and services to the rural communities, low income rural communities in developing countries. Wow. So after I graduated, I went back to Costa Rica, where I'm from. And the university that I work at, has a campus in Costa Rica and has another campus in Nicaragua. And Nicaragua is the second poorest country in the Western Hemisphere. So my dissertation had to do with how do you choose which certification label to, to adopt to export your products, right? Whether you adopt fair trade, or rainforests are one of the which which of these labels, but when I went back, I realize that the social issues are very important. The levels of poverty in the area where the university works are very high. Like most of the countries in Central America, Honduras, El Salvador, Guatemala, we're talking 50% of poverty of the 50% of the population living in poverty. So how are we going to include them in the economy, like us, consumers can buy things can we include them as producers? So that's, that's one of the things that I have been working at, and particularly in those communities in the rural areas.
BradÌý 14:21 Ìý
I love that I haven't asked for you. And the ask is, because I have an aerospace engineer that has developed a solar water distillery that provides clean water with using just the energy of the sun. And I'd like to connect her with you.
Andrea PradoÌý 14:35 Ìý
That will be lovely. Let's talk about that. Yeah, let's talk about that. Because actually, my research talks a little bit about that, okay, about what really would it take for her with this great nation to actually be able to deploy that and bring that into the low income communities and it's not that easy. I agree. It's not that easy.
Jeff YorkÌý 14:59 Ìý
Help us understand though, cuz I mean, I, why is it not that easy? I mean, we have this great product, we're gonna bring it to a community that desperately needs it. I mean, serve. Like, yeah, this is a good product. So what are the challenges people face?
Andrea PradoÌý 15:12 Ìý
Well, the challenges is that how many times have your friend been in rural Guatemala?
BradÌý 15:18 Ìý
Two years? She was there. She got there. Two years there. Okay, so
Andrea PradoÌý 15:22 Ìý
she probably that knows what the challenges are in terms of transportation. Yes, in turn, that's actually
BradÌý 15:29 Ìý
what she's trying to solve. Because the community that she was in, people had to go 45 minutes each way just to get fresh water.
Andrea PradoÌý 15:36 Ìý
Okay. Now, she probably lived in one of those communities. That's great, because many intrapreneurs actually, from developed countries, they want to help what's happening in developing countries, but they have never spent time there. So that's a great start for your friend.
Jeff YorkÌý 15:54 Ìý
I see. It's constantly with students. Yes, like, every semester,
Sophie BacqÌý 15:59 Ìý
lack of engagement, if not attachment with the community, that means lack of understanding, right?
Andrea PradoÌý 16:05 Ìý
Lack of understanding, sometimes they go there, they don't even speak the language. And it's not just the possibility to communicate verbally, but then culturally, do we understand what the needs of the right people really are? Right? And, for instance, something like this, I don't know how it operates, but how foreign or how close is this device, to the culture of the margins. For instance, majors are the indigenous people, that that will be something because there are many devices that actually purify water? That's a big problem in places like Guatemala, for instance. Some of them are pills, chloride pills to clean the water. And people don't like that, like they give them for free.
BradÌý 16:51 Ìý
No additives. Here. It's all about the sun and evaporation. Does it
Andrea PradoÌý 16:55 Ìý
have a color?
BradÌý 16:56 Ìý
No same water?
Andrea PradoÌý 16:59 Ìý
Some machines like have, you need to connect it in the electricity, and they have a blue light, and then they purify water and they are like,
BradÌý 17:07 Ìý
just a sunlight? Well,
Andrea PradoÌý 17:09 Ìý
that's great. I don't know if she has a chance. I mean, like, what does she want to do with that? Does she want to give it away? Or does she want to sell it?
BradÌý 17:19 Ìý
I think her hardest she wants to give it away. You know,
Andrea PradoÌý 17:23 Ìý
let me tell you a bit of a story of a social entrepreneur that I know that I have written a case that he comes into my class all the time from that area. And he developed these eco filters that are by now in more than 50 countries around the world. And he's a social entrepreneur, he retired very young, he came back into what Amala. And because he was retired, he was he said to the sister, let me help you in the family foundation that was given away equal filters. And those equal filters, they weren't given away. I don't know. Like in many years, they have only given away like 5000 because they have to find donations to actually be able to give away the filters. And then he went into the houses that had the filters. And guess what they were using the filters for trash cans. They wouldn't know. That's incredible.
Jeff YorkÌý 18:19 Ìý
You hear stories like this all the time you
Andrea PradoÌý 18:21 Ìý
hear that all the time
Sophie BacqÌý 18:23 Ìý
says no mosquito net says fishing.
Andrea PradoÌý 18:27 Ìý
Give things for free. And that's one of the things that happened because people are not really appreciating the value of what they are receiving. So that's one thing. The other thing that he noticed when he was going into those houses, he's like, well, but this is weird. These people have a flat TVs and they have cell phones and Samsung is not giving away any cell phones that I know. So he started thinking how can I really bring the solution to purify water? But that actually people use it and people appreciate the value of these water filters. And these water filters. They are ceramic. You know what? They have store water for a long time? Yes.
Jeff YorkÌý 19:19 Ìý
All right, we have to stop for a second because in the meantime, we were having like we have people doing some kind of interpretive dance over
BradÌý 19:27 Ìý
or the rat dance or
Jeff YorkÌý 19:29 Ìý
we don't. And we have another guest has joined us Please introduce yourself.
Julienne ShieldsÌý 19:35 Ìý
All right. I'm Julianne Shields, and I am the president and CEO of the United States association for small business and entrepreneurship also.
BradÌý 19:45 Ìý
What are you drinking?
Jeff YorkÌý 19:46 Ìý
Same I think brainwash with fresh sheets room. Yeah. And so what what is your verdict on the beverage?
Julienne ShieldsÌý 19:56 Ìý
I have never tasted anything quite like it. So On
Jeff YorkÌý 20:00 Ìý
high praise, so. So everyone feel free to join this conversation. So Andre, we were talking about trying to bring,
Sophie BacqÌý 20:09 Ìý
I mean, important.
Jeff YorkÌý 20:13 Ìý
But that's kind of the I mean, that's what we were trying to do on this podcast is to take entrepreneurship and make it a little more approachable entrepreneurship research, it might make it more approachable. So you were saying like, so a lot of times people bring these innovations to the market, and they come up with these ideas, and they present them to folks. And, and they even like, give them away with the best of intentions. Oh,
Andrea PradoÌý 20:32 Ìý
I mean, what the Milo or Nicaragua is, in the rural communities you go, they give them away things for free all the time you go and see if they are deploying them. They're using them Not
BradÌý 20:42 Ìý
really. And then what about the things that they pay for?
Andrea PradoÌý 20:45 Ìý
They pay for it, they will use it? That's right, one
BradÌý 20:50 Ìý
actionable insight, I think. So the insight, Jeff, may be that you need to actually have your end customers believe that there's value to what you're delivering to them. Right?
Andrea PradoÌý 21:03 Ìý
That's that insight is, what one of them you don't need as an entrepreneur, just like you would do anywhere else develop a value proposition, value proposition, even if you're coming to poor communities, why is it that you cannot offer and develop a value proposition around a water filter, and you and you are going to give it away for free, and you won't do that. In the meantime, remember
BradÌý 21:28 Ìý
that these early stages are just hypothesis looking for validation. And the business model actually, I think, fits in much later than this early stage that right, you define the problem, you validate the problem, you validate, this is what your customers will pay for, and then you work on the business model.
Andrea PradoÌý 21:49 Ìý
That is correct. But many social entrepreneurs, they will never get there, they would think that what they want is to solve the problem, and they will solve it by giving it away for free. Well, that's just
BradÌý 22:00 Ìý
stupid.
Jeff YorkÌý 22:02 Ìý
But how do you? Okay, yes, maybe it's stupid, but, but it's stupid with good intentions.
BradÌý 22:11 Ìý
It sounds great attention.
Andrea PradoÌý 22:13 Ìý
It has great intentions. But what is interesting is that if you do it like that, you're bounded by the level of donations, so that you can scale up the operation. So these intrapreneur because he's an entrepreneur, he took the foundation and change it into a social enterprise, a social company, and he started selling the filters. But he came up with a value proposition so that the people could understand the value. He basically did the math, he understood how much money the families were spending in wood to boil the water. So the alternative is either you buy a Waterfield, or you need to buy the wood, how much is that he did the math. And then he would offer the filters for a better deal than the boiling water, and they will save money. So you're offering a value proposition that is not just oh, you're going to have clean water on your walk 40 minutes, you're touching the wallet. Didn't know what you're gonna say with that touching? Drinks It
BradÌý 23:28 Ìý
was great. No, but I bet but I think that actually, we can compare them social entrepreneurship, with commercial entrepreneurship. And there, there are many parallels. Definitely.
Jeff YorkÌý 23:40 Ìý
Let's open up looks. I would love to hear this whole we've assembled this panel of folks now who are making consumed brainwash mixed with three sheets, rum, but Andre and I have the actual good mix over here. But anyway, we will mention that you guys enjoy the brainwash, I'm sure it's an amazing when we talk about this is sort of a foundational thing that I have my own opinions about, and I'm just going to shut up in a minute, I promise. Is social entrepreneurship, really something different than entrepreneurship? I know that seems like a question that those of us have been involved in this for years are like, Oh, my god, yeah, like that question. But I think it's be interesting for people to hear like, what do we think?
Sophie BacqÌý 24:19 Ìý
I would say so today? I don't know that. I thought so. 10 years ago? Yeah. So I mean, I think the attention was really much on the intention, like what do you do with this entrepreneurial mindset and entrepreneur passion, you do it for others, you want to help others, right. That's your antecedents. That's your passion. And the outcomes. What you're going to measure out of your entrepreneur activity is like what you achieve, how many of these you know solar panels you either donated or sold, right? And so one could have assumed and I think I assumed that the entrepreneurial process was the same but these days And this is in line with, you know, what I'm arguing these days is that social entrepreneurship I do think is about a process of empowerment, changing the power structures. For those who are excluded from the common market structures, I really do believe in the power of entrepreneurship. But I do believe that empowerment makes a difference. And so I place empowerment in this process. And I do think then it makes it different from entrepreneurship. So just
Andrea PradoÌý 25:27 Ìý
talking about empowerment, and you speak with this entrepreneur, whose name is Philip Wilson, he's one of the Shoah Foundation social entrepreneurs from around the world. And he says, When you allow the people to pay for the product, instead of giving it away, you are empowering them absolute. They instead of being a charity, where you are right, the good person giving this for free to you. When they pay, they are empowered. And that is something that I have heard not just from feeling from, from many other entrepreneurs
BradÌý 26:02 Ìý
really interesting, your idea of?
Sophie BacqÌý 26:05 Ìý
Absolutely. So I see empowerment as broader than economy empowerment, which you could understand as as, as placing beneficiaries in the means of production and hiring them. Right. So giving them economy opportunities for a better lifestyle and economic well being. But I think what Andrea is talking about is really maybe almost emotional empowerment. There is political empowerment. So having a voice into decision making, right? And yeah, much broader definition than just economix. Thanks for raising that it. Well, I
Julienne ShieldsÌý 26:39 Ìý
would even say there's an element of knowledge, empowerment, right? So when you think about education itself, and I'm going to pull it back to not just entrepreneurship, but I was a part of a company in my development, that was an open book management company. So they were sharing the financials and the decision making explaining quarterly, what the p&l is were why they were making decisions. And that level of knowledge was empowerment, like we were comfortable, we were helping make decisions and helping with our actions. And I, when I was hearing what I heard today, that's what immediately Orion where I went back to I'm like, you're essentially helping people no more so they can choose and have choices and make their own priorities and assist. It is empowerment, it's ownership at a different level. Absolutely.
Andrea PradoÌý 27:24 Ìý
Broadway, don't we go back to your friend? Yes. Right. So I think the first advice for her would be what is the value proposition for those water filters for the users? Why should a person from rural Nicaragua should get that even if it's for free? Why would that person use it?
BradÌý 27:46 Ìý
So I can't 100% speak for her. But I would just my my feeling is or my sense is, is that it's a lower cost option. And it's, it's more efficient, meaning that that time from the 45 minute trip each way allows for time to do other things in the day. So I think that there's two value propositions that she would argue.
Andrea PradoÌý 28:09 Ìý
Okay, so that's interesting. And it's just the value proposition, as, as we discussed, needs to go first, of course, to touch the wallet of the users, but also, to make sure that something else the other part of the value proposition, it's culturally aligned, what do I mean, it has been shown that some people try to bring these innovations in Africa, for instance. And they say also that the women don't go and bring the water. But oops, it happened, that that is the only time that women have to be together with the other women from the community. And they actually enjoy that trip into the river, and washing things, for instance, and coming back, and that's the only time so it's very precious. So that's right, it is important in that value proposition to have some kind of economic value proposition but culturally, it needs to be aligned.
BradÌý 29:07 Ìý
I totally agree with you. Right?
Andrea PradoÌý 29:10 Ìý
thing for the inside? Oh, make sure the value proposition is culturally aligned with the community.
Jeff YorkÌý 29:22 Ìý
I mean, that's, I mean, that's, I think, like, like we were saying earlier, I just see this every single semester when I teach social or sustainable entrepreneurship. I have these lovely, very, very fortunate very, very smart MBA students that are lucky enough to have been admitted and gone to school in lovely Boulder, Colorado. They came from great educational backgrounds, like me, they are the beneficiaries of a ton of privilege, and they really want to do something good. And then they design solutions that they've been to all semester and they Come to the finals. And the judge says, How many of your customers have you spoken to that? Well, we talked to, we talked to leaders in the community, who like more people from the churches, for example, are trying to figure out how to solve a food desert and they are saying differ. And they just don't
BradÌý 30:16 Ìý
talk to people. Okay, I have one more of that. I was at a pitch competition, a scientific pitch competition last week, and a team was awarded $125,000. And their use of the funds was to interview 100 people. I'm thinking that is insane.
Andrea PradoÌý 30:34 Ìý
Wow. Yeah. Probably we're going to go and interview people in developing countries.
BradÌý 30:40 Ìý
No, this is something different. Okay. My students got to interview 100 People I
Jeff YorkÌý 30:47 Ìý
got a pretty good job. If they give me that money, I'll go interview 100 people. This is this is brainwash. Really good. This is actually really good. I
Andrea PradoÌý 31:07 Ìý
think you should we, we at the university windows, we need to be conscious about these because universities absolute, the shelves are full of creations or inventions to help the poor in the developing world. And they're just not, you know, they will never make it, they will never make it to a point where people will actually use it in hand, they have the best intentions, but they will get stored somewhere in the universities in the States or in Europe. And that's how it is because the innovation that you need, is not at the technological level. Right? Agreed, for instance, oh, so I have been working in health many years, right? Children are dying out of diarrhea. We know how to fix diarrhea, the problem is that the pill is not making it to the people that need it, either because of the cost or because of the logistics or because of the distribution system. That is the innovation has to be at the level of the business model, not at the level of the technology.
Sophie BacqÌý 32:15 Ìý
That is good inside.
Jeff YorkÌý 32:17 Ìý
I really think that is and I mean, I think that also happens so much when people are talking about climate change. And they're talking about renewable energy, which I know you also have done mark and Andrea, I mean, and people talk about, we're just gonna have this technological breakthrough, it's gonna be awesome carbon capture, you know, the carbon is carbon sequestration is gonna be great. We don't need any new technologies. We need political willpower.
Sophie BacqÌý 32:41 Ìý
And what about citizen willpower? Right? I feel like we're hearing you it's like the hope lies in collectives, well, collective responsibility, responsibility and human behaviors, meaning both social and foreigners understanding that they need to be really serious about the life mind issue and understand the distribution issue of those spills, and maybe human behaviors when it comes to climate change. It's not only political will, it's not only technologies, it's all of our action together.
Andrea PradoÌý 33:20 Ìý
I want to say another thing. So I come from Central America, right, one of the most vulnerable regions in the world. So climate change, and many of the countries are talking about decarbonisation about the emissions. And what we should be talking much more is adaptation. And the more we see the news of the fluorine, in Germany and in the US and the effects, then we're going to start talking more seriously about adaptation. And not just the mitigation, because we need to bring that into the agenda is not easy, because each community almost, it's almost at the community level. Right? It's not one single standard, we don't really know how to do it for all the industries, it will be different for each of them. It's much more of a complicated conversation, but we need to start talking about adaptation because climate change is here, and we are not ready.
Jeff YorkÌý 34:21 Ìý
And beyond that, too. I totally agree with everything you're saying. We're getting ready to have a UN conference on climate at ²ÊÃñ±¦µä. And I think that's just, it's something that I really only during the pandemic started to think about for a long time. I thought about this way, I was like, Well, you know what, you know, we can only do so many things in life. And I'm gonna focus on climate change. So I'm not gonna really worry about these other social problems because like, I got, I gotta focus on the thing. And really, people have made me totally rethink that and realize that solving climate change is a problem of equity and justice. I mean, it can't have bit without addressing that. And I just didn't get that for the longest time. But I do I absolutely get it now. And I think I think that goes right along with adaptation, you've got to think about the justice of how are the countries that have caused climate change and doing this, and we're seeing thisÌý lovely courtyard.
Julienne ShieldsÌý 35:18 Ìý
incandescent lights
Jeff YorkÌý 35:21 Ìý
are looking at how much energy we are using right now to
Sophie BacqÌý 35:24 Ìý
do this, shut down the mics right now. But
BradÌý 35:28 Ìý
it was great having this group on we could sit around and have cocktails all night. But I greatly appreciate all of you for trying to solve the world's problems and thinking about how to do that. I think that that's what we need. And I also think that the younger generation that's coming up what i've what I've seen, is the DNA and the courage and the will to to work. Here, it's really calm. So that's just fabulous.
Jeff YorkÌý 35:54 Ìý
I want to make sure to talk about Andres paper that's impressed serving rural, low income markets through a social entrepreneurship approach, venture creation growth that is forthcoming in the strategic entrepreneurship journal. We'll have a link below of course, written by Andrea as well as Jeffrey A Robinson observership. Great paper, highly recommend it. Awesome. Yeah. So let's do around the horn here. Don't use everybody knows who they were listen to. I'm Jeff York, research director at the Deming Center for Entrepreneurship, lead School of Business.
BradÌý 36:24 Ìý
I am Brad Warner. I'm an entrepreneur and I'm the faculty director of the diamond center.
Sophie BacqÌý 36:28 Ìý
Sophie back Associate Professor at the Kellogg School of Business Indiana University.
Julienne ShieldsÌý 36:32 Ìý
Julian shields, the President and CEO of the United States association for small business and entrepreneurship, and an
Andrea PradoÌý 36:37 Ìý
associate professor and entire business school in Costa Rica.
Jeff YorkÌý 36:41 Ìý
You guys are awesome. Thank you so much for joining us. We had a really great time, the rest of your night to the bar.
Stefani HÌý 36:52 Ìý
We hope you enjoyed this episode of Creative Distillation recorded live on location at the 19th Annual Social Entrepreneurship Conference hosted by . Learn more about on her faculty page at . That's I-N-C-A-E .edu. We'd love to hear your feedback and ideas. Email us at CDpodcast@colorado.edu, and please be sure to cubscribe to Creative Distillation wherever you get your podcasts. The Creative Distillation podcast is made possible by the Deming Center for Entrepreneurship at the ²ÊÃñ±¦µä's Leeds School of Business. For more information, please visit deming.colorado.edu. That's D-E-M-ING and click the Creative Distillation link. Creative Distillation is produced by Joel Davis at Analog Digital Arts. Our theme music is "Whiskey Before Breakfast" performed by your humble hosts, Brad and Jeff. Thanks for listening. We'll see you back here for another episode of Creative Distillation. If you've enjoyed this episode, you may also enjoy Leeds Business Insights, check them out at .