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Entrepreneurship, Strategic Management, Social Sector.

The case can be used in undergraduate, graduate and executive education courses in entrepreneurship and strategic management. It is a perfect fit for executive sessions at incubation centers for not-for-profit (NPO) start-up social enterprises. The case is aimed at early-phase social entrepreneurs and those interested in the field.

Anthill Creations (hereafter referred to as Anthill) is a NPO organization engaged in building low-cost sustainable playscapes for underprivileged children. Their mission is to “Bring Back play” in the lives of millions of children of marginalized communities by building sustainable playscapes. It is an effort that contributes toward the objectives of clause 1.2 (Ministry of Human Resource Development, Government of India, 2020), on “Early Childhood Care and Education” (ECCE) in the new National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 of India as released on July 30, 2020. The ECCE clause emphasizes the importance of “learning through play”; and recognizes it to be central to quality early childhood pedagogy and education. Anthill has been working on the same philosophy since its inception in 2016. They have successfully built 300 playscapes across 18 states of the country and impacted the lives of more than 200,000 children. The playscapes are built using upcycled waste material, such as scrap tires, waste cable and oil drums; further, they use local resources and contextual designs and built them by mobilizing community participation. The playscape play elements provide for unstructured free play for children and encourage them to use their imagination to invent new games.

Pooja Rai – the founder and CEO of Anthill Creations, an architect by discipline started the NPO immediately after her graduation. It was her “calling” in life that pushed her to quit a corporate job in the early stages of her career and instead pursue a career in the social sector. The case details her methodical approach in pursuing her intuitive response to a social need, the way she adopts a lean start-up framework to set-up Anthill, her frustrations, personal resilience and ability to balance different stakeholder interests as she treads the difficult journey of building the awareness of inculcating play as a pedagogy in the early years of childhood development.

The case provides data on the large proportion of the marginalized population in India and the abysmal conditions of the Indian Government schools. The objectives of clause 1.2 on ECCE in NEP 2020 show the Indian Government’s good intent. And yet with the prevailing conditions, the policy’s ambitious target of universalization of ECCE by 2030 (Chanda, 2020), seems a mammoth task, even for the Indian Government.

On the other hand, Anthill as a small NPO of young dedicated individuals is invested and experimental in their approach; they have a tested model but financial dependency limits their activities. The ECCE clause is a sign of new hope for NPOs such as Anthill who want to reach out to millions of Indian children from marginalized communities. What could be a compatible, perhaps complementary or even skillful pathway to integrate Anthill’s tested model of building sustainable playscapes with the Indian Government’s good intentions of universalization of ECCE by 2030? How could Anthill “scale” for a systemic “impact”? Should not the NPOs, early childhood development researchers, funders and government authorities study collaboratively instead of the present siloed approach so as to bring about a systemic change in the thinking lenses about “play” to be an integral part of early childhood development? Rai ponders on the above questions.

To explain the importance of one’s purpose (calling) in life and how the authors can identify with it.

To explain how an intuitive response to social need can be complemented with a methodical approach to social entrepreneurship.

To discuss the importance of business model canvas from the social sector lens.

To explain the important elements in sustaining small start-up social organizations.

To discuss and evaluate the options an early-stage social enterprise can engage into “scale” for “impact.”

Teaching notes are available for educators only.

CSS 3: Entrepreneurship.

To understand the challenges of building a successful business in an emerging market like Yola, Nigeria. To understand the role of micro-finance banks in doing business in Yola, Nigeria. To comprehend strategies adopted in market segmentation and sales of products or services to the customer. To apprehend strategies adopted to sustain and compete in Nigeria – both rural and urban.

Standard Microfinance Bank Limited (SMFB) was a private micro-finance bank situated at Yola, Adamawa State of Nigeria. It initially started as a community bank in 1992 to provide loans to individuals and small business owners in Adamawa. It started with the services of payment service and savings account with a limited lending capacity. It had become a full-fledged retail bank and was grown to 13 branches across Nigeria. It planned for expansion such as market development, product development and diversification by the year 2020. It had a customer base of 60,000 till the end of December 2018. Vazheparambil Mani Francis was the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the SMFB. The SMFB faced challenges such as operating the remote villages, lack of financial literacy among people, recovery of the loan amount, submission of false credentials and change of customer identity after loan by their customer. It was not going to be an easy task for him to operate the business of SMFB in Nigeria. However, in December 2018, Francis was facing a dilemma about the future success of SMFB business in Nigeria by looking into the challenges and complexities of business. Francis was determined to figure out the appropriate growth strategy for managing the challenges.

Undergraduate and graduate early-stage program.

Teaching notes are available for educators only.

CSS 11: Strategy.